CNN’s Kaitlan Collins praises Karoline Leavitt for backing her free press rights in Saudi

ATLANTA, GEORGIA: CNN anchor Kaitlan Collins has shared a rare word of praise for White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt recently.

Collins credited Leavitt for stepping in during a tense moment abroad, when Saudi Arabia’s Royal Guard attempted to bar her from a press event.

Speaking on Heather McMahan’s 'Absolutely Not' podcast aired on Wednesday, Feb 11, Collins recalled the incident, which occurred during a presidential trip to Saudi Arabia with President Donald Trump and other world leaders.

Kaitlan Collins recalls confrontation in Saudi Arabia

Collins said the confrontation began after she shouted a question to Trump as the US press was briefly allowed into a room with foreign leaders.

“We were in Saudi Arabia and we were on a foreign trip with the president and he came in with all the other leaders, including the Saudi crown prince,” Collins said.

“They famously do not like the media there, to put it lightly, and I asked a shouted question to President Trump, who had seen me when the US press came in.”

She noted that Trump did not answer- something she described as normal in those settings.

“He didn’t answer, which is how it works, you shout questions, they either answer or they don’t, it’s their prerogative and then the world leaders left the room,” Collins explained.

But shortly afterward, Saudi officials approached her and told her she would not be permitted to attend the next event.

“The Saudi Royal Guard kind of freaked out because I had dared to ask a question and they’re not used to that there because they don’t have a free press,” she said.

“And so they came up and they said, ‘Okay, well you can’t come into the next event,’ which was like two minutes later, and I was like, ‘That’s not how this works, I belong to the US press,’ and they were like, ‘Well, you’re not coming in.’”

Collins said she could see officials “whispering and pointing” at her as the situation escalated.

Kaitlan Collins says Karoline Leavitt backed her

According to Collins, some younger White House staff members traveling with the press pool were unsure how to respond and took the issue to Leavitt.

“And they went to Karoline, and to her credit she said, ‘No, Kaitlan’s coming in with the rest of the US press,’ and we went in, and so it didn’t become this big issue,” Collins recalled.

She underscored why the moment stood out to her.

“So to her credit, she without a doubt was like, ‘No, you’re coming in,’ which I do think is important in that moment, especially when you’re kind of the US contingent abroad and we don’t do things like they do in Saudi Arabia,” Collins said.

Kaitlan Collins rejects Trump's media bias claims

On the same podcast, Collins rejected criticism by the Trump administration of media being 'unfair' and 'inaccurate'.

Kaitlan said “They always argue the media is biased against them, it doesn't cover them fairly even though we cover them I think fairly and accurately.”