'What do you tell your daughter?': CNN's Whitfield rakes GOP Rep over the coals about Trump tweets
In a tense interview on Sunday afternoon, CNN anchor Fredricka Whitfield cornered GOP Rep. Lee Zeldin on his hypocrisy about President Donald Trump's vicious attacks on women and the media on Twitter by asking him what lesson his 10-year-old daughter should take away from the past week.
Zeldin argued that in Twitter, when he's not acting out, Trump has "a great tool through social media to be able to communicate with the American public."
Whitfield asked if Twitter is a great tool for the president to encourage people to "beat up the press or CNN?"
"For one," Zeldin said, "he's been using Twitter to communicate that and also uses twitter to say other things that, you know -- I think of my 10-year-old daughter."
"But today," Whitfield pressed, "today, right now, the tweet that was sent by the president of the United States" is a violent attack on the media.
"What's your answer to the president who just might be listening right now?" Whitfield asked. "About his behavior and about his use of Twitter, what's your message?"
Zeldin stammered and equivocated before saying, "When I was my daughter's age and I was 10 years old, we looked up to the president of the United States when trying to understand the difference between right and wrong and set our own moral compass. Being presidential is being that role model. I don't believe that some of what he's doing on Twitter is setting the right example for my kids."
"What's your message to your daughter, then, this morning?" asked Whitfield. "hat do you say to your daughters about trying to explain what we're all trying to view and understand today? Since you brought it up, you use the presidency as an example, as a lesson to your daughters, what's the message you convey to your daughters today when trying to extrapolate and understand the tweet that went out by the president of the United States today?"
Trump has exhibited a long pattern of misogyny and aggression toward women, both online and off.
This week's attack on MSNBC's Mika Brzezinski and today's broadsides against the media have some people questioning whether Trump is mentally competent to hold the highest public office in the land.
Watch the video, embedded below in two parts:
Part One:
Part Two: