AOC Blasts CNN Over ‘Dangerous’ Trump Town Hall

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-NY, was among the harshest critics of CNN’s Wednesday night town hall with Donald Trump, accusing the network of platforming conspiracy theories and adding that it cannot “feign ignorance” over how the event turned out. 

“This cannot be normalized,” Ocasio-Cortez tweeted late Wednesday. "It's dangerous."

She accused CNN of making the “choice” to air Trump’s 2020 election fraud conspiracy theories and to tolerate him repeatedly “interrupting” moderator Kaitlan Collins and mocking E. Jean Carroll, the author who this week won a defamation suit against the former president.

Carroll had accused Trump of rape, something he's denied repeatedly. A civil trial ended with a jury finding him liable for sexual abuse and defamation and awarded $5 million to Carroll.  

Ocasio-Cortez said CNN "set up a sexual assault victim to be targeted and attacked on national television a day after the verdict."

CNN released a statement Wednesday defending the town hall. The network praised Collins for fact checking the former president "in real time" and said the event was part of its mission to "hold the powerful to account."