The tension between Donald Trump and the press has always been combative, but in recent weeks it’s intensified, narrowing its focus and sharpening its edge. His harshest outbursts now land squarely on female reporters, fueling a public debate the White House keeps insisting isn’t about gender. But the pattern keeps repeating itself, louder each time, and people are paying attention.
What once would’ve been unthinkable for a sitting president — openly mocking a journalist’s appearance, throwing around insults that sound more like schoolyard taunts than presidential remarks, even using ableist slurs against elected officials — has gradually become his default tone. His supporters call it candor. His critics call it cruelty. Whatever it is, the latest string of attacks has pushed the tension between the media and the administration into a new phase.
In early November, when a Bloomberg White House correspondent pressed him about the Epstein files, Trump snapped, “Quiet, piggy.” The insult ricocheted through the newsroom world within minutes. A few days later, he turned his attention to a CNN reporter, calling her “nasty” and “stupid” when she asked a straightforward question about foreign policy. It wasn’t the first time he’d dismissed a woman this way, and it didn’t look like it would be the last.
Thanksgiving didn’t soften his mood. On Truth Social, he targeted Minnesota Governor Tim Walz with an ableist insult. Then he pivoted to Rep. Ilhan Omar, slipping into xenophobic language, calling her “the worst ‘Congressman/woman’ in our Country… always wrapped in her swaddling hijab.” Even longtime political observers, desensitized by years of incendiary rhetoric, paused.
Days later, when another female journalist questioned him about details surrounding a suspect in an attack on National Guard members in Washington, D.C., he fired back with a flat, biting, “Are you stupid? Are you a stupid person?” It wasn’t anger. It was contempt — blunt, intentional, and public.
Kaitlan Collins, CNN’s chief White House correspondent, became the next target. During a press conference, she questioned him about a series of controversial renovations at the White House — including a privately funded ballroom he repeatedly claims is “under budget and ahead of schedule.” A routine press question, delivered calmly. Hours later, he blasted her on Truth Social, misspelling her name and writing, “Caitlin Collin’s of Fake News CNN, always Stupid and Nasty…”
CNN responded quickly and without theatrics, describing Collins as “an exceptional journalist audiences trust for clear, factual reporting.” Collins didn’t rage publicly. Instead, she posted a quiet correction on Instagram: “Technically my question was about Venezuela.” She was referring to a deadly bombing off the Venezuelan coast that killed more than 80 people — an attack widely criticized amid speculation over a potential “double tap” strike. The Pentagon denies wrongdoing, insisting all operations remain in line with U.S. and international law.
At the same time, another front opened. Trump grew irritated with coverage about his physical stamina. The New York Times reported that he had been showing “signs of fatigue” and confronting “the realities of aging in office.” Rather than ignore it, he attacked the outlet online, calling the reporters “Creeps at the Failing New York Times” and insisting, “I have never worked so hard in my life.”
Then, perhaps attempting to reassure supporters, he added a curious note: “There will be a day where my energy will run out, but my medical tests show that won’t be anytime soon.” The Times stood by its reporting. “Name-calling and personal insults don’t change that,” spokesperson Charlie Stadtlander said. “Our journalists will not hesitate to cover this administration.”
Despite this very visible pattern — nearly all of the targeted reporters being women — the White House continues to insist the president’s behavior isn’t about gender. “President Trump has never been politically correct, never holds back, and in large part, the American people re-elected him for his transparency,” spokeswoman Abigail Jackson told The Independent. “This has nothing to do with gender — it has everything to do with the fact that the President’s and the public’s trust in the media is at all-time lows.”
But the explanation doesn’t match the optics. Over and over, it is women asking tough questions who are met with the sharpest attacks. Women whose professionalism is dismissed with a single word — nasty, stupid, incompetent. Women who walk into the room prepared, only to be reduced by one sneer from the podium.
Inside newsrooms, the conversations are less about shock and more about exhaustion. Reporters know the game by now. Ask a serious question, risk becoming a headline yourself. Push for clarity, brace for an insult. Challenge a claim, prepare for the online wave of harassment that often follows the president’s remarks. For female journalists especially, the backlash tends to escalate quickly: sexist slurs, threats, doxxing attempts, and constant attempts to undermine their authority.
For Collins, and others like her, the response is to stay steady — keep asking the questions, keep reporting the facts, keep showing up to a job that now requires as much resilience as it does skill.
The deeper issue is the long-term damage. When the president publicly ridicules journalists, especially women, it gives others a permission slip. It lowers the bar for acceptable public discourse and makes hostility toward the press feel normal — even justified. Reporters covering this administration already face more aggressive crowds, more online vitriol, and more attempts to delegitimize their work.
Political strategists are split. Some say Trump’s attacks on the press are deliberate — a way to rally supporters, reframe criticism as bias, and cast himself as a victim of media persecution. Others say it’s emotional impulse, pure frustration erupting in real time. But whether intentional or not, the effect is the same: a relentless strain on the relationship between the administration and the journalists tasked with holding it accountable.
For now, nothing suggests the tension is easing. Each insult lands a little harder. Each exchange becomes a little more heated. And reporters — especially the women who keep finding themselves in the crosshairs — continue doing the work anyway, asking the hard questions in rooms where the temperature rises the moment they open their mouths.
In an era where truth already feels fragile, the battle over who gets to ask questions — and who has the right to demean those who do — is shaping into one of the defining struggles of this political moment.