President Donald Trump clashed with an NBC News reporter Friday after she pressed him on his support for a controversial Ohio campaign ad from Republican gubernatorial nominee Vivek Ramaswamy.
Trump had a heated exchange with NBC reporter Monica Alba after once again defending the ad, which features Democratic nominee Amy Acton’s estranged mother calling her a liar. Ramaswamy has confirmed that his campaign paid for the ad, in which Acton’s mother, Donna Arthur, calls her a “liar” and suggests she has mental health issues.
Referring to the ad, Trump said a mother was essentially warning voters not to put her daughter in office because she is “a terrible person” and “a liar.”
Alba then asked him, “But do the sexual abuse allegations mean nothing to you?” Trump kept talking, and Alba kept repeating the question.
“Who are you with?” Trump asked. “I am with NBC, sir,” Alba said. “One of the worst networks you have,” Trump replied. As Alba kept questioning him, Trump told her to be quiet and then said, “You’re a horrible little reporter, aren’t you?”
Trump defended the ad by arguing that Democrats would use similar criticism against him from his own mother. “If my mother said bad things about me, do you think the Democrats would put it up?” He added that Arthur also said her daughter lied about her opponent, Ramaswamy.
Alba pointed out that Acton’s mother stayed with the stepfather accused of raping Acton. Trump again told her to be “quiet” and said he did not know anything about the stepfather.
The president first weighed in a day earlier. In a Truth Social post Thursday, Trump called it “a very powerful Ad” about a mother saying her daughter is a liar. He also accused the press of a “concerted and well coordinated attack” aimed at getting Ramaswamy to take the ad down.
The ad has drawn criticism from both parties, including from inside the GOP. Ohio’s Republican governor, Mike DeWine, has said Ramaswamy should pull it. “It needs to be taken down,” DeWine said Thursday. Nikki Haley, who clashed with Ramaswamy in the 2024 GOP presidential debates, also criticized the ad on X.
Ramaswamy’s campaign has said it committed $4 million to air the ad. Since the ad began running, Acton has been narrowly favored to win.
The exchange was the latest of several this week. Trump also lashed out at CNN’s Kaitlan Collins and an ABC News reporter as they questioned him.
