CNN journalist Jim Acosta is in Paris on Friday to cover President Trump’s visit to France, two days after the White House suspended his press credentials.
Acosta shared a photo of himself in front of the Eiffel Tower shortly after the president and first lady Melania Trump departed for Joint Base Andrews to board Air Force One.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Acosta’s coverage plans in Paris.
Trump criticized Acosta while speaking with reporters before departing the White House on Friday.
“I think Jim Acosta is a very unprofessional man,” Trump said.
The president’s remarks came after the White House suspended Acosta’s press credentials after he verbally sparred with Trump during a press conference on Wednesday.
{mosads}White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders accused Acosta, CNN’s chief White House correspondent, of placing his hands on a female intern who tried to take a microphone away from him while he was posing questions to the president.
“President Trump believes in a free press and expects and welcomes tough questions of him and his administration,” Sanders said. “We will, however, never tolerate a reporter placing his hands on a young woman just trying to do her job as a White House intern. This conduct is absolutely unacceptable.”
Sanders also released a video of the incident that many journalists say was doctored in a way that made Acosta’s actions look aggressive. Trump denied those assertions while speaking with reporters on Friday.
“Nobody manipulated, give me a break. That is dishonest reporting. All that was was a close-up,” he said.
The president on Friday also threatened to pull press credentials from other reporters who don’t show him “respect.”
He called out April Ryan of American Urban Radio Networks, calling her a “loser” who “doesn’t know what the hell she is doing.”
Acosta defended Ryan on Twitter, calling her an “incredible journalist and a wonderful person.”
Trump will be in Paris to commemorate Armistice Day on Nov. 11, which marks 100 years since the end of World War I. He will meet with French President Emmanuel Macron while in France.