CNN: ‘Donald Trump Won’t Change’
The campaign of President-elect Donald Trump has been the polar opposite of one-dimensional. While many in the beginning thought that his efforts to be the 45th president of the United States was dead on arrival, his aggressive declaration of building walls, kicking out illegal immigrants, temporarily banning Muslims from entering the U.S., and reviving the job market somehow gave him the support he needed to shockingly win the popular vote, despite most media outlets predicting him to lose.
During his campaign, he would continue to create foes both inside and outside his political party. His hot-headed temper caused a very peculiar divide in the voter base. While some approved and affirmed his unfiltered comments, others questioned if his demeanor was accepted as presidential.
230 things Donald Trump has said and done that make him unfit to be president: https://t.co/5TsqL8r3OP pic.twitter.com/gP2lP1nsqV
— Slate (@Slate) October 18, 2016
One of the ways Trump would handle the pressure of the road to the White House is through social media; particularly, Twitter.
Despite gaining a wide base of supporters through media streams, he spent a great deal of his time proverbially biting the hand that fed him through his oftentimes off-color comments about the media. In what has grown to be a bitter rivalry, Trump has an arch-nemesis by way of CNN.
A significant portion of Trump’s issues fell under CNN’s portrayal of him not being emotionally fit to assume the position as the United States president.
For instance, one year ago, CNN reported him seemingly mocking a disabled reporter, which caused a great uproar and was the object of many ads presented by Hillary Clinton.
While Serge Kovaleski, the New York Times reporter who Trump mocked, said that “the sad part about it is, it didn’t in the slightest bit jar or surprise me that Donald Trump would do something this low-rent, given his track record,” campaign officials countered by stating that he “was merely emphasizing the uncertainty of the verbal/written statement provided by the reporter in regards to his article,” per the Chicago Tribune.
CNN also heavily criticized how many of Trump’s supporters would revolt if he lost the election, including Illinois Republican politician and talk show host Joe Walsh.
“…former Rep. Joe Walsh became the latest in a long line of high-profile Trump supporters to invoke a bloody revolt and firearms in response to the GOP candidate’s potential defeat on Election Day.
“Trump has played at this with jarring regularity, creating a series of tense flashpoints during the course of the campaign. On October 13, he told supporters that, in the eyes of the global power structure they sought to topple, the coming election ‘is a war.'”
Even though Trump was elected to office and the idea of a revolt was dampened, the war between Trump and CNN is seemingly nowhere close to being over. As long as Trump has access to Twitter, CNN will continue to be scrutinized. For several consecutive days, he has gone to Twitter to voice his disdain for CNN’s media coverage.
.@CNN is so embarrassed by their total (100%) support of Hillary Clinton, and yet her loss in a landslide, that they don't know what to do.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 29, 2016
I thought that @CNN would get better after they failed so badly in their support of Hillary Clinton however, since election, they are worse!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 29, 2016
CNN commentators have not been silent about Trump’s attacks. Stephen Collinson made a presentation through a recent article of why Donald Trump will not change just because he won the election, calling him a “mercurial, sometimes thin-skinned, gregarious, truth-challenged, media taunting and unpredictable figure.”
“The clearest sign that Trump has no intention of changing, despite his new responsibilities, has emerged in a volley of controversial tweets in the last two days. ‘In addition to winning the Electoral College in a landslide, I won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally,’ the President-elect fumed in a tweet — based on a falsehood — that underscored his enduring addiction to conspiracy theories.”
Perhaps the biggest asset of his campaign – the ability to march on and grow his base through Twitter – is now becoming his greatest hindrance in getting the country as a whole to accept that he is able to unite the people and “make American great again.”
[Featured Image by Evan Vucci/AP Images]