Sebastian Gorka's stock is soaring with President Donald Trump after the combative White House deputy assistant sparred with cable channel hosts in recent days.
According to Axios, Trump was asking West Wing staff before he left for Paris on Wednesday, "Did you see Gorka? So great, I mean really, truly great."
The president was particularly giddy about Gorka chiding CNN for its ratings slide, telling morning host Alisyn Camerota more people are interested in cartoons than CNN.
"The amount of time you spend in desperation on a topic that has plummeted you to 13th place in viewership ranking across America — more people watch Nick at Nite cartoons than CNN today," he told her.
And dismissing the controversy over Donald Trump Jr.'s 2016 meeting with a Russian lawyer whom he thought had damaging information on Hillary Clinton, Gorka told MSNBC's Stephanie Ruhle, "Would you like to talk about Mosul, or continue talking about the nothing burger story? . . . The Hillary Clinton campaign collects dirt on Bernie Sanders. Is that unusual?"
To CNN's Anderson Cooper, Gorka said he was "sad to see CNN fall to this . . . I know you want salacious and sensational coverage for your ratings so your corporate sponsors and owners will have more money, but that's not media, that's not reportage. It's just fake news."
Gorka has even taken up a new disparaging term for the media – "the fake news industrial complex," and crediting the label to Andy Surabian, an aide to Trump's chief strategist, Steve Bannon.
According to Axios, Trump has also has loved watching Kellyanne Conway defend him on television – viewing both her and Gorka as people willing to go "into lions' dens."