Meghan McCain is calling on the White House to pull the credentials of CNN reporter Kaitlan Collins for asking Trump administration officials tough questions.
“Kaitlan Collins is an absolute imbecile and a pure partisan hack,” McCain wrote on the social platform X. “Have some respect for the two women standing in front of you who are exposing lies, deep corruption and keeping the country safe. The White House should pull her credentials.”
Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard declassified and released documents on Friday which she claimed showed top Obama officials manufactured the claim that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election and amounts to a “treasonous conspiracy”.
But, nothing in the newly unsealed documents did anything to undercut the government’s core findings in its 2017 assessment that Russia launched an influence and hacking campaign and sought to help Donald Trump defeat Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.
At the White House, Collins asked Gabbard if she was trying to improve her standing with Trump by threatening criminal referrals and baseless accusations of treason for key officials in the Obama administration.
“What would you say to people who believe that you’re only releasing these documents now to improve your standing with the president after he said that your intelligence assessments were wrong?” Collins asked Gabbard, in reference to conflicting intelligence within the administration relating to Iran’s nuclear program, according to The Hill.
Gabbard refused to answer the question. But White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt did by accusing the media of sowing “distrust” among Trump’s cabinet.
“The only people who are suggesting that the director of national intelligence would release evidence to try to boost her standing with the president are the people in this room who constantly trying to so distrust and chaos amongst the president’s cabinet,” Leavitt said. “It is not working.”
“He has the utmost confidence in director Gabbard,” she added. “He always has, he continues to, and that is true of his entire cabinet, who is all working as one team to deliver on the promises this president made.”
