CNN’s John Berman on Wednesday mocked White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany for boasting that President Donald Trump does, in fact, read the intelligence briefs that are given to him.
After playing a clip of McEnany on Tuesday insisting that “the president does read,” Berman marveled at how low a bar had been set when it comes to expectations for America’s commander-in-chief.
“To be cornered into a space where your response is, ‘The president does read,’ that’s not a place you want to be,” Berman said. “That’s tantamount to, ‘The president ties his own shoes and cuts his own meat.’ You don’t want to be in a place where saying ‘the president reads’ is your best defense.”
CNN reporter Abby Phillip agreed.
“There’s absolutely no universe in which saying that ‘the president reads’ is an accolade,” she said. “I mean, he is the president of the United States. I think we just kind of get to the point where the — we expect so little at this point, but he’s the president of the United States and on this matter, I think, putting all of the other things aside, on issues of national security, I think that is where the bar is extraordinarily high.”
Watch the video below.