Ex-Trump Press Secretary Just Shut Down Tony Dokoupil With Four Words About His CBS Stunt
CBS tried to convince Americans they're changing.
Nobody's buying it.
And former Trump press secretary Sean Spicer shut down Tony Dokoupil with four words about his CBS stunt.
CBS anchor claims he's just like regular Americans
Tony Dokoupil spent the last few weeks telling America he's one of them.
The new CBS Evening News anchor released a video saying the mainstream media "missed the story" by listening to elites instead of average Americans.
"I know this because, at certain points, I have been you," Dokoupil said in his promotional video.
Sean Spicer wasn't having any of it.
The former Trump White House Press Secretary torched Dokoupil on his podcast The Huddle for pretending to be some kind of media outsider.
"You got to go back to what he said. 'I was you.' No, dude. You were the problem," Spicer said.
Those four words cut right through Dokoupil's act.
Dokoupil spent years sitting on the CBS Mornings roundtable pushing the same left-wing narratives he now claims to reject.
He went to a $53,000-a-year prep school in Miami.
Graduated first in his class from George Washington University.
Got a graduate degree from Columbia.
Lives in one of Brooklyn's most expensive neighborhoods with his wife, MS Now correspondent Katy Tur.
That's not exactly the resume of someone who understands regular Americans struggling to pay their bills.
"This isn't some guy that was shouting from the rooftop," Spicer continued.
"Tony is the problem. And for him to gaslight us and act like he was somehow the one who understands and identifies with is total BS."
Megyn Kelly shreds CBS reboot before it even starts
Spicer wasn't the only one calling out Dokoupil's phoniness.
Megyn Kelly predicted the entire CBS Evening News reboot will crash and burn.
"Where was he standing up for people who were in the independent lane trying to tell the truth about media, about government, about the Biden administration?" Kelly asked on her show.
"I don't remember you, Tony, so I find this utter bullst condescension, and I do believe it will fking fail, as all these networks are failing because the audience has caught on to their bulls**t."
Kelly pointed out that CBS hasn't been relevant in decades.
The Evening News has been stuck in third place behind ABC and NBC for years.
Dokoupil's debut on Monday night proved Kelly right.
Technical glitches plagued the entire broadcast.
A photo of Senator Mark Kelly appeared on screen when Dokoupil was trying to introduce a segment about Minnesota Governor Tim Walz.
"To other news, as you just heard from Jill—oh, to other news now. Ah, to Governor Walz—no," Dokoupil stammered as he tried to figure out what was happening.
After an awkward silence, he finally asked the control room, "Are we going to Kelly here or are we going to go to Jonah Kaplan?"
Then Dokoupil called Minnesota "the Great Lake State" when that's actually Michigan's nickname.
"First day, big problems here," Dokoupil admitted on air.
Social media erupted.
"This is embarrassing," one viewer wrote.
"CBS News is crumbling at a record rate under Bari Weiss," another added.
New boss brings same failed strategy
CBS brought in Bari Weiss as editor-in-chief to supposedly fix the network's credibility problem.
Weiss founded The Free Press and worked at The New York Times before landing at CBS.
She picked Dokoupil to be the face of CBS Evening News despite him having zero track record of standing up to the media establishment.
The one time Dokoupil showed some backbone was when he challenged author Ta-Nehisi Coates about his anti-Israel book.
CBS executives actually scolded Dokoupil for that interview, saying it didn't meet their "editorial standards."
Now those same executives want Americans to believe Dokoupil will hold power accountable?
Dokoupil promised viewers he'd put them first over "advertisers," "politicians," and even "the corporate owners of CBS."
But when has any CBS anchor actually delivered on that promise?
The network settled President Trump's lawsuit over their deceptively edited interview with Kamala Harris.
Bari Weiss killed a 60 Minutes segment on Trump administration deportations just hours before it was supposed to air.
CBS keeps talking about rebuilding trust while doing the exact opposite.
Spicer nailed the real problem with Dokoupil's makeover.
"If he had sat back and said, 'I was part of the problem,' as opposed to, 'I was you,' I could at least buy it," Spicer explained.
"But this is so ridiculous."
Dokoupil could have admitted he spent years as part of the media machine that lied to Americans about Russia collusion, Hunter Biden's laptop, and COVID lockdowns.
Instead, he's pretending he was always skeptical of the establishment.
Americans aren't stupid.
They see through the act.
CBS Evening News has cycled through six different anchors in the last decade trying to boost ratings.
Nothing worked.
Dokoupil won't be any different.
The network keeps rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic while wondering why nobody wants to buy tickets.
Conservatives aren't going to suddenly trust CBS because they hired Bari Weiss and put on a populist show.
And liberals are furious the network is even pretending to care about fairness.
CBS managed to alienate both sides with this stunt.
That's what happens when you try to fake authenticity instead of actually changing your broken institution from the ground up.
Sources:
- Sean Spicer, "The Huddle," podcast, January 6, 2026.
- Megyn Kelly, "The Megyn Kelly Show," podcast, January 6, 2026.
- Jeremy Barr, "Tony Dokoupil Named 'CBS Evening News' Anchor," The Washington Post, December 10, 2025.
- Daniel D'Addario, "Tony Dokoupil CBS Evening News Debut," Variety, January 6, 2026.
- "CBS Viewers Blast Tony Dokoupil's Evening News Debut," TV Insider, January 6, 2026.
