Kaitlan Collins Just Revealed What Trump Is Actually Like In Oval Office Press Conferences, And It's Very Eye-Opening

Posted 5 minutes ago

Donald Trump loves calling out CNN’s Kaitlan Collins for, uh, doing her job.

As you probably have seen, she made a pretty significant cameo in his White House Correspondents' Dinner speech.

First, he took credit for the award she won: "I wanna personally congratulate CNN's Kaitlan Collins on receiving her award. Was all about me. It's a fake, she shouldn't get the award. It was a fake, but I didn't mind. I said, 'Kaitlan, congratulations.' But it was fake. There's no question about it."

Then he went into his go-to criticism of her "never smiling": "She's a young, attractive woman. She never smiles. I said, 'Kaitlan, do you ever smile? Smile. You have a nice position. You're at CNN Fake News. You should be a happy person. So smile, Kaitlan, just smile.' But, uh, we attack and I thought Kaitlan had really made it big with a major new sponsorship, but then I informed her that it wasn't her on the Bud Light can, it was Dylan Mulvaney."

He topped it off with this post:

Kaitlan posted some pictures from the night on Instagram and ended the carousel with a quote from Eleanor Roosevelt. Naturally, people thought this was in response to Trump's attacks.

Now, Kaitlan is speaking out about what it’s actually like in the room, and her perspective is pretty eye-opening.

During an interview on The Daily Show, she explained what happens behind the scenes during these interactions.

"I think he does surround himself with people who praise him or laugh at his jokes, and when he is confronted with someone who is asking a challenging question, or a critical question of his policy or strategy in the Iran war, I think he doesn't like it, and he lashes out over it."

.@kaitlancollins: The entire time I've covered Trump, I've never gotten in a back and forth with him. He surrounds himself with people who praise him or laugh at his jokes, and when he is confronted with someone who is asking a challenging question, he doesn't like it and he… pic.twitter.com/LFoLo1s4qz
— Headquarters (@HQNewsNow) July 28, 2026

Comedy Central/HQNewsNow/x.com

She was particularly surprised by how awkwardly his WHCD speech went down in the room: "What was most surprising to me was the room was filled with a lot of his staffers, his cabinet, his allies, Republicans in Congress. It was so quiet in the room during the president's remarks."

Another interesting anecdote she shared was about her mere presence setting him off.

"There have been moments where I go into the Oval Office when I’m on behalf of the TV pool and I haven’t even asked a question yet and he starts criticizing me. So it’s not even about the questions, sometimes it’s just my presence in the room."

But alas, rather than take Trump's bait, Kaitlan keeps her focus on the reporting.

.@KaitlanCollins on Trump's verbal attacks:

"It's really not about me, and I don't want it to be about my reaction. ... In those moments it's important to put the reminder back on the work, on the question, and on the non-answers that we get." pic.twitter.com/DY009dNy3k
— The Daily Show (@TheDailyShow) July 28, 2026

Comedy Central/The Daily Show/x.com

"It's really not about me, and I don't want it to be about my reaction. ... In those moments it's important to put the reminder back on the work, on the question, and on the non-answers that we get."

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