CNN Anchors and Jake Tapper Take Turns Roasting Rick Scott’s ‘Word Salad’ About Jake Tapper

CNN anchor Jake Tapper and the CNN morning crew took turns gleefully roasting Florida Sen. Rick Scott over a “word salad” CNN interview that was chock full of Jake Tapper croutons.

On Thursday morning’s edition of CNN This Morning, Kaitlan Collins interviewed Scott, who authored the proposal at the heart of the explosive moment Republicans heckled Biden at the State of the Union and Biden fired back.

During that grilling, Scott got really fixated on something Tapper said in order to argue that when Democrats legislated savings for Medicare on prescription drugs, they enacted a “cut.”

Collins mocked Scott in the moment, and on Friday morning’s edition of CNN This Morning, Tapper himself showed up to join in with Collins and co-anchors Don Lemon and Poppy Harlow.

Collins introduced the segment by playing highlights of the interview that were accompanied by an onscreen “Jake Tapper Count.” She then played a clip of what Tapper actually said in that 2017 interview with Trump Human Services Secretary Tom Price:

According to the Congressional Budget Office, the health care bill that just passed the House would cut $880 billion over 10 years from Medicaid.

Now, I know that the Trump administration is excited that Medicaid will go back to the states, where they have more control and can experiment and be more efficient, but, without question, 880 billion fewer dollars is a cut.

Collins then introduced Tapper, who went off on Scott’s “incomprehensible” and “strange” “word salad,” and Lemon offered his own assessment:

KAITLAN COLLINS: Joining us now to discuss is see it is Jake Tapper. Jake, what did you make of that, watching that interview, hearing your name be invoked so many times by Senator Scott?

JAKE TAPPER: Well, first of all, a rough morning for anybody that was playing the Jake Tapper drinking game — for eight times in 5 minutes, 10 minutes. It was incomprehensible to me, honest. I mean, there’s so many issues here. One is Senator Rick Scott proposed sunsetting all federal programs every five years. And if they’re worthwhile, then Congress can renew them. That’s his proposal. I mean, just in the last day, the Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, was saying “that’s the Rick Scott plan, it’s not the Republican plan.” And House Speaker McCarthy has been saying the same thing, “that’s not our plan.” But Rick Scott did propose it and he was the head of the National Republican Senatorial Committee when he when he proposed it. So, I mean, that’s just a fact. For whatever reason, Senator Scott didn’t want to stand by that plan. And there isn’t a way to discuss it. But, you know, you can say Medicare and Social Security, there are real issues with their solvency and this is a way to have that conversation, etc. And by all means, they should have that conversation. But the just, the the whatever that was, that that word salad where he kept on mentioning me was just very strange to me because he was trying to compare Medicare now, being able to negotiate drug prices with drug companies, which is not a cut from Medicare, it’s a cut in pharmaceutical company profits, no question. But it’s not a cut in Medicare. With me asking a question about the Congressional Budget Office analysis of a Medicaid bill from 2017, I mean, it’s really just kind of nonsensical.

DON LEMON: Jake, you know what that is? So he didn’t say “Jake Tapper says” when he did his interview on Fox, he didn’t say “Jake Tapper says” when he did his interviews other places, it was someone gave him that talking point, probably saying, “well, you know, they said it on CNN, Jake Tapper says it” then whatever. And so I think he was using that as a talking point in kind of a gotcha to CNN during Kaitlan’s interview. And she’s right. That’s not the offense that you think it is. So I think that’s what it was. But I think it obviously fell flat.

JAKE TAPPER: Yeah. And look, when he went on Fox, not this week, but recently to try to defend this Rescue America plan, he accused Fox of reading Democratic talking points. John Roberts … And and all John was doing was literally reading the Rick Scott plan. So, look, I’m not here to — the same as all of you — I’m not here to take a position on his plan. This is his plan. I’m not pro-Rick Scott plan. I’m not anti-Rick Scott plan. I’m just “here is what he is proposing.” And obviously, he doesn’t want to defend it. He wants to change the subject, which is an odd thing to do. But that’s also his prerogative.

Scott isn’t the only GOP senator with a plan to sunset entitlements. Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin suggested sunsetting the plans even more frequently. RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel endorsed Scott’s entire plan, as did Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville, Indiana Sen. Mike Braun, and Florida Congressman Matt Gaetz.

Watch above via CNN This Morning.