CNN broke away from President Trump’s 2020 kick off speech shortly after the crowd began chanting “CNN Sucks!”

While discussing the impact of the 2016 election, Trump directed comments to the assembled reporters.

“2016 was not merely another four-year election,” he told the Orlando, Fla., crowd. “This was a defining moment in American history, ask them right there.”

As Trump pointed to the media, the crowd began booing and chanting, “CNN Sucks! CNN Sucks!”

“The amount of press we have tonight reminds me of the Academy Awards before it went political and their ratings went down the tubes,” Trump went on.

CNN anchor John Berman cut in and said, “We’ve been watching the president kick off his re-election bid. He’s been on stage for about six minutes. Within two minutes, he did talk about the economy, but within four minutes it was attacks on the media. He was talking about a bright, rosy future but then quickly reverted to some of the same themes he’s been talked about since he began running four years ago today.”

CNN’s David Chalian said of Trump remarks: “Is Donald Trump going to seize this moment to frame his argument to the American people as to why they should renew his contract for another four years or is he just going to present us the Trump show, you know, and air his grievances and start the bashing of the free press and he shows no desire whatsoever to try and actually seize this moment to do something different. Again, I don’t think that’s terribly surprising.”

Here’s a transcript:

TRUMP: “We have a tremendous way to go, our future has never ever looked brighter or sharper. (applause) The fact is the American Dream is back. It’s bigger and better and stronger than ever before. (cheers and applause) 2016 was not merely another four-year election. This was a defining moment in American history, ask them right there.”

CROWD: “(booing) CNN sucks! CNN sucks! CNN sucks!”

TRUMP: “By the way, that is a lot of fake news back there. That’s a lot. That’s a lot. (cheers and applause) You know what I say? The amount of press we have tonight reminds me of the Academy Awards before it went political and their ratings went down the tubes. True. This was our chance to reclaim our government — “

BERMAN: “All right. We’ve been watching the President kick off his reelection bid. He’s been on stage for about six minutes. Within two minutes, he did talk about the economy, but within four minutes it was attacks on the media. He was talking about a bright, rosy future but then quickly reverted to some of the same themes he’s been talked about since he began running four years ago today. If I can, I want to bring back our panel to talk about what we’ve heard so far. David Chalian, it was notable to see one of the things we were watching for, Rick Santorum mentioned it before, would the President focus on the economy and he immediately did, saying the economy is thriving, prospering and booming. He called it perhaps the best economy ever. That message lasted about 30 seconds.”

CHALIAN: “Yeah, if the test tonight was is Donald Trump — and obviously nobody expects Donald Trump to change. I don’t think anyone will be surprised. But is Donald Trump going to seize this moment to frame his argument to the American people as to why they should renew his contract for another four years or is he just going to present us the Trump show, you know, and air his grievances and start the bashing of the free press and he shows no desire whatsoever to try and actually seize this moment to do something different. Again, I don’t think that’s terribly surprising. I will note this one thing, John, that he said that I think is interesting. He said that 2016 was not your typical election, that it was a defining moment in history and it just struck me when he said that because that is exactly what the Biden campaign put out in a statement in advance of this, framing this as make Donald Trump an aberration. Do not make it a defining moment of history. And I think you just saw how the Biden and the Trump teams are looking at where we are in just completely different terms.”



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