Few foreign leaders in recent decades have engendered as much fawning, pathetic adulation in the American liberal media like New Zealand’s Jacinda Ardern, who served as the leftist prime minister from 2017 to 2023 and thus, with a memoir out, they’d be lining up to sing her praises. Tuesday’s CBS Mornings filled that quota with co-host and Democratic donor Gayle King emoting joy over her presence.
Following a whopping four teases that hailed Ardern as having been “a different kind of Prime Minister” and a “great conversation ahead” (plus a flowery interview on CBS Sunday Morning with correspondent Robert Costa), King started with Ardern’s farewell address about what she billed as being a compassionate, emotional leader.
“You can lead and that she did…She won international acclaim for her leadership style while she was in office. She calls her approach a different kind of power, and that is the title of her new memoir,” she gushed.
The eye rolls continued: “We welcome you. I love – I love, Jacinda, how your book opened because it starts, you’re in the bathroom waiting for a pregnancy test. You said, at the same time I’m waiting to find out if I’m going to be prime minister. Talk about that moment while you’re finding out two very life-changing moments.”
Ardern explained in part she wanted to show that, “behind the scenes,” public officials are still “human[s] still doing a job, and I wanted to bring people into what that feels like.”
After an explanation of New Zealand’s parliamentary system (similar to most forms of government throughout the west) and her initial reluctance to lead her Labour Party, Ardern described saying as “the gift to be myself because this was no time to be anyone else except myself.”
Bleh. Smack over the head with a self-help book.
King continued down this thread with Ardern having said she felt as though she was grappling with imposter syndrome (click “expand”):
KING: You said to be yourself, but you also kept talking about impostor syndrome, and I kept thinking –
ARDERN: Yes.
KING: – what are you talking about? What are you trying – what did that mean to you?
ARDERN: Yes. I described it –
KING: Because you always seemed to know exactly what you were doing.
ARDERN: I would describe it – it is kind of a spectrum. I would describe it loosely as any time you have a confidence gap, when someone asks you to step up and you think of all the reasons you can to all the reasons why someone else would be bitter, and some of the people I admire most in the world have these feelings, but we often don’t talk about it. The reason I want to talk about it is I’ve got nothing to lose by doing so, but perhaps if I can speak to that person who is holding themselves back, those are the very people who bring humility to leadership.
KING: Yes.
ARDERN: They seek out advice. They bring in experts, and they often, not always, but often bring a real compassion to leadership. We need them to step up.
But zooming in on her time in office, King predictably had to go to the awful mass shooting at a mosque by a white supremacist:
[L]et’s talk about the word compassion, because you were hit during your administration, you know, there was a horrible shooting at a mosque, clearly targeted by hate, and you went to the mosque to meet with the people, and you covered your head and what was your takeaway at that particular moment? Because the images of you hugging the people went viral, and you said, why should I be applauded for just showing a humane response?
Ardern replied that it’ll always be “forever one of the most devastating moments in New Zealand’s history,” but “in the midst of all of it, the Muslim community in New Zealand opens its doors and its arms to New Zealanders to grieve with them” and showed “grace and compassion” that “I’ve never experienced” before.
The anti-gun King – who’s accused millions of Americans of caring more about guns than children – also cheered Ardern’s forced mass gun confiscation in the aftermath: “But what happened after that is in 26 days, you got the gun laws changed in New Zealand. You banned assault rifles. 26 days!”
Ardern said doing so was “incredibly important to me” in illustrating “compassionate leadership” means “nothing without action.”
“[I]f you are going to be led by people-centered approach, that does mean taking action where you see it is needed and New Zealanders, you know, they wanted to make sure this would never happen again. And so, in my mind, we just heeded their call. We banned military-style semiautomatic weapons. We bought them back. We paid people for them,” she added like a good, smiley-faced socialist.
Likely bitter it wouldn’t work here in the United States, King praised New Zealanders for having “willingly did that.”
Following a brief reflection in her stepping down, King concluded by queueing her up to rip President Trump. Cue one last eye-roll as Ardern invoked climate change in answer (click “expand”):
KING: And what’s your take on what’s happening in the world today? You know, you gave a speech about the planet being an all-out dumpster fire, you know, these are tough times. Do you believe that President Trump’s tariffs have contributed to the dumpster fire? What is your take on what is happening?
ARDERN: My description when I used that term is everything from climate change to global – you know, wars in the Middle East and in Europe and speaking to that next generation, I think they feel the chaos of this moment and my message to them is everything that they can do can make a difference in spite of the politics they see and the message to politicians for me is, you can lead differently. You can lead with kindness. You can lead with compassion and empathy. There is a strength and resilience to that as well.
KING: We have got to get that message out, Jacinda. You can’t say it enough.
To see the relevant CBS transcript form June 3, click here.
