‘You Used to Be a Conservative’; Trump SLAMS CNN’s Kaitlan Collins

Curtis Houck
June 3rd, 2026 6:31 PM

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Inside the Oval Office Wednesday and after signing a series of executive orders, President Donald Trump repeatedly tore into CNN chief White House correspondent and The Source host Kaitlan Collins, reminding viewers “you used to be a conservative” when she came to Washington (and reported for the Daily Caller) before she joined “crooked as hell” and “very corrupt” CNN to become a multi-millionaire and darling of the liberal Swamp.

The first mention came when Trump was asked by Daily Caller White House correspondent Reagan Reese about “why” he “decided to drop the anti-weaponization fund” that would have topped out at nearly $1.8 billion for those who believe they’ve been targeted unfairly by the federal government.

Trump explained he thought it was “so important” for “great, American people” — meaning, in large part, those who were in Washington D.C. on January 6, 2021 — who were “savaged” and “victimized...by the Biden administration, by a bunch of thugs” and “put in jail for long periods of time” with “their lives...destroyed.”

He then pivoted to explaining “everything about” the lawfare against him “was fake and corrupt” and “[w]e have all the information” that will be revealed “over the coming weeks and months.”

After he included the caveat that “CNN will believe” what was uncovered “because they knew what was going on,” he said the network is “crooked as hell” and “very corrupt...with a corrupt reporter standing right there” who never smiles.”

With Collins staring right at him, Trump asked those watching to “notice she never — she’s a young, beautiful woman — never smiles.”

“I never see a smile on — off [sic] her face. I see her standing there with hatred in her eyes, like, she has hatred. Because we have borders. Because we have a strong military. Because we cut our taxes. Because we do things that everybody wanted,” he added.

Later on in the Q&A, Collins followed up on Reese’s question: “Just to clarify on what you were asked earlier, is the $1.8 billion DOJ fund dead or is it on hold?”

Trump demurred: “It’s — I’d have to ask the lawyers, I don’t know.”

He further elaborated that he does “know one thing,” which is “[t]he weaponization fund, as far as I’m concerned was a beautiful thing” for those “abused...so badly” by “people like you.”

 

When he cited CNN and The New York Times as “hav[ing] abused our people,” Collins interjected to point out the bipartisan opposition to the fund.

It was here Trump turned his ire up to a 12 out of ten and reminded those listening of Collins’s past:

TRUMP: Well, wait a minute. Be quiet. Have abused our people so badly and you should be ashamed of yourself. You — you used to be a conservative. She was a conservative from Alabama. Can you believe it? But CNN in particular —

COLLINS: I’m still from Alabama.

TRUMP: CNN does such false reporting, but now they have new ownership, so maybe it’ll straighten it out. I doubt it, but it’s hard to straighten garbage out. But CNN has abused and others have abused so badly — people. these are people that are great. People that would destroy their families, have been destroyed. Many suicides. They committed suicide.

He finished with Collins by saying Americans such as those in D.C. on January “have been abused by you and by others and by the politicians, by the Dumocrats,” who instead “want open borders,” “high taxes,” “men playing in women’s sports,” and “transgender utilization of your children.”

There was one last personal jab to serve as a P.S. of sorts: “There’s something wrong with them. There’s something wrong with you. It’s a shame.”

NewsBusters is old enough to remember when the very outlets that hob-nob with Collins used to trash her as unqualified. NewsBusters has also been around long enough to recall when she would do things such as appear on the Fox News Channel to tear into the Deep State.

To see the relevant transcript from June 3, click here.

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