Fox News has been predictably apoplectic after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi ripped up her copy of President Donald Trump’s State of the Union address at the end of his Tuesday night speech.
Dagen McDowell’s reaction, however, truly stood out as the most overblown of the bunch.
At the top of Fox News’ afternoon talk show Outnumbered, the panel immediately took aim at Pelosi for her public display.
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“I thought it was immature, I thought it was contrived,” former Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-UT), serving as the female-centric show’s “One Lucky Guy,” said. “I don’t think it was a spontaneous moment. I think she went over the top. I think they lost control of their discipline. It’s so disappointing.”
The rest of the hosts, meanwhile, expressed concern over the erosion of norms and decorum, with Capri Cafaro—the panelist billed as a “liberal”—claiming there will be a lot of mainstream Democrats frustrated by “everyone is stooping to this level.”
The show’s main host Harris Faulkner then played a clip of Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-MI) calling Trump’s speech the “most partisan State of the Union” she has ever witnessed, prompting McDowell to go off on Pelosi for such partisanship.
“I would think Nancy Pelosi—or at least I thought until last night—that she was politically smarter than that,” the Fox Business anchor grumbled. “She won that job back because of moderates in this country.”
Complaining that Pelosi couldn’t applaud the “prosperity” voters are feeling because of “what President Trump has done,” McDowell said the speaker instead “chose to lick her lips like she had lipstick on her teeth” rather than clap when Trump awarded a scholarship to a young girl.
“I will say this, President Trump called Nancy Pelosi a third-rate politician,” the host said, continuing her rant. “This was back in October, the last time that they spoke. Last night, she proved that’s exactly what she is.”
“She’s a third-grader, essentially eating toilet paper in protest because she didn’t get a second slice of cake,” McDowell growled in conclusion. “I call her Speaker Veruca Salt. ‘I want it and I want it now!’ She’s a petulant child throwing a temper tantrum. That’s what America got to see.”
Co-host Melissa Francis, meanwhile, was sufficiently impressed.
“Mmm, burn,” she reacted.
