Santaland Back at Chestnut Ridge

CNN's Abby Phillip brutally fact-checked a MAGA pundit during Monday's broadcast of her show "NewsNight" over the White House's claim that left-wing rhetoric inspired the shooting at the White House Correspondents' Dinner on Saturday.

Ben Ferguson, who co-hosts the "Verdict" podcast with Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) joined the panel to discuss the shooting, and defended the White House's claim that Democrats inspired the shooter to attack the event. He pointed to recent statements from Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) and language the shooter included in his alleged manifesto as evidence that the rhetoric inspired the attack.

Phillip fact-checked Ferguson's claims with a couple of clips putting the Democrats' statements into their full context, and highlighting how Trump has spoken of Democrats the same way he has accused them of speaking about him.

"The point is that it's not that Donald Trump is responsible for violence against those people. The point is that it's not enough to explain that the moment we are in is just, 'Did he call her a fascist? Did she call him a fascist?'" Phillip said. "Because that is happening on both sides of the debate. There is more that is contributing to where we are as a country, and it is bad. It is unquestionably bad. And if we fail to actually address the root causes, we are going nowhere."