Earlier this week, CNN White House correspondent Kaitlan Collins had a back-and-forth with Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt about President Trump’s comments about people buying too many dolls. If the discourse sounds familiar, Trump has made similar comments before, including back in May when he was arguing for tariffs.
“If the economy is as strong as the president has said it is, why is he telling parents two weeks before Christmas that they should only buy two or three dolls for their children?” Collins asked Leavitt during the briefing, per a Mediate story.
Trump: “You can give up certain products. You could give up pencils. Because under the China policy, every child can get 37 pencils. They only need 1 or 2. They don’t need that many. You always need steel. You don’t need 37 dolls for your daughter. 2 or 3 is nice. So we’re doing… pic.twitter.com/aHYTqkg5jy
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) December 10, 2025
The two also discussed inflation:
COLLINS: Inflation is about what it was a year ago, as you know, and grocery prices have been up. So, we’ve covered the economy, but there’s mixed signals in terms of what that looks like. But on–
LEAVITT: Inflation is down from where it was. As measured by the overall CPI, it has slowed to an average 2.5 percent pace. This is down from what the President inherited–
COLLINS: It’s down from where it was at highs at 9 percent, but it’s at about 3 percent.
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Leavitt went on to accuse Collins of failing to report on inflation during Joe Biden’s presidency.
CNN’s Kaitlan Collins Drops Pile of Video Receipts on Trump Spox After Briefing Brawlhttps://t.co/BDQSTAQD30 pic.twitter.com/ckNqQZA1SR
— Tommy moderna-vaX-Topher (@tommyxtopher) December 12, 2025
On her show Thursday night, Collins provided some receipts about inflation, and also about CNN’s own reporting during the Biden era:
COLLINS: Now, despite what Karoline Leavitt argued, we did cover inflation during the Biden administration, whether that was questioning his press secretary or the President himself.
Collins then showed a clip of herself interviewing Biden’s then-press secretary, Jen Psaki, about inflation while he was the president.
“So the bottom line is, we did cover it, and we did certainly ask about it. Of course we did. We covered the news here,” Collins said on the broadcast.
Photo courtesy of the Political Tribune media library.
