Donald Trump is raging against 'crazy,' 'sleaze' and 'low-rated' media outlets
Over the weekend and going into Monday, the Republican presidential front-runner has slammed CNBC, The Wall Street Journal, Fortune magazine, and others.
Trump's media insults have particularly rained down on CNBC's John Harwood, who moderated last week's debate on the network. Harwood's first question to Trump there was whether the businessman was running a "comic-book" version of a campaign.
"This guy John Harwood, was he a dope?" Trump mused during a Saturday campaign rally in Norfolk, Virginia. "What a dope. What a fool. And look what it cost NBC - it hurt their reputation. It's a shame, actually. But he was really a jerk. But at the same time, I don't care."
And during a Monday morning interview on "Breitbart News Daily," Trump further called Harwood a "sleaze" and "not a good guy" due to his "disgusting" attacks against the billionaire magnate during the CNBC debate.
Trump appeared slightly more humble during a campaign rally in Iowa last Tuesday, where he held back some of his more pointed insults against the media - such as when he called the press "scum" the day before. He admitted he was behind retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson in polls of the state and pleaded with Iowans to get his numbers back up.
But Trump ratcheted up his criticism of the media over the weekend. At his Saturday rally in Virginia, Trump accused the media of playing up a national poll that had Carson leading the Republican field, which he said he didn't believe anyway. He slammed the media coverage of the poll as "bigger than Benghazi with Hillary."
"Oh they were so happy - I have never seen a poll get more play than this poll," Trump complained.
He also fired off a number of tweets attacking various outlets.
He warned The Journal that they better be "careful" or he would punish the paper: