When you as a liberal Democrat have lost CNN’s Abby Phillip and your protest gets LITERALLY laughed at live on CNN air, it may be a sign that your ability to influence coverage of the day’s events is waning. This was the reaction garnered by Congressional Democrats’ protest outside the headquarters of the dying United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
WATCH Phillip describe the protest as “a piñata in search of a stick”, which was met with an outburst of laughter by the guests at the table (click “expand” to view transcript):
Sad. Democrats have lost CNN. The entire CNN panel snickers at Democrats screaming about @ElonMusk. They even lost anchor Abby Phillip: “Democrats agree that Musk is a problem, but listen to them today and they have a pinata in search of a stick.” pic.twitter.com/BGbRxJWhuV
— Brent Baker 🇺🇦 🇮🇱 (@BrentHBaker) February 5, 2025
ABBY PHILLIP: Tonight. Democrats versus Elon Musk. The Tex- Tech titan may be a shadow President going full Bane, the Batman villain is what we're talking about here, crediting himself for returning power to the people while at the same time dismissing any criticism of anything that he is doing, calling all of his opponents cronies of the radical left shadow government. Democrats agree that Musk is a problem, but listen to them today and they have a piñata in search of a stick.
AYANNA PRESLEY: To our Republican colleagues, if you do not see the light, we will bring the fire. Resist!
JASMINE CROCKETT: We are going to be in your face. We are going to be on your asses.
CHRIS MURPHY: We have days to stop the destruction of our democracy. We have work to do.
RON WYDEN: Tell Elon Musk to take his hands off your money.
MURPHY: We don't pledge allegiance to the creepy 22-year-olds working for Elon Musk. We pledge allegiance to the United States of America.
PROTEST SPEAKER: And goddammit, shut down the city. We are at war.
CHUCK SCHUMER (LEADING CHANT): We will win. We will win. We will win. We won't rest. We won't rest.
PHILLIP: Gretchen.
GRETCHEN CARLSON: Yes. So, they need…
SCOTT JENNINGS: I’m so sorry, can we play it again?
CARLSON: The Democrats- the Democrats need a real leader, okay? They need a real leader, which currently does not exist in the Democratic Party. And they have been caught completely flat footed with the entire Trump presidency for the last two weeks. And Elon Musk, I said on CNN months ago that Elon Musk would be the most influential advisor to President Trump. And that is proving to be true whether you like it or not. But Democrats should have had a plan for this. They knew it was coming. We say this every single night.
PHILLIP: Project 2025. We just talked about it.
CARLSON: We knew it. We knew it. Trump has said all of these things were going to happen. We saw him align with Elon Musk, which may go down as the smartest thing that any presidential candidate has ever done. From the young vote, to tech, to a million other things. So Democrats needed to have a plan and it may be too late.
PHILLIP: Yeah. Bakari, are you fired up after…?.
BAKARI SELLERS: I'm fired up and ready to go? Can't you see it in my face? For me, I'm disappointed in the lack of plan. I'm disappointed in the- in the flat footedness.
Phillip opened the segment by oddly comparing Musk to Bat-villain Bane. Not to be that guy but, unlike Musk, Bane had no money of his own. He did blow stuff up, though, which is what happened to USAID and what triggered the much-maligned protest.
CNN Ratings King Scott Jennings was unable to contain his laughter at the spectacle of Democrat electeds attempting to protest (and more seriously, in the case of Ayanna Presley, potentially inciting violence) the collapse of USAID and by association defend transgender opera in Colombia, among many other such weird expenditures.
Former Fox host Gretchen Carlson reluctantly complimented the brilliance of President Trump’s selection of Elon Musk as a trusted advisor. Phillip then pivoted to commentator Bakari Sellers for reaction, and showed the world her ability to contain her laughter as Sellers slogged through this brutal segment. Of note, Sellers decried the Dems’ “lack of plan”.
Lots of rightful attention on @ScottJenningsKY bursting out in laughter but what elevated the segment to comedic gold and drove home the story was @abbydphillip's masterful laugh suppression, IMO pic.twitter.com/PIs4rGjhBw
— Jorge Bonilla (@BonillaJL) February 5, 2025
Sellers doesn’t account for the fact that the Democrats very likely had a resistance plan in place but, in the words of the legendary political strategist Mike Tyson, everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face. The segment closed with Jennings summing up the madness on display as proof evident that the left has lost its way:
SCOTT JENNINGS: I think the highlight reel that you just played spliced with the highlight reel of all the people trying to run the Democratic National Committee at their organizational meeting ought to be put together, and we ought to take money from the Republican National Committee and play it on a loop. Ladies and gentlemen, the American left is so far off the rails, they're going to have to get Google maps to find their way back. They are way gone right now. And it’s glorious!
Agree or disagree, getting brutally mocked by a bipartisan panel on CNN is proof evident that the left has lost its way.
