President Donald Trump defended his lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, on Monday when answering questions from reporters, saying that Giuliani dismantled CNN’s Chris Cuomo during a recent appearance on the network.
Trump made the remarks in response to a reporter asking him if he is “happy with the way Rudy Giuliani has been handling the Ukraine situation.”
“I think he was excellent,” Trump responded. “I watched him the other night, I haven’t watched that show in a long time, I don’t watch CNN, because it’s fake news.”
“I watched Rudy take apart Fredo. Fredo’s performance was incompetent. Rudy took him apart,” Trump continued. “Rudy Giuliani took Fredo to the cleaners.”
Fredo is a fictional character from the movie “The Godfather” who “was known as the weakest and least intelligent brother of the Corleone crime family,” according to the Free Beacon.
WATCH:
Critics have frequently referred to Cuomo as “Fredo” as a way to mock him, but the nickname for the CNN host became mainstream over the summer after Cuomo had a public meltdown over someone calling him the name to his face.
“I thought that’s who you were,” the man said to Cuomo.
“No, punk-a** b****es from the Right call me Fredo,” Cuomo responded. “My name is Chris Cuomo. I’m an anchor on CNN.”
“Fredo is from ‘The Godfather,’ he was that weak brother and they’re using it as an Italian aspersion,” Cuomo continued. “It’s like the ‘N-word’ for us.”
The man responded to Cuomo’s intense words by remarking, “You’re a much more reasonable guy in person than you seem to be on television.”
Cuomo later said, “You’re going to have a f***ing problem.”
“What are you going to do about it?” the man asked.
Cuomo responded with a string of expletives. “I’ll f***ing ruin your shit,” the CNN host said. “I’ll f***ing throw you down these stairs like a f***ing punk.”
WATCH:
After the infamous incident, Trump helped amplify the nickname for Cuomo, tweeting: “I thought Chris was Fredo also. The truth hurts. Totally lost it! Low ratings @CNN”
Transcript of Giuliani’s conversation with Cuomo provided via CNN:
CUOMO: The President’s Counselor, former Mayor, Rudy Giuliani. Good to have you on the show.
GIULIANI: Oh, I’m glad I’m on tonight because what you just said is totally erroneous.
Every single thing you just said is completely spun in the same direction you’ve been doing for two years with these “Oh, tonight, Papadopoulos is going to prove Russian collusion.” Let me tell you what happened, OK?
CUOMO: Yes.
GIULIANI: What — what happened is that I was investigating, going back to last year, complaints that the Ukrainian people, several people in Ukraine, knew about a tremendous amount of collusion between Ukrainian officials, and Hillary Clinton, and the Democratic National Committee, including a completely fraudulent document that was produced, in order to begin the investigation of Manafort.
They were trying to get to us. But they were being blocked by the Ambassador who was Obama-appointee, in Ukraine, who was holding back this information. In the course of investigating that, I found out this incredible story about Joe Biden that he bribed the President of the Ukraine in order to fire a prosecutor who was investigating his son.
That is an astounding scandal, of major proportions, which all of you have covered up, for about five or six months. You’ve also covered up the fact that Biden and his son took $1.5 billion out of China.
And that’s why the President thinks you’re a corrupt media, because if this would — President Trump and Donald Trump Jr., and they took millions of dollars from a corrupt oligarch in the Ukraine, and they took $1.5 billion out of China, while the President was negotiating with China, you would be screaming, and yelling, and going crazy about how corrupt it is. And because it’s Joe Biden, and he’s a protected Democrat, you don’t cover it.
CUOMO: All right. GIULIANI: This scandal is a scandal–
CUOMO: I–
GIULIANI: –of major proportion. Now, was I–
CUOMO: Are you — are you done now?
GIULIANI: No, I’m not done now.
CUOMO: Because you haven’t said anything — you have well–
GIULIANI: No.
CUOMO: But you can’t just talk the whole time, Rudy.
GIULIANI: I have — I haven’t done — I haven’t — I haven’t said anything yet.
CUOMO: You can’t say that everything I said was erroneous.
GIULIANI: I haven’t said anything yet.
CUOMO: When I didn’t say anything that’s untrue yet.
GIULIANI: No, you did.
CUOMO: By your own reckoning.
GIULIANI: You said I was investigating–
CUOMO: What did I say?
GIULIANI: –it for political purposes. I was not.
CUOMO: You — I said you — I said–
GIULIANI: I’m a lawyer, Chris.
CUOMO: I know what you are.
GIULIANI: I’m a defense lawyer.
CUOMO: I know what you are.
GIULIANI: That’s protected by the United States Constitution.
CUOMO: Which raises the question why were you investigating this? Why did you back away from the trip when it got scrutiny?
GIULIANI: Because I was told–
CUOMO: Why did you wind up meeting in Spain instead of Ukraine?
GIULIANI: –because I was told that the people at the meeting with the President were people who work for George Soros. And George Soros had been funding this whole thing from the very, very beginning. Not only that. That was corroborated–
CUOMO: That’s why you backed away?
GIULIANI: Yes. Because they were going to lie about the conversation I was having with the President.
Read the rest of the transcript here.