Jake Tapper prefaced his interview with Jimmy Kimmel by citing the late night host’s colorful criticism of new Twitter owner Elon Musk.
Musk tweeted and deleted a tweet sharing an article from a disreputable website that baselessly suggested the suspect who attacked Paul Pelosi – the husband of Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi – was actually his lover.
The CNN host noted the site in question had also claimed Hillary Clinton died in 2016 and was replaced by a body double.
He then quoted what Kimmel had to say about Musk’s retracted tweet.
“The host of Jimmy Kimmel Live! on ABC tweeted – after Musk did this – ‘It has been interesting over the years to watch you blossom from the electric car guy into a fully-formed piece of shit.’”
Tapper welcomed Kimmel to the show.
“Interesting tweet,” Tapper told him. “Strong words, and it does play right into this national conversation we’ve been having about free speech. How do you see those issues, given free speech on one hand and yet the dangerous spread of misinformation and hateful rhetoric that’s inciting some of these attacks on the other?”
“Well, first of all, Jake, I love hearing you curse,” Kimmel replied. “It’s one of my favorite things.”
“I only quote people cursing,” Tapper said. “I never curse on my own. It’s only within quotations. The Trump era gave me a lot of opportunities to do that, by the way.”
“No, I like it,” Kimmel responded. “It’s like CNN after dark. You know, I have to say, when I am the voice of decency we’ve got a problem because the idea that this old man – an 82-year-old man – has been attacked in his bed in his home by a person who obviously has some problems and our first reaction isn’t, ‘Oh, my goodness’… how can we move so quickly to smearing these people?”
Kimmel noted that Musk has yet to apologize for tweeting the dubious article.
“Everybody is a target all the time now,” he added.
Watch above via CNN.
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