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CNN 3 323

TARGET? ELLISON BUY?

merri ok

TARGET TY COBB 2 26

ELLISON WANTS TO BUY 9 25 DID?!3 26

SCOTT JENNINGS FAILS

BEST COP 30 COVERAGE AMANPOUR

AN cites many factchecks on trump surogates? see jake tapper also acosta

promoted primary 1/18 on death threat/attack  1219 bak see tapper , cooper did well on hurricane harvey AGW toll attack on dox 'threat" mfg some cable prez said trump great for biz/ratings hired  s moore?cnn logo on face in wrestle video?

JRNL FAIL? ON ZELDIN WRIGHT 8 25

9 22 note new owner/mgmt  --> // Fox (town hall fail)

chris licht fired Stelter legit ~ trump proto bari weiss fail

see sunday talk SOTU dana bash lobby fail

html TokenNegro

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cnn best on hurric beryl AGW but not gt?

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// kara swisher bail skydance ellison

The truth behind Christiane Amanpour’s exit as CNN execs begged her to stay

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an 10 26

CNN ups the ante with major legal threat against Trump over press ban

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9 26 BONTA BAIL, EDIT BD BS // MURDOCH, 5 YR SUNSET

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mma FOX SUPPORT CNN MSNBC &

Greg Kelly claims CNN “deserve” their ban from the White House grounds

09/23/26

Newsmax host Rob Finnerty: “A press pass to the White House is a privilege and definitely not a right”

09/23/26

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AN 9 26

At a time when his network remains under assault by the administration, CNN's top fact-checker Daniel Dale received acclaim as he revealed his top takeaways after a full decade of covering and correcting President Donald Trump.

On Sunday morning, Dale published a new piece marking the notable anniversary, digging into the things he has learned over the years of sifting through Trump's "remarkable number of lies" during his time at the forefront of American political life.

“Ten years ago this month, in my old job as Washington correspondent for the Toronto Star, I started what I believed would be a quick little side project: fact-checking underdog presidential candidate Donald Trump, who was telling a remarkable number of lies but was rarely being corrected. Like a lot of people, I thought Trump would lose the 2016 election,” Dale detailed. "I was very wrong. And Trump continued to be very wrong, about a dizzying variety of subjects, for the next decade.”

He added later in the piece: "The lies cause real harm. Some of Trump’s lies are so bizarre or trivial that I can’t help but laugh. On the whole, though, his lies have been deeply harmful to the country. People died because of the Capitol riot prompted by his lies about the 2020 election. His lies downplaying Covid-19 almost certainly led to deaths, too. Specific people targeted by his lies, including journalists, judges and election workers, have faced threats and harassment. His lies have worsened innumerable public debates around critical policy issues. And American democracy itself is worse off for all the lying, too."

The reaction to the piece across social media was largely glowing, with various colleagues and public figures hailing Dale's efforts and highlighting the particularly important points raised in his new piece.

"Thank you, Daniel Dale, for being one of the few political reporters who is willing to describe Trump's unmatched degree of dishonesty and lying more accurately and consistently," communications consultant Susan Bordson wrote in response to the piece on X, highlighting further a "Key excerpt re MSM press practices" in response to Trump's lies.

"Pro-Trump media entities have shown embarrassingly little interest in addressing his lies," Dale wrote in the passage she highlighted. "But more neutral outlets have regularly failed, too. On the last full day of Trump’s first presidency in 2021, I wrote, 'Too often, coverage of flagrantly dishonest Trump speeches still mentioned the dishonesty in passing or not at all. Too often, coverage still quoted the president’s lies without explaining that they were wrong.' More than five years later, these problems persist."

Brian Stelter, a professional colleague of Dale's and chief media analyst for CNN, highlighted some of what he saw as the key takeaways from the piece: "Dale's takeaways include: 'the bigger the crisis, the more Trump lies,' Trump 'is not only a supplier of bad information but a consumer of it,' 'the mainstream media doesn't handle Trump’s lying well enough,' and 'the lies cause real harm.'"

"That our nation has largely adjusted to having a habitual liar as president is shameful," Jennifer Erin Valent wrote. "Worse yet, he has been strongly supported by Christians who claim to honor the God of truth, who are meant to defy the father of lies, and who are commanded not to bear false witness."

"Everybody who supports or opposes Trump should read this, the thoughts of prominent factchecker Daniel Dale on the context and proliferation of Trump's lies," retired Chicago reporter Ray Long wrote.

"One of the heroes of American journalism is this Canadian, who has single-handedly researched and catalogued thousands of lies by our president," Daniel Boardman, dean of the Klein College of Media and Communications, wrote in a post about Dale.

