Kaitlan Collins appeared on “Late Night with Seth Meyers” this week to talk about her CNN show “The Source with Kaitlan Collins,” plus her obsession with Alabama football. But the comedian and talk show host also asked the Alabama native about her role in the network’s coverage of the Israel-Hamas war.

Meyers first asked how Collins has adjusted to evenings while hosting “The Source with Kaitlan Collins” after a stint as co-host of CNN’s morning show. “I mean, it’s a 3:30 a.m. wakeup call versus a 3:30 p.m. wakeup call,” she said. “So it’s a little bit more amenable to do the 9 p.m. I mean, 3:30 a.m. was so brutal. Every night I went to sleep just praying that I did not oversleep, which luckily, I never did.”

Meyers also asked Collins about getting answers from politicians during “The Source,” noting they often “answer the questions they wanted you to ask them, as opposed to the one you did.” He referenced her recent interview with a Republican presidential hopeful, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.

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“It’s always going to happen, because any politician is, like, media-trained,” Collins said. “They know to just kind of listen, and they just don’t answer. And I think a lot of times people feel pressed for time, so they’ve got to move on, they have a lot of subjects they want to ask about. I’ll just stay on it all day, because I think it’s important to just push on that one subject. And I think the hardest thing is listening to them, and just making sure … you’re not getting an answer. And sometimes you can’t force them to answer, but I always like to point out when they don’t.”

Meyers shifted to discuss Collins’ recent trip to cover the ongoing Israel-Hamas war. While covering the White House presented its own challenges, this conflict was another level of stakes.

“I think the trip to Israel was one of the toughest things that I’ve ever covered,” Collins said. “And it was because what you were witnessing and what these people were going through. I mean, the entire country is grieving, very much so. And we had been there maybe two weeks after the attack had happened. And just going through the airport, going into the city. Tel Aviv is usually like Miami. It’s so fun, everyone’s out. Everything’s closed, everything’s quiet. A lot of people likened it to New York after 9/11 when everything was just really quiet until this time of year.”

Collins called it “a nuanced and complicated story” with “a lot of different angles to it.” She said their coverage attempted to focus on the humanity of the conflict and that they faced parents whose children have been kidnapped and experienced unimaginable loss.

Meyers then said he appreciated Collins and other journalists who are actually present in Israel as the story is unfolding. She said she remains in contact with doctors from Gaza “almost daily” to try and get a sense of what’s happening there.

“These people are just living through a life-changing event,” Collins said. “These are people at the center of it. These are moms and dads and brothers and sisters. And it’s just important to tell their stories, and they want their stories to be told. I think that’s another important aspect of it.”

In May, CNN announced Collins would take over the network’s 8 p.m. central primetime slot, previously occupied by Chris Cuomo whom the network fired in December 2021. The news came after the Alabama native moderated CNN’s Republican town hall with former President Donald Trump that month in New Hampshire. Collins’ handling of the event divided critics and viewers, while Variety and Puck reported CNN planned give her the primetime slot permanently after publicly supporting her performance at the town hall.

Collins became CNN’s youngest-ever chief White House correspondent six years ago at age 29. “Since joining CNN in 2017, she has become one of the most influential journalists in the nation due to her tough questions, objective reporting and signature style,” a CNN release said. “Kaitlan has broken numerous stories of consequence from both the Biden and Trump administrations, including significant policy decisions and major staff changes, traveling the globe extensively to report on their presidencies. Collins has also reported on the Senate special election in her home state of Alabama.”

Collins replaced Jim Acosta as chief White House correspondent in 2021. When she joined the network in 2017, Collins covered the Trump White House and quickly rose to the top of her field. She covered Biden for a year-and-a-half before taking on her new role as co-anchor of “CNN This Morning.”

Collins is from Prattville and graduated from the University of Alabama in 2014. She also previously worked for the right-wing Daily Caller media outlet, which was launched by Tucker Carlson.

Prior to landing the primetime gig, Collins served as co-anchor on “CNN This Morning” with Don Lemon and Poppy Harlow, a show that saw a shakeup in April after the network fired Lemon. The former longtime CNN host announced on Twitter he had been fired by the network where he worked for 17 years. Shortly afterward, Collins addressed the shocking news of Lemon’s departure and said she wished him the best in future endeavors.