At a campaign rally in Moon Township, Pennsylvania, where he is stumping for Republican congressional candidate Rick Saccone, Trump spent the large majority of the time bouncing between self-congratulatory praise, defending his own missteps in office, and spewing unscripted – and misguided – remarks.
One such remark, which Sarah Huckabee Sanders will inevitably need to defend tomorrow, was the president referring to NBC host Chuck Todd as a “sleeping son of a bitch.”
Trump on Chuck Todd: "He's a sleeping son of a bitch." pic.twitter.com/tyjyvsinrL
— Washington Examiner (@dcexaminer) March 11, 2018
Chuck Todd, for his part, wasted no time in issuing his own response to the President.
Don’t miss @MeetThePress tomorrow! I know folks may be tired in the morning due to springing forward, so set those clocks and DVRs now before your eyes get too sleepy.
— Chuck Todd (@chucktodd) March 11, 2018
The verbal attack came in response to what Trump perceives as critical media coverage of his upcoming North Korea meeting.
In the first hours after hearing that North Korea’s leader wanted to meet with me to talk denuclearization and that missile launches will end, the press was startled & amazed.They couldn’t believe it. But by the following morning the news became FAKE.They said so what, who cares!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 10, 2018
Today’s desperate pandering, rife with juvenile epithets, comes amid a tightening special election race in Pennsylvania’s 18th Congressional District. Whereas Trump won this district by a 20-point margin in 2016, polls have shown Democrat Conor Lamb leading his Republican counterpart in what may be the latest in a string of humiliating lost seats for the GOP leading up to midterms.
Perhaps Trump should stop lobbing the same sophomoric attacks that have turned him into the least popular president in modern American history, and instead make any attempt whatsoever at acting like the full-grown president of the United States.
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