President Trump’s senior policy advisor Stephen Miller reportedly had to be escorted by security from CNN’s studios in Washington, DC, after his trainwreck interview with Jake Tapper on Sunday.
Tapper cut 32-year-old Miller’s interview short after he started attacking the network’s credibility, labeling them ‘fake news’.
Tapper accused Miller of wasting his audience’s time to please the president.
Apparently after Miller was taken off air, he refused to leave the studios, a CNN source told CBS.
‘The segment was over and Mr. Miller was politely asked to leave the set multiple times. After refusing to leave, he was escorted out by security,’ the source said.
Stephen Miller reportedly had to be escorted from CNN’s studios in Washington, DC on Sunday after his trainwreck interview with Jake Tapper
Tapper, right, cut Miller’s interview short when he questioned the network’s credibility
President Trump applauded Miller’s performance in a tweet on Sunday.
‘Jake Tapper of Fake News CNN just got destroyed in his interview with Stephen Miller of the Trump Administration,’ Trump wrote. ‘Watch the hatred and unfairness of this CNN flunky!’
Tapper grew tired of Miller repeating pro-Trump and anti-Bannon talking points and called the aide’s constant interruptions ‘hysterical,’ as he cut the interview short by announcing, ‘I think I’ve wasted enough of my viewers’ time.’
When Tapper returned from commercial break, the journalist began the second part of his show by saying, ‘Welcome back to State of the Union and planet Earth.’
The interview began courteously enough with Tapper wishing Miller a ‘happy new year.’
It went downhill from there.
Tapper asked Miller about allegations laid out in the new book, ‘Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House,’ by Michael Wolff.
Bannon, Tapper reminded Miller, had criticized the Trump Tower meeting between Russians and campaign staff, saying, ‘The chance that Don Jr. didn’t walk these Jumos up to his father’s office on the 26th floor is zero.’
The president applauded his 32-year-old aide, writing in a tweet that he ‘destroyed’ Tapper
Tapper wanted to know if Miller had any first-hand knowledge of the now-president meeting with the Russians who visited in Manhattan office building in June 2016.
Miller took the cue to lash out at Bannon.
‘Steve Bannon’s eloquence in that description notwithstanding, it’s tragic and unfortunate that Steve would make these grotesque comments, so out of touch with reality and obviously so vindictive,’ Miller said.
‘And the whole White House staff is deeply disappointed in his comments, which were grotesque,’ he said, using the adjective again.
Bannon, Miller said, wasn’t even there.
‘It reads like an angry, vindictive person spouting off to a highly discredible author,’ Miller continued, pivoting to lash out at Wolff too.
‘The book is best understood as a work of very poorly written fiction,’ Miller added. ‘And I also will say that the author is a garbage author of a garbage book.’
Miller tried to counter Wolff’s portrayal of what Trump is like to what the aide personally encountered when traveling with the candidate and now president.
When Tapper tried to get him back on track to talk about the meeting, Miller replied, ‘I have no knowledge of anything to do with that meeting.’
From there, the conversation was more about CNN.
Miller charged that the cable news network was going ’24/7 with all the salacious coverage.’
‘And I know that it brings a lot of you guys a lot of joy to trying to stick the knife in,’ he said.
Tapper pushed back on that claim, noting how many people from the White House are quoted, on the record, in Wolff’s book.
The newsman also got into a tussle with Miller over who hired him, suggesting it was Bannon who helped bring the young aide on board.
Miller said the credit goes not to Bannon, but to Trump’s first campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski. He also said Bannon had nothing to do with the writing of Trump’s controversial travel ban.
Throughout the interview, Miller repeatedly praised Trump’s political prowess, knocking the ‘so-called political geniuses in Washington’ who didn’t predict the populist Republican’s ascent.
‘The only person who has called himself a genius in the last week is the president,’ Tapper uttered.
Miller said that point was true, calling the president a, ‘A self-made billionaire who revolutionized reality TV and who has changed the course of our politics.’
‘I’m sure he’s watching, and he’s happy that you said that,’ Tapper shot back.
Miller called Tapper’s comment ‘condescending’ and said it was a ‘snide remark,’ broadening that point to the whole of CNN.
‘You get 24 hours of negative, anti-Trump, hysterical coverage on this network hat led in recent weeks to some spectacularly embarrassing false reporting from your network,’ Miller said.
Tapper countered by saying, ‘I think the viewers right now can ascertain who is being hysterical.’
The conversation further devolved as the CNN newsman tried asking the aide about Bannon’s role in the White House and also about a letter Miller helped draft that articulated reasons to fire FBI Director James Comey, a move Trump made in May.
When Tapper got to the president’s mental fitness, Miller turned it into a full-on slap of CNN, saying there was a ‘crisis of legitimacy’ and a ‘toxic environment’ at the network.
Miller also argued that the president’s Saturday tweets, in which he boasted about his ‘mental stability’ and IQ, were helpful in arguing the point that he had the fortitude to do the job.
‘The president’s tweets absolutely reaffirm the plainspoken truth: A self-made billionaire revolutionized reality TV and tapped into something magical that is happening in the hearts of this country,’ Miller said.
With that, Tapper scoffed.
‘The president has an approval rating in the 30s,’ the journalist said. ‘I don’t know what magical you’re talking about.’
The two squabbled for a minute more, before Tapper had had enough.
‘I get it,’ the veteran journo said. ‘There is one viewer that you care about right now. And you’re obsequious, you’re being a factotum, in order to please him.’
Tapper meant Trump.
Miller tried to protest, but Tapper quickly said, ‘Thank you Stephen.’ The camera panned away from the White House aide as Tapper started reading from the teleprompter, readying his audience the next segment.