Chuck Todd Responds to Trump Calling Him a 'Sleeping Son of a Bitch'
Updated | NBC host Chuck Todd on Sunday mostly ignored President Donald Trump calling him a "sleeping son of a bitch" the day before, saving his only reference to the vulgar comment for the last line of his show.
Wrapping up Meet the Press, Todd said only, "That's all we have for today. Neanderthals, sleepy eyes and all, we'll be back next week. If it's Sunday, it's Meet the Press."
Both the "Neanderthal" and "sleepy" references alluded to comments Trump made while speaking to supporters in Moon Township, Pennsylvania, on Saturday.
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Trump took a shot at Todd after mentioning his own 1999 appearance on Meet the Press when he discussed the need to “take out” North Korea.
“A show now headed by ‘Sleepy Eyes Chuck Todd,’” Trump said. “He’s a sleeping son of a bitch."
Todd first addressed the comments on WRC-TV, Washington DC's NBC station, before his Sunday morning show.
"I bring my kids up to respect the office of the presidency and the President," Todd said. "I don’t allow them to say anything negative, ever, about the president."
"It creates a challenge to all parents when he uses vulgarities like that," he said.
Todd wasn't the only journalist Trump targeted during the rally for GOP congressional candidate Rick Saccone on Saturday.
"I read one woman in the Wall Street Journal today," Trump said, apparently referring to piece by Journal columnist Peggy Noonan that was published Thursday. "Nice woman. I like her, actually, Peggy Noonan.”
"She doesn't like me much," he continued. "[S]he is writing like I'm some kind of Neanderthal. And I'm saying, you know, I'm really smart."
Noonan, who appeared as a guest on Todd's program Sunday, said she would never conflate Trump with a Neanderthal—ostensibly to avoid denigrating the archaic human species.
"I would like to note merely he seems to think that in this column I called him a Neanderthal," she said. "I did not, I would not. I've been studying Neanderthals. They had great cave paintings, those paintings spoke of a certain sensibility, a certain artistic complexity, their tribes were organized. I would not call him a Neanderthal because that would not be fair."
Correction: This article originally stated WRC-TV as an NBC affiliate. It is an NBC owned property.