CNN and PBS anchor Christiane Amanpour interviewed House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in Munich, which aired on PBS on Monday night. Amanpour showed a photo of Pelosi ripping up Trump's State of the Union speech on the front of The New York Times and gushed "This really was one for the ages!"
AMANPOUR: You gave me a lovely show and tell, an amazingly dramatic bracelet you have [with a bullet for gun control] and sometimes I like to show pictures. This really was one for the ages.
PELOSI: It was on the front page of The New York Times. I didn't even see it.
AMANPOUR: And everywhere. It went sort of viral.
PELOSI: You know, I saw it a lot of other places. Yes.
AMANPOUR: I just want to ask you, did Vice President Pence -- I mean, he's showing remarkable discipline by not looking at you. Did he say anything?
PELOSI: No, no. He may not have even known. He was just looking straight at the president.
Pelosi groused that Trump used the speech to do inappropriate things, like giving the Medal of Freedom to Rush Limbaugh.
PELOSI: I was very disappointed in the fact that the president used the chamber of the House of Representatives, the people's house as a backdrop for a reality show, doing some things that are not appropriate, including misrepresenting the facts. But in addition to that, giving the presidential medal to Rush Limbaugh. But that's something he should do in his own office.
We don't go over there and say "knock, knock, we've come to do our work in your office." He shouldn't be doing that in the House, especially something so inappropriate. Quite frankly, when he started talking about a person so respected in our country, diagnosed with cancer, we thought he was going to be talking about [liberal Democrat] John Lewis. And even if he's talking about Rush Limbaugh - -
AMANPOUR: The great congressman, civil rights leader.
PELOSI: Civil rights leader, yes. And even talking about Rush Limbaugh as being sick, he has our sympathy, but the Medal of Freedom, no.
Amanpour followed up on the page-tearing: "Are you giving a signal that the Democrats will fight back hard, that you will not be constrained by what you believe to be insurgent behavior on the other side and that this is, you know, a time to go mano a mano?"
As if impeaching Trump didn't show that?
Pelosi claimed "I had no intention of doing that when we went to the State of the Union," but since there's a pile of bills the House Democrats have passed that didn't get much press because the Senate won't take them up, "it seems that if you want to get press, you have to get attention. So, I thought well, let's get attention on the fact that what he said here today was not true."
PS: Speaking of untrue statements, other websites noticed the clip where Pelosi refused to accept that President Trump was acquitted, oddly claiming there was no trial. This was tweeted as somehow factual:
Speaker Pelosi says President Trump is "impeached forever, branded with that and not vindicated." @camanpour @SpeakerPelosi @TeamPelosi pic.twitter.com/Iua6OP4PZ9
— Amanpour and Company (@AmanpourCoPBS) February 17, 2020
