CNN contributor Angela Rye on Monday called out conservative commentator Rick Santorum and accused him of "talking down" to her because she had a different opinion than him about President Donald Trump's mental health.
During a panel discussion about reports that Trump's schedule is shrinking in favor of more so-called "executive time", Santorum said that the transition was normal.
"Every president has downtime or time just for him to be able to... talk to people," the former Republican presidential candidate opined. "Yeah, clearly the president watches television. I don't think there's any question about that."
"The fact that he does it in the Oval, I don't think is a big deal," he added.
Rye, however, had a different take.
"I find it very disconcerting," she said. "I find it hard to understand that someone who is a working professional would need three hours in the morning to do whatever. If he needs downtime, here's I suggest he use it. Put down the remote, put down your phone and stay off of Twitter, put down other things besides human beings, put down everything that you're doing to make this office a disgrace."
Santorum immediately shot back: "This is the kind of disqualifying commentary that we see from the left."
"It's not disqualifying because you don't like it," Rye interrupted.
"It is," Santorum snapped. "Because you're basically saying, 'Whatever the president does is wrong.'"
"That's not what I said," Rye pointed out.
"I don't know if you know, but the president is a pretty stressful office," Santorum remarked.
"Former Sen. Santorum," Rye chimed in, "let me give you also a recommendation. Speaking of down, what you should not do is not talk down to another fellow commentator on the same network. So, you don't have to agree with my commentary at all. But it is certainly not disqualifying because I disagree with you."
"And it certainly is disqualifying if a work professional spends the first three hours of the workday spending time relaxing when they need to get abreast on foreign policy issues, domestic policy issues, making sure that they can manage their team instead of then wreaking havoc all over the country and certainly in the White House," she added. "I don't think that it's right for you to talk down to a fellow commentator because you don't like what I said."
For his part, Santorum insisted that the remarks were not personal.
"I wasn't talking down to you," he said. "I was talking down to the comments that you made."
"I disagree with that," Rye concluded.
Watch the video below from CNN.
