CNN’s Scott Jennings Has Blunt Reaction to Trump’s Rob Reiner Comments
What To Know
- Scott Jennings slightly criticized Donald Trump’s insensitive comments about murdered director Rob Reiner, stating he disagreed and wished the President had said nothing.
- Jennings argued that, in cases of tragic deaths, public figures should refrain from making inflammatory statements, drawing a parallel to liberals who celebrated Charlie Kirk’s assassination.
- Fellow panelist Bakari Sellers challenged Jennings’ stance, questioning whether silence is an acceptable standard for presidential conduct in response to such tragedies.
Scott Jennings almost brought himself to criticize Donald Trump on Monday’s (December 15) episode of CNN NewsNight when he said he “disagreed” with the President’s comments about murdered director Rob Reiner.
The conservative commentator and fellow panelists were discussing the double murder of the When Harry Met Sally director and his wife, Michele Singer Reiner, who were found stabbed to death in their Los Angeles home on Sunday (December 14), and Trump’s disturbing Truth Social post that followed.
In his post, Trump referred to Rob as “tortured and struggling” before claiming reports suggested he “passed away” due to “the anger he caused others through his massive, unyielding, and incurable affliction with a mind crippling disease known as TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME.”
Host Sara Sidner asked Jennings how he squares this with the rhetoric that followed the Charlie Kirk assassination earlier this year, with Trump and fellow Republicans blasting those celebrating Kirk’s death.
“I don’t,” Jennings said, per The Daily Beast. “I disagree with the statement. I wish he hadn‘t made it.”
Jennings added, “I think he should have said nothing. I’m not surprised that Donald Trump didn‘t have anything nice to say about Mr Reiner. Reiner was one of his most vocal critics and did for, you know, basically a decade, say he should be in prison, called him a fascist.”
“The correct answer here, and the advice I would have given, is just put it in your pocket,” he continued. “You‘re allowed to harbor opinions and feelings about people, but in this particular case, someone was tragically murdered.”
He went on to say that “thousands and thousands of liberals celebrated” the murder of Kirk. “They shouldn’t have done that either,” he stated, “and so, you know, in this particular case, putting it in your pocket would have been the right thing to do.”
Earlier in the day, Trump had taken to Truth Social to promote Jennings’ new book, A Revolution of Common Sense: How Donald Trump Stormed Washington and Fought for Western Civilization. The post included a photo of Jennings with the President in the Oval Office.
Fellow author Bakari Sellers was also a guest on Monday’s edition of NewsNight and wasn’t on board with Jennings’ “just keep it quiet” argument.
“For somebody to simply say that the President of the United States, when somebody dies in the fashion that they did, should just be quiet, we all need to look at ourselves and say ‘That is the standard that we hold for the President of the United States?’” Sellers stated.
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