‘People Can Finally Sleep Comfortably Again:' Arnold Schwarzenneger Offers to Trade Jobs With Trump

Despite the back-and-forth, both men share at least three things in common: They're Republicans who have been both actors and politicians

President Donald Trump took more than a moment at the National Prayer Breakfast Thursday morning to pray for former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and talk some trash on the new host of NBC’s “The Celebrity Apprentice.”

And "The Governator" lashed back, offering to trade jobs with POTUS saying he could do a better job.

The coast-to-coast tiff occurred within one hour, from 6 a.m. to 7 a.m. PST.

"They hired a big, big movie star to take my place," Trump said at the prayer breakfast, after being introduced by Mark Burnett, the producer and creator of both “The Celebrity Apprentice.” "And we know how that turned out. The ratings went down the tubes. It's been a disaster."

Then he said: "I want to just pray for Arnold if we can."

At 7:01 a.m. Schwarzenegger took on Trump on the president's favorite platform, Twitter.

In a post titled, "The National Prayer Breakfast?" the former governor and longtime actor made a homemade video that looked like he was standing on his back porch.

"Hey Donald, I have a great idea," he said. "Why don't we switch jobs? You take over TV because you're such an expert in ratings. I take over your job because then people can finally sleep comfortably again."

Schwarzenegger's premiere night audience for "Celebrity Apprentice" in early January was a disappointing 5 million viewers, according to the Nielsen company. Viewership dropped to 3.9 million viewers in the second week.

The season-to-date average for the first month was 4.7 million viewers, compared to 7.6 million viewers for Trump's final season as host in winter 2015.

Trump is still listed as an executive producer of "Celebrity Apprentice" and retains a financial stake in the NBC program, so he has incentive to want high viewership.

Thursday was not the first time Trump criticized Schwarzenegger over the show's ratings. Trump tweeted last month that Schwarzenegger was "swamped" in his "Celebrity Apprentice" debut "by comparison to the ratings machine, DJT."

"So much for being a movie star," said Trump's tweet, which continued: "But who cares, he supported Kasich and Hillary."

Schwarzenegger did endorse Ohio Gov. John Kasich during the Republican presidential primaries, but he did not endorse Democrat Hillary Clinton in the general election.

Despite the back-and-forth, both Trump and Schwarzenegger share at least three things in common: They're Republicans. They're politicians. They're reality TV stars.

AP's Darlene Superville in Washington, D.C., and television writer Frazier Moore in New York contributed to this report.

Contact Us