The crooked charge against NBC: Why the Donald Trump-Kristen Welker slugfest went off the rails

The headlines say “stormed” out of his interview with NBCs Kristen Welker.

The reality was a little more subtle.

Its easy to second-guess. The natural tension that comes with interviewing any politician for television – but especially this president, who can dominate this kind of sit-down – calls for split-second judgments.

Having numerous times – especially in a high-stakes session two weeks before the election, at his invitation – gives me a certain perspective.

Things did not end well with Welker:

“Youre crooked, your press is crooked, And Meet the Press is crooked.”

“To be fair, Im not crooked.”

“Really? Well, you play right into their hands then. Youre either crooked or youre stupid.”

Geez.

And then: “Sorry. Lets call it quits because Ive had enough. Thank you, darling. Have a good time.”

Im pretty sure Trump has never called me darling. He does seem to treat certain women differently.

The other day he ripped CNNs Kaitlan Collins for asking a question, saying shes “beautiful” but he never sees her smile and that she has “hatred in her eyes.” Even in the Welker interview, Trump said ABC, CBS and CNN were also crooked.

Its close to a no-win situation. You prepare a bunch of blue cards, knowing you wont get to everything. No matter how wide-ranging the interview, armchair critics will whack you: 

“Yeah, why didnt you ask that?“

My approach is that youve got to let the guest speak, but jump in when its becoming what senators call a filibuster. And do some real-time fact-checking when you can.

Where Welker fell into a trap, in my view, is that she interrupted Trump so often that it looked like she was debating him.

Now there were times when Welkers persistence paid off. When she asked about the $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization” that even Republican members of Congress are denouncing, there was this exchange.

WELKER: Just to be very clear, are you backing off the fund completely, as your has said, or are you looking for another avenue to revive the fund?

TRUMP: So let me explain what the fund is. People have been hurt so badly by radical left lunatics that worked for the Biden administration and Sleepy Joe. Theyre vicious. 

Theyre violent, what they did to people. And, of course, they went after me more than anybody else. They raided Mar-a-Lago and all the other things. But people have been badly hurt. Theyve committed suicide. Theyve lost their jobs. They’ve lost their families. 

Theyve lost their wives. Theyve lost everything. Theyve lost everything over a fake weaponization of government. Now, let me just tell you—”

WELKER: So are you looking for a way to revive it?

TRUMP: I wouldnt be inclined to say so, but I have to see it. I can tell you this: 97% of those people, you look at them, the FBI or whoever it was, cause you had a lot of crooked cops, you had dirty cops. Comey was a dirty cop. A guy like Bolton was a dirty cop.”

WELKER: But there is no evidence that people who—”

TRUMP: Wait a minute. You think Comey was a straight cop?

WELKER: We had 170 people who pleaded guilty to assaulting police officers.

TRUMP: Comey was a dirty cop. 

“But the people who assaulted police officers,” Welker shot back.

“I dont know whats going to happen with the weaponization fund. I love the idea, because people like you, the fake dirty press, the crooked press, people like stupid Biden, hes not smart enough to know whats going on, but people that surrounded him, surrounded his beautiful Resolute Desk in the , what they did to the lives of people, they destroyed people. They sent people to jail who did nothing wrong.”

Welker interjected again. “Just to be very clear, theres no evidence of what youre saying.”

“Theres a lot