On the September 21, 2026 edition of The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell on MS NOW, Lawrence O’Donnell apparently became a mind reader. He informed viewers exactly who President Donald Trump supposedly hates, how intensely he hates them, and what secret emotions are driving him.
The episode was later posted under the title “Lawrence: Trump’s perverse jealousy of JFK is driving his destruction of the Kennedy Center.”
O’Donnell said:
“Donald Trump hates a lot of people in this world. He hates huge populations of millions of people. He hates individuals very intently. He started publicly expressing his personal hatred of me 15 years ago when I called him a liar on this program the first time he opened his mouth about President Obama’s birth certificate. He has publicly expressed his hatred of individual members of the press many times since then. Individual members of Congress, actors, singers, football players, anyone.
Donald Trump is extremely generous with his explicit, specific expressions of hatred against named individuals. But it may be that his most extreme individual hatred, the one that consumes him the most now, is for someone who is no longer with us. Someone who fills Donald Trump with the most painful feeling he can ever experience. Jealousy…”
O’Donnell sure uses the word hate a lot. But President Trump has spent his entire public life around people — business associates, employees, customers, construction workers, union members, celebrities, entertainers, athletes, television personalities, members of the media, politicians, journalists, law enforcement, military members, supporters, foreign leaders, and enormous crowds.
Whatever anyone thinks of Trump, “he hates huge populations of millions of people” is O’Donnell’s line, not an accurate description.
Meanwhile, Trump himself has been the target of intense hatred from Democratic politicians and operatives, liberal cable hosts and commentators, Democratic voters, Hollywood actors and celebrities, late-night comedians, musicians, athletes, activists, protesters, progressive advocacy groups, campaign strategists, political organizations, social-media influencers, former government officials, academics, authors, entertainers, and anti-Trump Republicans.
O’Donnell then revealed that the dead president supposedly consuming Trump is John F. Kennedy.
JFK was president from January 1961 to November 1963 — less than three years, not even a full term. Then O’Donnell explained why Trump supposedly cannot stand him:
“The feeling that someone is better than he is at something. Someone is smarter than he is. Wiser than he is. More thoughtful, more articulate, and even from a mind as base as Donald Trump’s, more attractive.”
More attractive? Seconds later, he did it again:
“Imagine what it’s like for Donald Trump to regard a man better educated than he is, more thoughtful, more articulate, more clever, more charming, more intelligent, and better looking.”
There it is again: better looking. Twice in less than a minute, O’Donnell made Kennedy’s face part of his theory about what Donald Trump supposedly thinks.
Where is the evidence that Trump sits around thinking JFK was better looking than him? Where is the evidence that Trump feels inadequate because of Kennedy? And how could Lawrence O’Donnell possibly know that JFK is the person Trump hates most?
He can’t. And Trump’s own words wreck the theory. Trump has called John F. Kennedy “a great guy” and “handsome.” He has compared his tax cuts to “the tax cut that John F. Kennedy proposed 55 years ago.” He campaigned on releasing the JFK assassination files and ordered more of them out. Those are hardly the words and actions of a man supposedly consumed by hatred and jealousy toward John F. Kennedy.
Trump was not trying to erase Kennedy’s name from the building. The Kennedy Center board voted to add Trump’s name alongside John F. Kennedy’s, renaming it The Donald J. Trump and The John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts, commonly shortened to the Trump-Kennedy Center.
There is plenty of irony in O’Donnell accusing Trump of being consumed by hatred. This is the same host who unloads on Trump every night as if insults were the news. He has called Trump “the most cowardly president in American history,” “the stupidest president in American history,” a “pathological liar,” “the worst possible person on earth to be in the White House,” “a deranged president,” and “the laziest and most mentally vacant president in history.” He has said Trump’s behavior showed “the mark of a sociopath” and repeatedly declared that “Trump has lost his mind.” On Monday he added “narcissist,” a “base” mind, and “horrible inadequacy.”
Reporting what Trump actually says and does is one thing. Claiming to know that Trump secretly hates millions of people, hates JFK, feels inadequate next to him, and is jealous because Kennedy was smarter, more charming, and better looking is mind reading.
O’Donnell can speculate all he wants about who Trump hates. But speculation is not evidence, and mind reading is not journalism. It’s fake news.
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