"'Two months before Election Day in 2020… he was telling so many campaign lies that I’d become physically unable to look into all of them while living something loosely resembling a healthy life,'" senior CNN producer Shawn Reynolds wrote in a post quoting Dale's piece. "By then, I’d recorded more than 8,500 false claims since September 2016.”

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ARI MELBER , WANTS CNN CEO FIRED BY FEDS?

President Donald Trump's top trade adviser appeared on MS NOW on Wednesday and said it is a "dirty little secret" that Fox News settled for $700 million after telling defamatory lies about the 2020 presidential election for one reason: They didn't want network founder Rupert Murdoch on the stand.

Peter Navarro appeared on Ari Melber's show and called for Fox News CEO Suzanne Scott to be fired after one of their on-air talents, Maria Bartiromo, was fired after sharing an internal corporate memo with Navarro in which Scott told people not to amplify the same discredited election theft claims that previously got them sued.

"There was no expectation of confidentiality," Navarro said. "There was an expectation that the White House would be informed,' adding that "basically, what Suzanne Scott should have done when the White House contacted her was apologize and acknowledge that it was disrespectful to the president and to people in this country — not to have that network even talk about the address."

Navarro was referring to Trump's July speech in which he heavily implied that China had meddled in the 2020 elections in a way that ultimately caused the contest to go to his opponent, Joe Biden, instead of himself. Critics overwhelmingly agree that the speech did nothing to verify Trump's discredited claim that the election was stolen from him.

From there Navarro argued that Fox News had "censored" Trump's July speech, which Melber pointed out was not true. They covered it, but declined to do so either live or without fact-checking Trump's various claims.

"It was aired, not censored," Melber said, adding that it seemed like Navarro was arguing that the government should be able to tell networks what to cover and not to cover, including disproved claims about election theft. Navarro reiterated his call for Scott to be fired for not covering Trump's election fraud claims, although he added that he was speaking only for himself and not for the White House.

Overall, Navarro complained that Fox News only agreed with Trump on some issues but not on others.

"There's this misconception among viewers on the right and left that somehow that Fox is a conservative messenger and supports Donald Trump and. Fox in a heartbeat will tell you about transgender stuff and illegal aliens rape and killing as well they should," Navarro told Melber, before complaining that "there's certain guardrails they put up. Election integrity is one that you mentioned."

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an 8 26

CNN Trump defender laughed down for whining about Dem’s 'gutter politics'

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AN 7 26

Former LA congressman Garrett Graves got himself bushwhacked by a panel that included a Republican strategist after he refused to admit that Democratic Georgia Senators were legitimately elected to their seats.

“I mean, congressman, do you think that Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff were duly elected?” demanded CNN anchor Kasie Hunt after confronting the possibility that Trump may publicly call both senators illegitimate due to bogus claims of election tampering.

But, like the vast majority of the modern Republican Party, Graves was leery of stating what countless judges have already declared, that the elections were legit.

“Um, I haven't gone in and studied the elections, but I haven't. Let me be clear on this: I have not seen—”

At that point the panel attacked.

“That should be an easy answer,” muttered panelist Charles M. Blow.

“There were three — there were paper ballots that were counted three separate times. How can you not say that they didn’t win there?” demanded Democratic strategist Meghan Hays.

“Because I haven't studied the Georgia elections,” Graves blurted.

“You don’t have to study the elections to know,” said Blow, publisher of the Blowstack Newsletter.

“But hang on. Let me let me answer the question that I was asked,” Graves insisted. “I was asked the question if I believed that they were elected. I haven't seen anything to the contrary. So, I've never, ever said that there was anything in question about those folks being elected.”

“When did we get to this point? And do you think it's good for America — so, have your opponents conceded to you? They called you and said, ‘hey, you know, like, thanks for a good race. Congratulations. You won.’ Like, when did it get to be so hard, right? Like sporting events are won and lost. So are elections.”

“Hey, I'm going to I'm going to agree with you,” said Graves. “I think that politics … is a blood sport. I think it's gotten out of hand. I'll be the first one to say that. I think closed primaries have absolutely made it worse, including in our home state. But, but I don't think that, um, the president coming in and presenting … new evidence is something that we should all be afraid of. Let us look at the evidence, let us judge it, and then decide if it's something that's actually, uh, that we need to take seriously and find safeguards to protect or prevent from happening.”

“Where is this evidence in the 43 lawsuits that he litigated and lost?” said Hays. “So why are we doing it now? I just don't understand.”

Graves then made an appeal to new evidence that may have “popped up.”

“If we found a way that a foreign government was influencing our elections and caused outcomes to be distorted, that's something every American, regardless of if you’re liberal or conservative, should be concerned about. Integrity in elections is critical,” he said”

“Just saying that somebody caused an outcome to be distorted is something an influencer can do. That's very different. Changing any part of the electoral system, changing votes, changing tallying. That is the question, and that is what Donald Trump has been suggesting. And that has never, ever been found,” said Blow. “And I find it personally upsetting about Georgia because I voted in that election where Warnock and Ossoff won. There was no influence that was making me say, oh, I'm going to just these just these two lines are cheating. But the rest of the votes are legitimate. That's insane.”

