Trump plays CNN charts at his Texas rally: ‘They have to be credible when they’re positive’

Donald Trump has settled the media credibility question: a network is believable exactly when it agrees with him. Near the end of Tuesday’s rally in Corpus Christi, he introduced some CNN segments he’d brought along: “they’re really sort of amazing because CNN did them. They have to be credible when they’re positive. So I thought I’d put them up.”

Up they went. On the screens, CNN chief data analyst Harry Enten walked through his numbers: 99% of “MAGA GOP” voters went for Trump in 2024, 98% approve of him now, and 53% of Republicans call him the Republican president they most admire, ahead of Reagan at 18% and Lincoln at 8%. Those are CNN’s figures, as played. Enten joked that the slide might end up printed out at Trump’s desk. It ended up on a jumbotron instead.

“Thank you, CNN,” Trump said. Two days earlier, he told FOX 2 Detroit that CNN had him at “99% within the Republican Party.” The 99% on Tuesday’s screen was something else: MAGA Republicans’ vote for him in 2024. CNN’s own latest poll, from 15 to 18 October, has his overall approval at 32%. Credible, presumably, only when it’s positive.