Donald Trump’s daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, has denied that the president called a reporter “piggy” during an infamous Air Force One press gaggle.
Earlier this month, Trump told Bloomberg White House correspondent Catherine Lucey, “quiet, piggy,” after she asked about the government files related to the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
At the time, Trump was vehemently opposed to releasing the so-called Epstein files. He later reversed course and signed a bill forcing the Justice Department to release the files, despite his having the power to do so without Congressional approval.
Trump’s insult gained backlash, including from comedian Jimmy Kimmel, who joked on his late-night show, “If a man spoke like that to a female coworker in a workplace harassment training video, you’d go, ‘Ah, that’s over the top. Nobody would do that.”
Kimmel has been critical of Trump in the past, and the president celebrated his show’s brief suspension in September following comments he made about the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
Fellow comedian Bill Maher, who identifies as a liberal, also called out Trump’s comments during a sit-down with Lara on his podcast Club Random.
He was telling Lara about how he believes “woke” people are “snobs” for refusing to eat with conservatives at Thanksgiving dinner.
“What do we think we do to get the people who are the no-contact people back?” Lara asked.
Maher responded: “Don’t do things like call a woman, ‘piggy.’”
Lara then questioned, “Do we know that happened?”
“I saw it on tape,” Maher responded.
Lara later admitted that “Donald Trump is not perfect,” causing Maher to do a spit take. “But he does a lot of things that I think are great,” the former Republican National Committee co-chair added.
A White House official previously told The Independent that the reporter Trump insulted “behaved in an inappropriate and unprofessional way towards her colleagues on the plane”.
“If you’re going to give it, you have to be able to take.”
Bloomberg defended its reporters who cover the Trump administration, telling The Guardian, “Our White House journalists perform a vital public service, asking questions without fear or favor.”
“We remain focused on reporting issues of public interest fairly and accurately,” the Bloomberg spokesperson said.
