Liberals lash out at CNN's Kasie Hunt over her 'threat' to Dems dropping paid leave from massive spending bill

CNN journalist Kasie Hunt said she would be aiming to hear from suburban women disappointed with Democrats and many liberals lashed out at her over her tweet.

Hunt was referring to reports that Democrats were dropping paid family and medical leave from the "Build Back Better" legislation pushed by President Joe Biden. The tanking of a pivotal policy supported by Biden and many progressives was seen as a massive blow to their agenda.

Hunt implied that suburban women would be disappointed with Democrats and that she would interview them ahead of the midterm elections in 2022.

Initially, Biden and the Democrats had called for 12 weeks of paid leave in the bill, but that was whittled down to four weeks after objections to the cost of the legislation by Sens. Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona and Joe Manchin of West Virginia, both Democrats. On Wednesday, reports indicated that all paid leave was to cut out of the bill.

Many on the left were infuriated that Hunt would imply that Democrats were to blame for the failure to secure paid leave. Some accused her of threatening Democrats with her reporting.

"Oh, is making threats how it works now? Cool. Lemme try," replied Elie Mystal of the Nation sarcastically. "If voter suppression bills are allowed to stand, I'm going to spend the midterms covering how white people in the media don't give a s*** about democracy."

"Already right-wing CNN employee promises to become more brazen about being right-wing," tweeted Parker Molloy, a liberal writer.

"I'm not wrong to construe this as a bizarre threat to seek out bad coverage on the backs of an incredibly specific group of people, am I?" said another critic.

"So you are going to do everything you can to get Republicans elected—NONE of whom voted for paid leave. Brilliant strategy," tweeted a detractor.

"Your time would be better spent asking GOP members of Congress and the Senate why they refused to give the time of day to women and the issues that women most care about, and continue to act against those interests. But apparently that's not a ratings grabber," read another tweet.

Some Democrats have vowed to fight on to keep paid leave in the massive spending bill.

Kasie Hunt previously worked at MSNBC before leaving in July to join CNN.

Here's more about the death of paid leave:

Paid family leave could be dropped from reconciliation bill due to Manchin's objectionwww.youtube.com