CNN host Chris Cuomo to Trump: Being called 'fake news' is 'like an ethnic disparagement' for journalists

Screenshot/CNN

CNN anchor Chris Cuomo on Thursday said being labeled "fake news" was similar to an "ethnic disparagement."

"It's like an ethnic disparagement," Cuomo said. "We all have these ugly words for people — that's the one for journalists."

Cuomo made the comments after President Donald Trump again suggested that CNN was fake news.

"Chris Cuomo, in his interview with Sen. Blumenthal, never asked him about his long-term lie about his brave 'service' in Vietnam," Trump tweeted on Thursday. "FAKE NEWS!"

After showing the tweet, Cuomo asked his producers to play the clip of the interview he conducted with Sen. Richard Blumenthal, a Connecticut Democrat, in which he brought up what Trump alleged he did not.

"The president of the United States is saying that you should not be believed because you misrepresented your military record in the past," Cuomo said, to which Blumenthal did not directly respond.

The "New Day" host said it was "really, the first point I made in the interview."

"Once again, the president is off on the facts," he continued. "And that's not something that any of us have any desire to say on a regular basis, but it keeps being true."

Cuomo added that being called "fake news" was "the worst thing you can call a journalist."

"He just said, 'You never asked him about it.' I did," he continued. "He ducked it. And that's OK. Politicians duck things all the time. The truth of the matter asserted is whether this judge said what Blumenthal says he said. His own comms guy says it. Nobody denies it except the president of the United States. And once again, he doubles down when he's wrong."

The "major lie" Trump was referring to came from Blumenthal's 2010 campaign for Senate, when he had to hold a press conference after he said multiple times that he served "in" the Vietnam War, even though he did not, according to Politico. Blumenthal clarified that he meant to say he served "during" the war, as he was a member of the Marine Corps Reserves for six years during the war but did not serve overseas.

Trump was given five deferments from the military draft, including one that was a result of his receiving a diagnosis of bone spurs in his heels.

He never served in the military.

Blumenthal came under attack from Trump after he told reporters Wednesday that the president's nominee for the vacant Supreme Court seat, Judge Neil Gorsuch of the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals, told him in a meeting that Trump's recent attacks on the judiciary were "disheartening" and "demoralizing." A representative for the Supreme Court nomination team confirmed to Business Insider that Blumenthal's retelling of the conversation was accurate.

Watch Cuomo's comments below:

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