Ana Navarro became an instant social media sensation after she got into a heated exchange with Donald Trump campaign surrogate Scottie Neil Hughes on CNN Tonight With Don Lemon Friday, as a five-person panel argued over the explosive video from 2005 in which Trump is heard making explicit and vulgar comments about sexually assaulting women.
A video of Navarro’s exchange with Hughes is above. Be warned, it contains potentially offensive language.
The exchange went viral overnight and made Navarro an immediate Twitter favorite.
Watching Ana Navarro destroy Trump supporters for their disgusting defense of #TrumpTapes on @CNN like
Here’s what you need to know about the 44-year-old Republican strategist.
1. She Is an Immigrant From Nicaragua
Ana Navarro, CNN commentator (Twitter/Ana Navarro)
Navarro was born in Chinandega, Nicaragua in 1971, the youngest child in her family. She has two brothers and an older sister. Her father, Augusto “Tuto” Navarro served as Nicaragua’s minister go agriculture. But he opposed the Nicaraguan dictator Anastasio Somoza, so in 1979, the Navarro family fled the country.
As a seven-year-old, Navarro said in a recent interview, she was “thinking as so many exiles do, that it was only for a short time; never thinking that for me it was going to be a life-long change.”
After the Sandinista revolution overthrew Somoza, Navarro’s father opposed that regime, too, joining the “contras” — the American-backed anti-Sandinista insurgency.
“At his side, watching him, I learned to become involved politically,” Navarro says. “I grew up very sensitive to the meaning of the political system and to the crises in Latin America.”
2. She Became an American Citizen Under a Reagan-Era Amnesty Program
40th United States President Ronald Reagan (Getty)
During an exchange with another Trump backer, Jeffrey Lord, on CNN last year, Navarro explained how she became an American citizen — after Lord accused her of not being a “Latino.”
“I don’t think you’re a Latino,” Lord told Navarro. “I think you’re an American just like me.”
“Oh really, what am I? What do you think I am?. I am an American and America is my home,” she said. “I am an American who was born in Nicaragua and was naturalized under Ronald Reagan’s amnesty. So now that you’ve lectured me on how I should feel as a Republican, now that you’ve lectured me on what I’m hedging about, and now that you’ve lectured me about what I am, do you have an actual point?”
Though Navarro and her family first emigrated from Nicaragua to neighboring Honduras where they obtained legal visas before entering the United States in 1980, an amnesty program created by President Ronald Reagan allowed all immigrants who had come to the country prior to 1982 to obtain citizenship.
“I believe in the idea of amnesty for those who have put down roots and lived here, even though sometime back they may have entered illegally,” Reagan explained in 1984.
3. She Has Opposed Trump From the Start of His Campaign
From the start of his campaign, Navarro — who is a Republican and political conservative — has been an vocal opponent of Trump. As resident of Miami, Florida, Navarro threw her backing behind her state’s former governor, Jeb Bush. But even long after Bush dropped out of the race, Navarro has remained outspoken in her opposition to Trump, calling him “a flat-out racist.”
I stand by my words: “Donald Trump is a flat out racist”. I will fight him & what he represents til my last breath. t.co/4LCtIV6NAe
As a result, Trump has called for her to be fired from her paid job as a CNN commentator, which she has held since 2012. Trump added his name to an online petition in November of 2015, calling on the news network to pink-slip Navarro.
.@CNN should listen. Ana Navarro has no talent, no TV persona, and works for Bush—a total conflict of interest.
“CNN should listen. Ana Navarro has no talent, no TV persona, and works for Bush,” Trump said on his Twitter feed at the time. “Total conflict of interest.”
Trump stopped short of agreeing with supporters who demanded Navarro’s deportation, instead simply describing her as “incompetent.”
4. Her Exchange With Hughes Was Over a Slang Term For Female Anatomy
For Trump apologists, when Trump says, “pussy”, it’s a cute, little, baby cat. When I say it, it’s offensive. Surreal. Absurd. Hypocrisy. t.co/QLSiOb7q5O
In the video released Friday by The Washington Post and Access Hollywood, Trump is heard to use the slang term “p——y” to refer to the female genitals, saying that his position as a famous person — then star of the NBC reality show, The Apprentice — allowed him to “do anything” to women, even “grab ’em by the p——y.”
As seen in the video at the top of this page, Hughes — a conservative pundit and onetime news director of the Tea Party News Network — demands that Navarro “stop saying that word” because “my daughter is listening.”
That comment angered Navarro, who snapped back, “Don’t tell me you’re offended when I say ‘p——y,’ but you’re not offended when Donald Trump says it. I’m not running for president, he is…. Don’t act outraged and offended when I say the word that you’re not offended by the man who you are supporting is saying. That is just absurd.”
5. Both Navarro and Hughes Stuck By Their Stances The Next Day
The instantly viral exchange between Hughes and Navarro happened late on the night of October 7. By Saturday morning, October 8, Navarro was still calling for Republicans to abandon their support of Trump.
Hughes, on the other hand, continued to defend Trump and dismiss his comments about groping and forcing himself on women as irrelevant. On a CNN appearance Saturday morning, after another panelist called Trump, “an irredeemable pervert and sexual predator,” Hughes responded by saying that the remarks had not affected women at all.
“This is all about the female vote,” Hughes said. “While it’s wrong, it is a distraction. This morning, no woman woke up affected by these words.”