‘Can I Finish Or Are You Guys Gonna Jump In?!’ CNN Newsnight Guest Seethes After Getting Interrupted, Takes a Shot at Show’s Format

A guest on CNN NewsNight fumed after being interrupted during a debate on immigration — then swiped at the show’s contentious format.

In a heated discussion on President-elect Donald Trump saying he’ll use the military to help in his plan for mass deportations, Independent Veterans of America CEO and Iraq War veteran Paul Rieckhoff knocked the very show he was on as he pushed back on support for the military being deployed to American cities to support in deportation efforts.

Rieckhoff and CNN contributor Scott Jennings shot back and forth on the topic and the exchange followed a separate heated exchange over the military being sent to the southern border. In that testy debate, Rieckhoff ended up asking Jennings if he’d served in uniform.

“The challenge of sorting through them is mammoth. We had a hard time doing it in Iraq. Our troops have had a hard time doing it in Afghanistan, trying to ask them to sort through who is who and implement it. So I’ll see this over here in the United States. It’s like nothing we’ve ever seen,” Rieckhoff argued. “I mean, maybe the only precedent we have is internment camps during World War II against Japanese Americans, but there’s not a military precedent for sorting through who on the Upper East Side is an illegal and who is not. And you’re asking a 19 year old holding a weapon who signed up to serve his or her country to thrust themselves into maybe the most fraught political topic that we’ve got in this country twice.”

Jennings pushed back and accused his fellow panelist of insinuating multiple times that the incoming president is targeting American citizens for deportation.

“You twice now insinuated that Trump’s going to send the military to round up American citizens, which is totally false. There are 1.3 to 1.6 million illegal immigrants in this country today who have already received deportation orders from a court. You can start there,” he said. “There’s another population, as Marc said, that have either committed violent crimes in the United States or committed violent crimes where they came from. You can also do that. That has nothing to do with the people in your neighborhood.”

Rieckhoff then pushed Jennings for the specifics of this plan involving the military, including what their mission would be. Jennings argued the military can be used in a supportive capacity for local law enforcements.

“Local law enforcement, county sheriffs, people who know their communities. Because I assume a lot of the local sheriffs and jailers are going to be the people who end up housing some of these folks before they are deported. But there has to be some purpose,” Jennings said.

“So what’s the task and purpose? What’s the mission to a young private? What’s he actually going to be tasked to do? Guard a gate or is he going to investigate?” Rieckhoff said, kicking off crosstalk between the heated pair.

“One at a time,” guest anchor John Berman said.

Jennings then accused Rieckhoff of wanting to leave illegal migrants where they are, calling it “mind boggling,” while Rieckhoff denied this was what he was saying.

Berman stepped in again to ask Rieckhoff what voters are expecting for action from Trump on immigration.

“I think that the voters are saying do something about it. I think broadly across partizan lines, there is is almost universal need for people to do something about it. What you do about it is a totally different story — can I finish?” Rieckhoff said as Marc Lotter, former Trump campaign strategic communications director, tried to step in.

NewsNight, regularly anchored by Abby Phillip, is a panel show set at a table where guests face each other and exchanges often get heated very quickly. Reickhoff noted as he looked around the table that this may be the “normal” for them, but he was having none of it.

“Can I finish or are you guys going to jump in? I know this is like the normal thing around here, but I’m trying to have a conversation without getting cut in half every time,” he said.

Rieckhoff continued by arguing there need to be more specifics in a plan before involving deploying the military. Lotter argued there need to be more specifics in a plan before involving deploying the military.

“We use the military all the time on floods, on other kinds of dangerous situations. And I have a feeling I don’t know to be true,” Lotter got the chance to say after. “But you’re going to have the same theory, which is federal support of state and local leadership. You also have an entire agency in ICE that does this for a living. That’s their job. And I could see an area where the military is in a support role, whether it’s on the border or in these with these agencies or local officials.”

Watch above, via CNN.