In a grueling face-off between CNN’s Chris Cuomo and Kellyanne Conway, the anchor and White House special counsel battled over President Donald Trump’s recent endorsement of alleged sexual predator Roy Moore.

During the over 20-minute interview, Conway attempted to defend the president’s endorsement of the controversial Alabama Republican by deflecting from his accusations of sexual assault and focusing on slamming “liberal Democrat” Doug Jones.

Conway stated the following after New Day‘s Cuomo confronted her with the fact that Trump “would rather have an accused child molester than a Democrat” in Alabama:

“When the president endorsed Roy Moore, when he started talking about Doug Jones, the opponent, which you still don’t want to talk about but the president does, he took a lead in the polls again. Why is that? Because the president himself came out and said he doesn’t want a liberal in the Senate. He wants a reliable vote for taxes for life. The president said something else that you don’t want to reflect, [Moore] has denied those allegations and the president said you have to take that into account too.”

The White House advisor went on to invoke some whataboutism to defend Moore as she brought up the allegations against Senator Al Franken, saying the Minnesota lawmaker accused of sexual misconduct is being defended by fellow Democrats and CNN is not calling them out.

“You have no standard of morality!” shot back Cuomo.

Conway contested this claim, leading the anchor to clarify, “The president seems to have no moral standard at play, it’s all pragmatism.”

At one point while discussing Franken, she directly asked Cuomo if he thought the Senator “was groping” Leeann Tweeden in the damning photo. Conway then made mock-groping gestures on-air, waving her arms and squeezing her hands to imitate Franken.

The administration official later defended the president’s stance in the Alabama special election by mocking CNN’s “Fact’s First” advertising campaign. “I’m talking apples and not bananas, I’m seeing lots of bananas,” said Conway with a grin.

The two also discussed Mitt Romney and Trump’s relationship, as the standing of the two has been brought into question lately. Cuomo pushed Conway on why the president sent “his pit bull” Steve Bannon — the former White House chief strategist — to an Alabama rally yesterday so he could mock and ridicule the ex-governor of Massachusetts.

Additionally, the Breitbart News CEO attacked Senator Jeff Flake and other “establishment” Republicans during his speech for not supporting Moore.

Finally, the interview was concluded with heated debates on tax reform — which Cuomo stated will help “rich people” — and the White House’s decision to move the U.S. embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, upending decades of foreign policy precedent.

Watch above via CNN.

[image via screengrab]

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