discuss our job numbers, strong economy, success with i.c.e., the border and so much more. some say trump over stepped it with the video. tom bosser insist it didn t go too far. i think no one will perceive that as a threat hope any they don t. he s beaten up on cable forums he has a right to respond to. reporter: republicans senator ben sass accused trump of trying to use distrust in the media as a weapon to undermine american freedom. therein an important distinction to draw between bad stories and crappy coverage and the right citizens have to argue and complain about that, and trying to weaponize distrust. reporter: urging trump to tone it done can be a fewtal per suit. he defended his twitter habits this weekend saying my use of
distrust. weaponize distrust. interesting way to put it in the sense that the president does not want his bases specially to trust people who are critical of him. he says everything critical, any poll critical, fake news. report that s critical, fake news, despite the fact it s based on fact. yeah. how you in part keep your base. by trying to delegitimize the mainstream press. if you look, as i did yesterday, at the front pages of major papers across the country, what they were focused on. it wasn t trump s tweets. it was medicaid and health care broadly. and, john, to your point, this is why trump wants to create this dynamic with the media. because if his supporters don t believe those stories about folks losing health care coverage, or folks losing medicaid, then i i think that the assumption is that his party will suffer less at polls next year, if folks don t believe
said on sunday that he s been troubled by the president s recent attacks on the news media. there s an important distinction to draw between bad stories or crappy coverage and the right that citizens have to argue and complain about that, and trying to weaponize distrust. the first amendment is the beating heart of the american experiment, and you don t get to separate the freedoms that are in there. for more we re joined by kyle felcher, breaking news editor at the washington examiner. good morning to you. ben sass, a critic of the president says, we re living in an america of perpetual adolescence. however, it appears a 71-year-old man is the adolescent setting the tone. here is someone from his administration, tom bossert, homeland security adviser, talking about the president s twitter habits with abc yesterday. i think that no one would perceive that as a threat. i hope they don t. i do think that he s beaten up in a way on cable platforms that
your own people in your own party are in the 90s. 95s. suggests to me as a political strategy, not the best one. probably in his first year, elected in a controversial way george w. bush was but tried to broaden out and get numbers up in the first term, maybe win a second term. not sure trump is pursuing a strategy that s that smart, even if it is a strategy. deliberate from day one, undermine the credibility of any organization that might question the president. question his strategy, question his policies. put up a scorecard that says obamacare is still the law of the land. haven t built the wall, so an and so forth. listen to republican senator ben sasse on state of the union with jake tapper. the president has every right to complain about coverage he doesn t like, but i mean, there s an important distinction between bad stories or crappy coverage and the right that citizens have to argue about that, and complain about that. and trying to weaponize
serious consequences. people are begging the president not to do this. and, you know, he ought to stop doing it. there is an important distinction to draw between bad stories or crappy coverage and the right that citizens have to argue about that and complain about that. and trying to weaponize distrust. the president has a busy week this week as north korea continues to promote the president putting in calls to the presidents of south korea, japan. and leaving for a critical trip, the g-20 summit to europe and also a face to face meeting with russian president vladimir putin. alisyn, john. suzanne, thank you very much. let s bring in our panel to discuss it, errol lewis, alex byrne, and national political reporter for the new york times caroon demergon. i ve been off for a week. what did i miss? how are we supposed to interpret what happened this