Left-wing actor and director Rob Reiner defended teenage climate alarmist Greta Thunberg, describing her as a “passionate caring champion for the survival of our planet” after President Donald Trump mocked her for being awarded TIME magazine’s “Person of the Year.”
“Greta Thunberg is a passionate caring champion for the survival of our planet. Donald Trump is a Soulless Pathologically Lying Malignant Narcissist who cheats to win and pisses on our Constitution and the Rule of Law. So there’s that,”Rob Reiner, one of the president’s most vocal Hollywood critics, wrote on Twitter Saturday morning.
The attack from Rob Reiner comes after the president called Thunberg’s TIME coverage “so ridiculous” and urged the 16-year-old Swede to “work on her anger management problem.”
She should “then go to a good old fashioned movie with a friend! Chill Greta, Chill!” he then joked.
Shortly after President Trump’s quip, Thunberg responded by changing her Twitter bio to read: “A teenager working on her anger management problem. Currently chilling and watching a good old fashioned movie with a friend.”
Donald Trump Jr. also joined in on criticizing TIME for selecting Thunberg, arguing that the pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong were more worthy of the accolade.
“Time leaves out the Hong Kong Protesters fighting for their lives and freedoms to push a teen being used as a marketing gimmick,” the president’s eldest son tweeted. “How dare you?”
Thunberg, who has become the public face of climate change activism since leading school strikes in her home country of Sweden, was forced to apologize Saturday after saying world leaders should be put “against the wall.”
The 16-year-old Swede made the comment in a speech to young activists in the Italian city of Turin on Friday.
Thunberg later said she was making a literal translation from Swedish, in which the expression means to put someone on the spot with tough questions.
“That’s what happens when you improvise speeches in a second language. But of course I apologise if anyone misunderstood this,” Thunberg wrote on Twitter on Saturday.
Thunberg told the crowd in Turin that world leaders were running away from their responsibilities to fight climate change.
“We have to make sure that they cannot do that,” she said. “We will make sure they, that we put them against the wall, and that they will have to do their job and to protect our futures.”
The expression “putting someone against the wall” in Swedish describes a situation when someone is forced to address difficult questions or a difficult situation.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.