Former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski locked horns with CNN’s Chris Cuomo over the president’s remarks on a GOP congressman who body-slammed a reporter.

After spending an entire segment trying to prove that joking about violence is never okay, ( if your name is Trump or you are a Republican), Cuomo cluelessly tells his guest in the end, if he ever attempted to kick him, it would be the last thing he ever did on this earth.

On “Cuomo Prime Time” Friday, Cuomo repeatedly tried and failed to get Lewandowski to single out President Donald Trump as being wrong for praising Rep. Greg Gianforte, as he insisted “nobody on the left” would encourage such violent things.

“Why lionize him in front of the crowd, why say he’s your guy?” Cuomo asked about Trump’s comments following Thursday’s incident at a Montana rally.

“Any guy that can do a body slam, he is my type!” Trump said to a cheering crowd Thursday, referring to the Republican congressman’s body-slam of a reporter last year while campaigning. Gianforte, who went on to win the special election and is now up for re-election, pleaded guilty and was sentenced to community service for his actions, according to ABC News.

“Nobody on the left has said anything like that? Why would the president?” Cuomo asked Lewandowski on Friday.

“Well, Chris, I think the rhetoric as it comes to this is just, again it’s way too high,” Lewandowski responded.

“His is way too high. Call his out, Corey,” Cuomo urged, as Lewandowski replied that “it’s going to be on both sides.”

“But I want to hear you say that what Trump said was wrong!” Cuomo insisted, refusing to move on or even accept anything the former Trump campaign manager said.

“What I’m saying is both sides are wrong,” he countered as he repeatedly condemned anyone “condoning this type of violence.”

Lewandowski, who faced his own controversy during the 2016 campaign when a reporter for Breitbart News accused him of forcefully grabbing her at a press event, would not give in to Cuomo’s relentless pressure for a sound bite.

The CNN host had thrown down a challenge to Gianforte earlier, as he likened the crowd’s cheering of Trump’s praise to ancient Romans who roared “when lions mauled someone in the arena.”

“Why does Trump praise bullies? Time and again, he celebrates punks who go after the little guy,” Cuomo told his viewers Friday. “Does it on the world stage with bad guys whom you’re clearly impressed by. And do you it on the rally stage and make no mistake, he wasn’t just getting carried away in the moment.”

“Why does Trump praise bullies? Time and again he celebrates punks.”
In his #ClosingArgument, @ChrisCuomo defines what it means to be a leader, and he uses a certain #NBA superstar as his example.https://t.co/MXKTN5wDSL pic.twitter.com/HNYJ2SVUF4

— Cuomo Prime Time (@CuomoPrimeTime) October 20, 2018

“Everything Gianforte did is weak, okay? He attacked someone who wasn’t a threat, was at every disadvantage, Gianforte showed no control, no confidence, no respect for his office or his constituents or for the law. He is weak,” Cuomo said. “And if he doesn’t like it, he can come body slam me as well. I welcome it.”

He continued his line of reasoning as he pressed Lewandoski later to just admit Trump was wrong. ( It’s unclear why Cuomo could not mentally process the “both sides are wrong” statement).

“Look, it wasn’t the president who body-slammed anyone,” Lewandowski argued after an extended back-and-forth with Cuomo.

“I know! but he’s the one celebrating it,” the exasperated CNN host countered, suggesting Lewandowski was like someone “hypnotized” into not being allowed to say the words.

Lewandowski, meanwhile, defended Trump’s support of the Republican congressman in Montana while he persistently maintained that “we can’t allow” the physical violence.

“There has to be a new decorum,” he said.

“So then say the president shouldn’t have said it! That’s how you get the new decorum!” Cuomo insisted, refusing to accept anything but Lewandowski’s finger pointing at Trump.

The segment went on for many minutes with the two wrestling in a battle of words that finally ended with an amazing show of hypocrisy from Cuomo.

“If you go down and I kick you in the head and then I put out a tweet saying, ‘Whoops I was just kidding,’ that doesn’t clarify anything,” Lewandowski said, referring to comments by former Attorney General Eric Holder who urged his supporters to “kick”  Republicans.

In a complete lack of self-awareness, Cuomo shot back with a typical liberal double standard, touting actions by himself that he condemned in others.

“Corey, the moment that your foot touched my head, it would be the last thing you ever did on this earth, so there’d be no tweeting after,” he said as the two finally agreed to disagree.

A death threat? Nice way to wrap up a painfully tone-deaf lecture on the dangers of rhetoric condoning violence.

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Frieda Powers

Senior Staff Writer
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Originally from New York, Powers graduated from New York University and eventually made her way to sunny South Florida where she has been writing for the BizPacReview team since 2015.

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