About

Says Who? refers to a series of jokes mocking Michael Cohen, lawyer and spokesperson for Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, after he responded to CNN's Brianna Keilar telling him Trump was losing in all the polls with "Says who?"

Origin

On Wednesday, August 17th, 2016, Cohen appeared on CNN's The Situation Room to address a recent shakeup in the Trump campaign staff. Host Brianna Keilar observed "You guys are down," to which Cohen interrupted, "Says who?" Keilar responded "Polls. Most of them. All of them?" After a long pause, Cohen repeated, "Says who?", sparking the spread of the joke.

Spread

The Twitter account for CNN's The Situation Room, "@CNNSitRoom"^[1] tweeted the video of Cohen's interview at 5:38 PM that day. Shortly after, Twitter users began tweeting jokes and spamming Cohen's Twitter account with "Says Who?"^[2] By the end of the day, the "Says Who?" phenomenon became a Twitter moment.^[3] A large number of major news outlets covered the story and the spread of the meme, including The Daily Dot,^[4] Wired,^[5] Vox,^[6] Gawker,^[7], and New York Magazine.^[8]

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References