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Kellyanne Conway on Jim Acosta Video: It’s ‘Sped Up,’ Not Doctored

“They do it all the time in sports to see if there's actually a first down or a touchdown.”

White House counselor Kellyanne Conway on Sunday pushed back against claims that a video released by the White House was doctored to bolster the Trump administration’s allegations that CNN reporter Jim Acosta behaved aggressively toward an intern—by admitting that the clip was “sped up.” In an interview on Fox News Sunday, Conway insisted that the video being “sped up” does not mean it was “altered.” “Well that's not altered,” she told host Chris Wallace. “That's sped up. They do it all the time in sports to see if there's actually a first down or a touch down,” she said. The video, released by White House press secretary Sarah Sanders to justify the administration’s decision to pull Acosta’s White House access, was made by far-right news outlet InfoWars. In it, what appeared in the original footage to be Acosta’s arm accidentally brushing against that of a White House intern as she tried to take a microphone from him, was made to look like an aggressive push. The White House claimed Acosta had “put his hands on” the young intern, an accusation reiterated by Conway on Sunday. “As a woman whose had people put their hands on me, thinking they have a right to get in my personal space … I don’t like him pulling that mic back and doing on her arm, it looked like a karate chop almost,” she said.

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