CNN star anchor Kaitlan Collins recalled a surprising moment of mutual respect from her rival in the White House.
Appearing on an episode of Heather McMahan’s Absolutely Not podcast published on Wednesday, Collins, 33, shared a story about a time that White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, 28, came to her defense in front of a foreign government’s military.
The reporter whom Trump accused of “never smiling” said that while she was with the White House press pool on a foreign trip to Saudi Arabia, the kingdom’s Royal Guard almost prevented her from doing her job.
“They famously do not like the media there, to put it lightly, and I asked a shouted question to President Trump, who had seen me when the U.S. press came in,” Collins recalled. “He didn’t answer, which is how it works—you shout questions, they either answer or they don’t, it’s their prerogative.”
However, she said, the Royal Guard was not accustomed to such behavior from reporters “because they don’t have a free press,” and they told her she was not allowed at the next event, which was supposed to start two minutes later.
“I was like, ‘That’s not how it works, I belong to the U.S. press,’ and they were like, ‘Well, you’re not coming in,’” she continued.
Then, Collins said, the Royal Guard turned to Leavitt, who stood up for the star reporter of the network she had long railed against as biased.
“They went to Karoline, and to her credit, she said, ‘No, Kaitlan’s coming in with the rest of the U.S. press,’ and we went in, and so it didn’t become this big issue,” she said.
“She, without a doubt, was like, ‘No, you’re coming in,’” Collins added. “Which I do think is important in that moment, especially when you’re the U.S. contingent abroad, and we don’t do things like they do in Saudi Arabia.”
Despite Leavitt’s act of goodwill to Collins in Saudi Arabia, the relationship between the two media figureheads is, more often than not, less than friendly.
Leavitt has hurled numerous insults at Collins’s network, accusing CNN of pushing “untrue narratives” about the president. She has also called out Collins individually, including in December, when the reporter asked a question about Trump’s tariffs.
“Again, with respect to affordability, every economic metric—Kaitlan, and I wish you would report more on it—does, in fact, show that the economy is getting better and brighter than where it was,” Leavitt said.
Collins has also blasted the press secretary for her work with the administration, most recently calling out Leavitt for her dismissal of Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick’s ties to infamous sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.
“There’s always a naturally tense relationship between the press and the press secretary,” Collins explained on the podcast. “You’re covering things that they’re trying to spin in the best light for their boss, you’re asking questions that maybe they don’t want to fully answer.”
“So that is something that always exists,” she added. “I don’t think you should have an amazing relationship with whoever the press secretary is because it’s just at odds with the nature of your job.”
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