Click “expand” to view the full transcript of the aforementioned segment as aired on CNN NewsNight with Abby Phillip on Tuesday, February 4th, 2025:
CNN NEWSNIGHT WITH ABBY PHILLIP
2/4/25
10:50 PM
ABBY PHILLIP: Tonight. Democrats versus Elon Musk. The Tex- Tech titan may be a shadow President going full Bane, the Batman villain is what we're talking about here, crediting himself for returning power to the people while at the same time dismissing any criticism of anything that he is doing, calling all of his opponents cronies of the radical left shadow government. Democrats agree that Musk is a problem, but listen to them today and they have a piñata in search of a stick.
AYANNA PRESLEY: To our Republican colleagues, if you do not see the light, we will bring the fire. Resist!
JASMINE CROCKETT: We are going to be in your face. We are going to be on your asses.
CHRIS MURPHY: We have days to stop the destruction of our democracy. We have work to do.
RON WYDEN: Tell Elon Musk to take his hands off your money.
MURPHY: We don't pledge allegiance to the creepy 22-year-olds working for Elon Musk. We pledge allegiance to the United States of America.
PROTEST SPEAKER: And goddammit, shut down the city. We are at war.
CHUCK SCHUMER (LEADING CHANT): We will win. We will win. We will win. We won't rest. We won't rest.
PHILLIP: Gretchen.
GRETCHEN CARLSON: Yes. So, they need…
SCOTT JENNINGS: I’m so sorry, can we play it again?
CARLSON: The Democrats- the Democrats need a real leader, okay? They need a real leader, which currently does not exist in the Democratic Party. And they have been caught completely flat footed with the entire Trump presidency for the last two weeks. And Elon Musk, I said on CNN months ago that Elon Musk would be the most influential advisor to President Trump. And that is proving to be true whether you like it or not. But Democrats should have had a plan for this. They knew it was coming. We say this every single night.
PHILLIP: Project 2025. We just talked about it.
CARLSON: We knew it. We knew it. Trump has said all of these things were going to happen. We saw him align with Elon Musk, which may go down as the smartest thing that any presidential candidate has ever done. From the young vote, to tech, to a million other things. So Democrats needed to have a plan and it may be too late.
PHILLIP: Yeah. Bakari, are you fired up after…?.
BAKARI SELLERS: I'm fired up and ready to go? Can't you see it in my face? For me, I'm disappointed in the lack of plan. I'm disappointed in the- in the flat footedness. I don't, but, you know, Josh and I just had this kind of robust conversation about- about how we view this issue about Israel and Gaza and relitigating November. But I believe going forward, Democrats have to present at least a unified front with all wings of the party, all factions of the party, and actually have some energy that focuses on these bread and butter issues. I've told- I've said it till I'm blue in the face that Elon Musk having access to your social security number is an issue. The freeze on aid is an issue. That issue cuts across USA- USAID- do you know that they purchased billions of dollars of goods from American farmers? I don't want to hear Chuck Schumer saying, “and we won't lose and we won't rest.” I rather I rather have a small business owner up there talking about the impact on them. I'd rather have somebody who is displaced, who's a black woman who's worked hard to have her business out there chanting and talking.
And they need to pick their targets, because there is a risk here that they end up going to bat over things that Americans are like, what does this have to do with me?
JOSH ROGIN: Well, we know that the Trump plan is to flood the zone. What do they call it? You know, some some sort of like strategy to to throw so many things out to us that the press can only cover so much, the Democrats can only cover so much. And then the really important stuff flies under the radar. I think that's what's happening. We spend all our time talking about Greenland. Next thing we know, USAID gone. And then everyone was like, what just happened?
BRAD POLUMBO: But do you think the screaming, the Nazi rhetoric, one of the Democratic Congresswoman literally called, I think it was Ayanna Pressley, but it was a Democratic Congresswoman literally called Elon Musk a Nazi. Do we really think that kind of alarmism is helpful?
ROGIN: I totally agree with you.
POLUMBO: I mean, after years, you’d think Democrats would learn that just screaming hyperbole about Trump… America's rolling their eyes. They rolled their eyes in 2016. They rolled their eyes in 2024. It's all a bit much. You lose credibility.
ROGIN: Not in 2020. Not in 2020- they- they voted Democrat in 2020. And 2022. And 2023.
PHILLIP: He’s making a good point that if you’re at 15 every single day. Okay, people are going to tune out, no question.
SELLERS: Yeah but the fact is like, look, I mean the imagery is there. This is how we miss our moment on the day of inauguration, sitting behind Donald Trump was Elon Musk, was the CEO of TikTok. Were these billionaires who now have offices in the white house, who are now going and affecting your figuring out how you file your documents, your social security, all of these things, the-y they don't speak for us.
PHILLIP: Scott;
SCOTT JENNINGS: I think the highlight reel that you just played spliced with the highlight reel of all the people trying to run the Democratic National Committee at their organizational meeting ought to be put together, and we ought to take money from the Republican National Committee and play it on a loop. Ladies and gentlemen, the American left is so far off the rails, they're going to have to get Google maps to find their way back. They are way gone right now. And it’s glorious!
