Trump tweets fake video of him attacking CNN The wrestling video seems to turn the mainstream press into cartoon villains.

President Donald Trump escalated his self-proclaimed war with the media Sunday, tweeting an edited video that portrays him physically attacking CNN.

The 28-second professional-wrestling clip shows Trump tackling and repeatedly striking a man whose head is replaced by a superimposed CNN logo.


The tweet, posted shortly before 9:30 a.m. Sunday, included little commentary from the outspoken president, who simply hashtagged “#FraudNewsCNN” and “#FNN,” letting the video largely speak for itself. But the incendiary post threatens to take his fraught relationship with the media to a new, dangerous low.

“It is a sad day when the President of the United States encourages violence against reporters,” a CNN spokeswoman said in a statement. “Instead of preparing for his overseas trip, his first meeting with Vladimir Putin, dealing with North Korea and working on his health care bill, he is instead involved in juvenile behavior far below the dignity of his office. We will keep doing our jobs. He should start doing his.”

Republican lawmakers have called for civility in the wake of a shooting last month at a congressional baseball practice that left House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) critically injured and others wounded. But the White House has declined to follow their lead.

That incident occurred only weeks after Montana Republican congressional special election candidate Greg Gianforte body-slammed Guardian reporter Ben Jacobs. Gianforte went on to win the election.

Trump last week called CNN, NBC, CBS, ABC, The New York Times and The Washington Post “Fake News!” He later attacked “Morning Joe” co-hosts Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski in a crude tweet alleging that “low I.Q. Crazy Mika” came to Mar-a-Lago around New Year’s Eve “bleeding badly from a face-lift.” Many Republicans joined Democrats in swiftly condemning the president for his MSNBC post.

Asked about the perilous anti-media sentiment Trump has fueled in recent days, deputy White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders falsely claimed to reporters Thursday that Trump “ in no way, form or fashion has ever promoted or encouraged violence.”

“If anything, quite the contrary,” she added, concealing the fact that Trump at an Iowa rally in February 2016 encouraged supporters to “knock the crap out of” anyone poised to throw tomatoes, even promising to pay their legal fees. He had claimed a month earlier during another Iowa rally that he could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and not lose any voters, and he suggested in August that only “Second Amendment people” might be able to stop Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton from appointing federal judges if she won the election.

As the Fourth of July nears, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said the holiday is a time to “celebrate the freedom of the press, guardians to our democracy.”

“Violence & violent imagery to bully the press,” she tweeted, “must be rejected.”

Playbook PM Sign up for our must-read newsletter on what's driving the afternoon in Washington. Email Sign Up By signing up you agree to receive email newsletters or alerts from POLITICO. You can unsubscribe at any time. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

The video Trump shared seemed to be edited from an appearance he made at a WWE event a decade ago. It was first posted on Reddit. (The president tweeted a meme from the social media platform in March.)

The original video appears to be 2007 WrestleMania footage of Trump and WWE CEO Vince McMahon, whose face is covered by the superimposed CNN logo. McMahon’s wife, Linda, is now the head of Trump’s Small Business Administration.

Trump has a long association with the popular theatrics of the McMahons and WWE. He even landed in the celebrity wing of the pro wrestling organization’s hall of fame in 2013, joining the likes of Pete Rose, Mike Tyson and William “The Refrigerator” Perry.

After Trump’s election in 2016, the organization paid tribute to his victory on its website: “In November 2016, Trump culminated his campaign against key contender Hillary Clinton and was elected into office as the 45th President of the United States — the first time in history a WWE Hall of Famer would ever hold the distinguishing title of U.S. Commander-in-Chief.”

Speaking Sunday on CNN media reporter Brian Stelter’s show, Carl Bernstein called the wrestling tweet “an index of his state of mind.”

“It’s not just anti-CNN. It’s anti-freedom of the press,” the legendary Washington Post figure said.

Former “CBS Evening News” anchor Dan Rather said he is not only outraged, “but increasingly I feel the creep of dread and sadness.”

“Dread at a sense that no one knows, least of all I fear Mr. Trump, where this all may lead,” he explained in a Facebook post. “And sadness that this spectacle is now the norm of the United States.”

White House homeland security and counterterrorism adviser Tom Bossert argued that Trump’s tweet was just the president defending himself against cable news networks “beating up on him unfairly.”

“I think that no one would perceive that as a threat. I hope they don’t,” Bossert said in an interview on ABC’s “This Week.” “But I do think that he’s beating up in a way on cable platforms that he has a right to respond to.”

Bruce Brown, executive director of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, however, took Trump’s tweet as a “physical threat of violence against journalists.”

“This tweet is beneath the office of the presidency,” he said. “Sadly, it is not beneath the president.”

Conservative commentator Bill Kristol also took a dig at the president. He tweeted: "The speed with which we're recapitulating the decline and fall of Rome is impressive. What took Rome centuries we're achieving in months."

Trump’s feud with CNN escalated last week after the network retracted a story from late June that cited an anonymous source saying the Senate Intelligence Committee was looking into the chief executive of a $10 billion Russian investment fund who met with financier Anthony Scaramucci, a member of Trump’s transition team, before the inauguration.

The White House has since cited the incident as evidence of media bias.

On Saturday, the president tweeted that he was considering changing his nickname for CNN from “FakeNews CNN” to “#FraudNewsCNN.” He later called the entire fourth estate the “FAKE & FRAUDULENT NEWS MEDIA,” alleging that the press “is working hard to convince Republicans and others I should not use social media.”

“My use of social media is not Presidential — it’s MODERN DAY PRESIDENTIAL,” he said. “Make America Great Again!”

Trump briefly returned to Washington on Saturday from Bedminster, New Jersey, to deliver remarks at the Kennedy Center at a rally celebrating freedom.

“The fake media is trying to silence us, but we will not let them. The people know the truth,” he said Saturday evening. “The fake media tried to stop us from going to the White House, but I’m president and they’re not.”

The president posted Sunday morning’s tweet from Bedminster, where he was to remain until heading back to the White House on Monday.

David Cohen and Connor O'Brien contributed to this report.

