CNN anchor Chris Cuomo said Thursday that when President Trump refers to his network as "fake news," it's the same thing for reporters as the N-word is for black people.

"I see being called 'fake news' as the equivalent of the N-word for journalists, the equivalent of calling an Italian any of the ugly words that people have for that ethnicity," Cuomo said on SiriusXM. "That's what fake news is to a journalist."



Cuomo's comments were a variation of something he had said earlier in the day on CNN.

"'Fake news' is the worst thing that you could call a journalist," he said. "It's like an ethnic disparagement. We all have these ugly words for people, and that's the one for journalists."



Cuomo was responding to a tweet from Trump that accused Cuomo of conducting a poor interview with Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut.

Chris Cuomo, in his interview with Sen. Blumenthal, never asked him about his long-term lie about his brave "service" in Vietnam. FAKE NEWS! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 9, 2017



"Chris Cuomo, in his interview with Sen. Blumenthal, never asked him about his long-term lie about his brave 'service' in Vietnam," Trump's tweet said. "FAKE NEWS!"

Trump was referring to past statements from Blumenthal that suggested he had served in military combat. Though he was in the Marine Corps Reserves, he did not see combat, and Blumenthal held a press conference in 2010 to say he had "misspoken" in those statements.

The reason for Trump's tweet was that Blumenthal came out Wednesday night to say that Appellate Judge Neil Gorsuch, Trump's nominee for the Supreme Court, had told him in a conversation that he disapproved of Trump's recent attacks on another federal judge.

Sen.Richard Blumenthal, who never fought in Vietnam when he said for years he had (major lie),now misrepresents what Judge Gorsuch told him? — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 9, 2017



"Sen.Richard Blumenthal, who never fought in Vietnam when he said for years he had (major lie),now misrepresents what Judge Gorsuch told him?" Trump had said earlier Thursday on Twitter, before Cuomo's interview with Blumenthal.

After Trump criticized Cuomo, however, Cuomo responded by showing that he actually had opened his interview that questioned Blumenthal's credibility. "Literally the first point I made in the interview," Cuomo said.