Stephen Colbert ripped into White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt for her latest defense of one of President Trump’s gaffes.
During Trump’s speech at the World Economic Forum on Wednesday, NewsNation reporter Libbey Dean observed in an X post that the president repeatedly mixed up Greenland and Iceland.
Leavitt responded to Dean on X, “No, he didn’t... His written remarks referred to Greenland as a ‘piece of ice’ because that’s what it is. You’re the only one mixing anything up here.”
Stephen Colbert didn’t buy the response from Leavitt at all.
“That is some grade-A Big Brother propaganda,” Colbert replied, referring to the tyrannical, near-omnipotent dictator from the popular dystopian novel 1984.
Referencing one of the most famous lines from the book, Colbert joked further, “As George Orwell wrote in 1984: war is peace, freedom is slavery, Karoline Leavitt is a dumba**."
Colbert wasn’t the only TV host to call out the 28-year-old.
CNN’s Jake Tapper also criticized Leavitt’s claim. He posted a video on X fact-checking her, and he did not mince words either.
“I mean, you know that that was filmed, right?” Tapper said to Leavitt. “Let’s roll the tape...”
Tapper played multiple clips from Trump’s speech. All of them, especially the one where he addressed the stock market dip on Tuesday, made clear Trump was indeed confusing the two countries.
Tapper also referenced 1984 in his video, saying, “This all reminds me of this great, horrifying quote from George Orwell’s dystopian novel, 1984: ‘The party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.’“
Tapper continued, “But we don’t live in 1984 and we don’t have to reject the evidence of our eyes and ears. We know that he confused Iceland with Greenland or Greenland with Iceland.“
Tapper told Leavitt, “You can lie to us if you want, but I don’t know why it’s worth it.”
