Lawrence O'Donnell: Trump Actually Wants You to Watch CNN
*By Max Godnick*
One of MSNBC's most well known on-air personalities thinks the President of the United States would rather audiences watch CNN.
"He never says the letters MSNBC," said Lawrence O'Donnell in an interview with Cheddar on Monday. "We have a much bigger audience than CNN and he would prefer people to watch CNN."
The host of "The Last Word" said he thinks Trump's anti-CNN rhetoric is meant to increase the network's viewership so that audiences can hear from pundits who agree with him. Unlike MSNBC, CNN uses conservative commentators like Rick Santorum, S.E. Cupp and Jason Miller to diversify its panels with voices from both sides of the aisle.
"A good third of the show will be a spirited, and insane and lying, defense of Donald Trump," said O'Donnell about CNN.
O'Donnell's own network made headlines when [Rachel Maddow broke down in tears](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKuIjT-k-C8) last week while reading a breaking news report about the existence of "tender age" shelters for the babies and toddlers of illegal immigrants caught crossing the border. Maddow hosts the network's 9 o'clock hour and was handing over coverage to O'Donnell when the moment occurred.
O'Donnell told Cheddar that he was originally supposed to read the report, not Maddow.
"I was afraid of reading it because I didn't think I could get through it," he said. "I'm a real crybaby, Rachel is the hardest person in the world to crack."
The host said it was his colleague's tearful display that allowed him to stay composed on air.
"Rachel strengthened me," O'Donnell said. "I was able to be less emotional because Rachel was expressing my emotions for me."
Cable news networks devoted wall-to-wall coverage to the family separation crisis at the border. After a days-long standoff that saw some members of the president's own party rebuke his policy, Trump signed an executive order that ended the practice. O'Donnell said Trump's reversal does not mean networks like MSNBC will stop covering the aftermath.
"We're going to continue to get more secret recordings of children out of these jails," he said.
For the full segment, [click here.](https://cheddar.com/videos/lawrence-odonnell-sounds-off-on-the-cable-news-landscape)
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