MSNBC host Lawrence O’Donnell launched a scathing critique of CNN’s Scott Jennings, accusing the MAGA pundit of being a paid liar for Donald Trump and proof of the network’s decline.
O’Donnell’s take on CNN’s stewardship under Trump-supporting CEO Mark Thompson singled out Jennings for his unscrupulous views.
Following the departure of veteran reporters such as Jim Acosta earlier this year, “everyone who remains has become much more careful in anything they might even think of saying about Donald Trump,” O’Donnell said on The Last Word.
From that void emerged Jennings, he continued, who CNN “eagerly pays to lie every day and every night for Donald Trump.”
Jennings, who initially made his name as a more moderate conservative, was not always the rabid Trump supporter he is now, the host said.
“When he first started appearing on television, he was capable of criticizing some of the more extreme Trump positions. But Scott Jennings figured out where the money is, and how he could get his own podcast, and decided to become the JD Vance of CNN.”
Despite often finding himself outflanked, outmaneuvered, and the object of ridicule during his many appearances on the network, Thompson defended Jennings’ employment at the network as “good television.”
“Scott’s like d’Artagnan. He’s got his sword out and he’s got about four Democrats against him, but he spiked them all off,” Thompson said, comparing Jennings to the protagonist of the Three Musketeers. “That’s much more like it. I think he’s a worthy opponent, as it were, for the Democrats in the room. And it makes not just good television, but also, in some ways, a slightly deeper testing of the ideas all the way around the table.”
O’Donnell, however, was having none of it. “Good television,” he said dismissively, as he tore into the “lost in America Englishman” who believes “lying for Donald Trump on TV is an honorable pursuit.”
Pointing to his own show’s ratings as proof of Jennings’ failure, the MSNBC host added, “Here’s how bad that television is that they make over there. The show that Scott Jennings frequents the most is on opposite this program. And that show, on a good night, gets half the audience of this show.
“This program usually has an audience triple the size of the terrible, terrible television that Scott Jennings is delivering on the absurdly degraded version of CNN, presided over by the man who thinks lying for Donald Trump on TV is an honorable pursuit.”
Responding to the rant on X, Scott Jennings simply said, “No, Lawrence, I don’t have time to save your show.”
Earlier this week, Mark Thompson told reporters to “stop boring viewers with White House ballroom stories” after a VIP trip to the Oval Office to see Trump.
A CNN spokesperson confirmed to the Daily Beast that the meeting took place, but said there was “zero truth to the conjecture” that was “not fact checked before publication.”
The post MSNBC Host Skewers Scott Jennings as ‘Paid Liar’ for Trump appeared first on The Daily Beast.
