By Matt Hadro | October 17, 2013 | 7:01 PM EDT

After slamming the "Tea Party radicals" who he said initiated the shutdown, CNN's Michael Holmes was admonished by his colleague Jim Acosta on Thursday.

"I mean, first of all, let's be careful about using the term 'radical,' because a lot of those folks feel like they're standing on principle today, even though they didn't come out on top in this," Acosta lectured Holmes.

By Randy Hall | October 1, 2013 | 2:23 PM EDT

During his Monday briefing with reporters in the White House, press secretary Jay Carney was asked several times how president Barack Obama would respond to a partial government shutdown. The most interesting query came from Cable News Network's senior White House correspondent Jim Costa, who asked if the Democrats have been using heightened rhetoric to attack Republicans and “trying to taunt” the GOP into doing a shutdown.

“In the last couple of weeks, Democrats including the president have -- and he has not used all these words but I’ll throw out some of them -- have referred to Republicans as arsonists, anarchists, extortionists, blackmailers, hostage takers,” Acosta noted. Even Dan Pfeiffer, assistant to the president and senior advisor to the president for strategy and communications, “talked about bombs being strapped to chests.”

By Matt Hadro | May 16, 2013 | 12:45 PM EDT

CNN's senior legal analyst thinks there's too much "hysteria" over the IRS scandal and that it really may not have been that big of a story to begin with. He argued thus on the 11 a.m. ET hour of Thursday's Newsroom.

CNN's Jeffrey Toobin's spin went as follows: "the IRS is required by law to investigate these organizations," and "it's not clear that there were liberal organizations applying, certainly, in the numbers that the Tea Party were," and "A lot of these organizations that are complaining wound up getting approved for 501(c)(4) status. So what are their damages?" Ergo, "we need to know a lot more, but we need perhaps a little less hysteria, too."

By Randy Hall | February 7, 2013 | 9:28 AM EST

Giving advice is easy; accepting it, not so much. One day after Chris Christie downed a doughnut and joked that he's “the healthiest fat guy you've ever seen in your life” on Monday night's edition of “The Late Show With David Letterman,” a medical expert on presidential health said the New Jersey governor's weight is no laughing matter.

"I'm worried he may have a heart attack. I'm worried he may have a stroke," former White House physician Connie Mariano said in an interview with Jim Acosta, CNN's national political correspondent regarding the GOP "heavyweight."

By Matt Hadro | January 21, 2013 | 4:22 PM EST

CNN correspondent Jim Acosta was positively giddy while covering President Obama's inauguration parade on Monday afternoon, and didn't hold back his feelings on-air.

"You know, I feel like I should pinch myself right now, Wolf. I can't believe I have this vantage point of history in the making," Acosta gushed. 

By Matt Hadro | October 9, 2012 | 11:14 AM EDT

A July campaign story by CNN's Jim Acosta was so biased that the Obama campaign trumpeted the headline in its new attack ad. That came after MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell cried foul over the campaign using footage of her in its ads, perhaps telling evidence of the role the liberal media is playing in this campaign by providing fodder for Obama.

Back in July, Acosta hyped that Mitt Romney's overseas trip to Europe began in "shambles" even though CNN hosts Piers Morgan and Fareed Zakaria threw water on that sentiment. Team Obama now has featured Acosta's story to cast aspersions on Romney's foreign policy credentials.

By Noel Sheppard | September 25, 2012 | 8:57 PM EDT

CNN's Jim Acosta on Tuesday's Situation Room asked what many will think was a truly offensive question.

"If you were to somehow beat the first African-American president, what would you say to the black community to assure them that you would be their president also?" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

By Matt Hadro | August 28, 2012 | 9:49 PM EDT

CNN's Jim Acosta tried to add some context to President Obama's infamous "you didn't build that" comment, during Tuesday's GOP convention coverage.

"But wasn't he talking about you need roads, you need bridges, get the supplies to your business," Acosta pressed Newt Gingrich, who scoffed at the Obama campaign's explanation as "total baloney."

By Matt Hadro | August 24, 2012 | 5:08 PM EDT

Instead of informing the public about Mitt Romney's energy plan unveiled on Thursday, CNN harped on a "distraction" in the form of Bain Capital documents released by the website Gawker.

Even an article on CNNMoney.com called the Bain files "worthless," and CNN reporters questioned the significance of the document dump, but correspondent Jim Acosta talked about it anyway on Thursday's The Situation Room, as a "headache" for Romney.

By Noel Sheppard | August 19, 2012 | 10:57 AM EDT

President Obama's deputy campaign manager Stephanie Cutter made an astonishing statement on CNN's State of the Union Sunday.

According to her, the current White House resident giving interviews to Entertainment Tonight and People magazine are "equally important" to doing an actual press conference with the national news media (video follows with transcribed highlights and commentary):

By Matt Hadro | July 31, 2012 | 11:51 AM EDT

CNN excused reporters for shouting questions that could have passed for heckling outside a sacred site in Poland, but ripped a Mitt Romney aide for responding by cursing at them. On Thursday morning, CNN's Jim Acosta dismissed any controversy over the loaded questions in a completely self-righteous narrative.

Acosta excused reporters, "it's really no surprise really, that the press tried their best to get a question to him today," despite the shouted questions coming outside Poland's Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. "I think it should also be noted that this press aide, and what he said to us, was really inexcusable."

By Matt Hadro | July 26, 2012 | 2:54 PM EDT

CNN's Wolf Blizer took a key Obama supporter to task on Wednesday over Vice President Biden's use of an anonymous quote to slam Mitt Romney. The Romney campaign had denied saying the racially-charged remark.

"[W]hy would a sitting vice president issue this condemnation of Mitt Romney and his campaign based on a British newspaper with some anonymous quote?" Blitzer asked on Wednesday's The Situation Room.

Other CNN reporters did not share Blitzer's skepticism, though, as five stories on the matter aired on Wednesday evening and Thursday morning with none of them challenging the appropriateness of Biden's remark. The story aired even though correspondent Jim Acosta admitted that the source for the alleged Romney adviser quote could not be independently confirmed.