CNN anchor Audie Cornish slammed Senator Joni Ernst (R-IA) Monday morning, calling a sarcastic apology the lawmaker issued to voters over the weekend a “head-shaking” moment.
Cornish began the segment by replaying a clip from last week of Ernst defending cuts to Medicaid.
The clip showed Ernst arguing with voters at a town hall about Medicaid fraud. One member of the crowd yelled about people affected by Medicaid cuts included in a budget bill the GOP is currently trying to pass. “They are all going to die," the crowd member yelled.
To which Ernst replied, “We all are going to die.”
The statement caused outrage and Ernst issued an apology for the interaction. “I made an incorrect assumption that everyone in the auditorium understood that yes, we are all going to perish from this earth,” Ernst said in the video, “So, I apologize, and I'm really, really glad that i did not have to bring up the subject of the tooth fairy as well.”
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Cornish chimed in, saying, “I think that was live from a graveyard just to underscore the point. Sarcasm is my love language, but it feels like this is not the moment.”
The apology was delivered while Ernst was actually in a graveyard — which Cornish suggested was symbolic.
The anchor turned to her guests, seemingly at a loss for words, “Like, it's kind of a — you guys should – just like – head shaking.” The panel burst into laughter before Cornish asked, “What's head shaking about this in this moment for this bill?”
“So two things,” Spectrum News NY1 Washington Correspondent Kevin Frey said. “One, this seems to be maybe symptomatic of kind of the Trump iteration of the Republican Party that you never apologize for anything. That's clearly what was going on there.”
He added, “Two, this kind of only underscores what clearly is a reality of this bill that the Republican Party is just not quite sure of how to navigate in terms of a messaging standpoint, because we know Democrats are eager to exploit this Medicaid aspect of this.”
Frey added, “We know Democrats spoke over the weekend, Schumer and Jeffries on Sunday. We know that the House Democrats are going to go over to the Senate this week to kind of show ways to exploit this bill. Medicaid is going to be front and center on that.”
Watch the interaction here or below.
- YouTubeyoutu.be
