I think most of us were thoroughly disgusted over CNN hosting the twice-impeached, indicted, sexual predator on their network for a live town hall. The most disgusting part was the audience laughing when Trump lashed out at E. Jean Carroll, the former President's sexual abuse victim. According to Puck, though, they were told not to boo, and some of the audience members were "disgusted" or "bewildered."
Republican political consultant Matthew Bartlett confirmed that in an interview with Puck News's Tara Palmeri.
"The floor manager came out ahead of time and said, Please do not boo; please be respectful. You were allowed to applaud," Bartlett said.
"And I think that set the tone where people were going to try their best to keep this between the navigational beacons, and that if they felt compelled to applaud, they would, but they weren't going to have an outburst or they weren't going to boo an answer," he continued.
"There were plenty of people in that room that were ardent supporters of President Trump, and no matter what he said, they were ready to jump out of their seats and applaud," he continued. "But there were also people that sat there quietly disgusted or bewildered. In a TV setting, you hear the applause, but you don't see the disgust. So Trump did not have the entire room on his side, make no mistake, even if it certainly came across that way on TV."
"When I turned on my phone after the event, the text messages came flying in. You saw the coverage afterward. People thought it was more of a rally than a town hall—maybe at one point even a debate between Kaitlan Collins and Donald Trump," he added. "But in that room, I remember walking out and people in the front row were like, He's talking some crazy stuff, and I think a lot of these lawsuits are adding up. There was heavy skepticism. He kind of lost the audience at some point when he was rambling about January 6th and the back and forth around the tweets. And then there were some people that were like, This is vintage Trump. I'm so happy to see him stick it to CNN right in their face. So it was a mix."
The crowd erupting in applause when Trump called Collins "nasty" and attacked the victim of his sexual assault was unnerving. There is no excuse for that. I guess we should be glad that not everyone cheered on his behavior. And Kaitlan Collins will always be thought of as an idiot.
