{"id":6424,"date":"2026-07-15T05:53:43","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T00:53:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=6424"},"modified":"2026-07-15T05:53:43","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T00:53:43","slug":"cnns-jake-tapper-gobsmacked-by-guests-trump-theory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=6424","title":{"rendered":"CNN&#8217;s Jake Tapper Gobsmacked By Guest&#8217;s Trump Theory"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div id=\"post-body\">\n<p>CNN\u2019s <strong>Jake Tapper<\/strong> was surprised by a guest\u2019s take on President <strong>Donald Trump<\/strong>\u00a0and asked if she was suggesting Trump is a secret \u201cDemocratic operative.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Tapper brought on <strong>Xochitl Hinojosa<\/strong>, a former communications director with the Democratic National Committee, and <strong>Mike Dubke<\/strong>, a former White House communications director during Trump\u2019s first term, on Tuesday\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mediaite.com\/tag\/the-lead\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><em>The Lead,<\/em><\/a> and during a discussion about the midterms, Hinojosa argued it looked like Trump was trying to purposefully \u201csabotage\u201d Republicans.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe\u2019s not talking about the war, he\u2019s not talking about gas prices, he is not talking about prices at the grocery store or all these great things that Mike just talked about. What he is talking about is that potentially two senators from Georgia were illegitimate. He is talking the 2020 election, which, why are we looking back?\u201d Hinojosa said, referring to the president\u2019s scheduled Thursday address to the nation where he will reportedly be discussing the 2020 presidential election.<\/p>\n<p>Hinojosa added she hopes networks do not cover Trump\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mediaite.com\/media\/news\/just-in-trump-announces-primetime-address-to-the-nation-in-new-post\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">address<\/a> live.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThese are conspiracy theories. My hope is that it is not covered live on a lot of networks. But it is. It is a joke, I\u2019m sorry, that he is trying to sabotage the midterm elections for Republicans. This is not what he should be talking about,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAre you saying he\u2019s a Democratic operative?\u201d a surprised Tapper asked.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think maybe,\u201d Hinojosa joked.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe was once a Democrat,\u201d Tapper responded. \u201cThis is a long, long play. That is a long play. That doesn\u2019t make any sense to me.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201c<em>Manchurian Candidate<\/em> territory,\u201d Dubke joked, referring to the 1962 film starring<strong> Frank Sinatra<\/strong> or the 1959 novel it\u2019s based on by <strong>Richard Condon<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI know. Somebody call <strong>Budd Schulberg<\/strong>,\u201d Tapper added, referring to the screenwriter behind films like 1954\u2019s <em>On the Waterfront<\/em> and 1957\u2019s <em> A Face in the Crowd<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>Watch above via <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/shows\/the-lead.\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">CNN<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><em><strong>New: The Mediaite One-Sheet &#8220;Newsletter of Newsletters&#8221;<\/strong><br \/>Your daily summary and analysis of what the many, many media newsletters are saying and reporting. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mediaite.com\/subscribe\">Subscribe now!<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><script type=\"text\/javascript\">\n!function(f,b,e,v,n,t,s){if(f.fbq)return;n=f.fbq=function(){n.callMethod?\nn.callMethod.apply(n,arguments):n.queue.push(arguments)};if(!f._fbq)f._fbq=n;\nn.push=n;n.loaded=!0;n.version='2.0';n.queue=[];t=b.createElement(e);t.async=!0;\nt.src=v;s=b.getElementsByTagName(e)[0];s.parentNode.insertBefore(t,s)}(window,\ndocument,'script','https:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/fbevents.js');\n<\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>CNN\u2019s Jake Tapper was surprised by a guest\u2019s take on President Donald Trump\u00a0and asked if she was suggesting Trump is a secret \u201cDemocratic operative.\u201d Tapper brought on Xochitl Hinojosa, a former communications director with the Democratic National Committee, and Mike Dubke, a former White House communications director during Trump\u2019s first term, on Tuesday\u2019s The Lead,&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6425,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.mediaite.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/tapper.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6424","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newsweek-trending"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6424","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6424"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6424\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6425"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6424"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6424"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6424"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}