Former Trump White House Communications Director Republican strategist Alyssa Farah Griffin, who was advising the Georgia Republican Party in 2020, said she was hoping the incumbents’ GOP opponents would win, but they did not.

“They lost fair and square to Warnock and Ossoff,” said Griffin. “But I'd also note this: Donald Trump was legitimately elected in 2016. The Obama administration was overseeing the federal government in 2020. The Trump administration was overseeing the federal government in 2024 when it was the Biden administration [that won]. So he's basically saying that the failure to administer, at least at the federal level, the elections, the failure to stop these interferences only happened under his watch.”

“I don't think it's the flex for the Trump administration that he thinks it is, that the one election that was stolen in 2020 was when he was in power as president,” said Griffin.

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AN 5 26

A CNN panel found itself in the uncommon position of ganging up on one of its own panelists after she defended the proposal of a slush fundentirely orchestrated by President Donald Trump’s handpicked board members.

“I mean, I would push back on that a little bit. What you call the slush fund I call the anti-weaponization fund,” right-wing podcaster Emily Austintold the “Table for Five” panel. “I'm sure on both sides of the aisle, we all have friends whose lives have been absolutely ruined, whether they were innocent. And you said that this is going to people who assaulted police officers on January 6th, ^But the truth is, we don't know where this money is going yet. … But I actually I view this as something very altruistic. Trump did not take the money and put it in his pocket like he could have.”

“Well, there lies the root of the problem,” said U.S. Democratic candidate Isaiah Martin. “You just said the very simple fact that we're not going to know exactly who gets this money. I know that there was this testimony inside of the United States Congress in which they said that there's really no rules behind what's going to happen. … You don't think that that's absurd, that the president of the United States can create a fund and divvy payments to people, and we don't know who the money goes to?”

Host Alyssa Farah Griffin asked Austin her opinion of Trump’s second proposal removing the IRS's power to investigate or prosecute him or his family over taxes, forever.

“Obviously, optically, it looks horrendous,” Austin answered.

“Because it ishorrendous,” quipped Martin.

“But there's also an unprecedented amount of persecution when it comes to the Trump and the Trump family. There has never been a president that has been persecuted as much as Donald Trump,” Austin insisted.

“We’ve never had a president who did what he did,” inserted author and panelist Josh Rogin, referencing Trump’s many indictments, ranging from hiding illicit hush money to attempting to overthrow a legitimate U.S. election. “… This is a pattern of the president of the United States pilfering from the national coffers to serve his own political and personal ends. We have the Board of Peace, billions of dollars of taxpayer money without any congressional authorization or oversight. You've got all of the stock trades that he's made, $750 million worth of stock trades on issues that he's adjudicating. This is a level of self-dealing and corruption that no one has seen before. And you have to view this slush fund in that context.”

“If President Obama sued his own department or his own IRS and settled with himself, I guarantee you that you and every conservative on Fox would be running around screaming for impeachment,” Martin told Austin. “You guys would be trying to throw him an Alligator Alcatraz.”

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RWW 4 26

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05/01/2026 RWW

by

Kyle Mantyla

President Donald Trump dismissed the idea of seeking congressional approval for his Iran war as “totally unconstitutional” on Friday, calling those asking for it unpatriotic.

The president lashed out at the newspaper after it published a scathing op-ed on Thursday, criticizing the U.S. military's readiness for the war in Iran.

HUFFPO NO LNX

President Donald Trump went on a lengthy tirade against The New York Times on Thursday, accusing the newspaper of being “seditious” after its editorial board published a piece titled “The U.S. Military Was Losing Its Edge. After Iran, Everyone Knows It.”

During his rant, Trump continued to insist that Iranian forces had been “militarily decapitated” before accusing both the Times and CNN of reporting that Iran was winning the war.

“...And yet I read in The New York Times, I see it on that stupid CNN, which I only watch because you have to watch a little bit of the enemy,” Trump said. “So I watch it for a very short period. But you have to, you know, you have to be smart. And if you see CNN, you’d think they’re winning the war. If you read The New York Times, it’s actually seditious in my opinion. You read The New York Times, you actually think they’re winning the war.”

It’s unclear which specific CNN report the president was referencing. As for the Times piece, it, among other things, argued that Iran’s control of the Strait of Hormuz was the linchpin in the conflict thus far, and that the United States’ trillion-dollar military was “ineffective against cheaper, mass-produced weapons,” such as Iran’s vast drone supply.

“But the problem is bigger than any single commander-in-chief. The United States has left itself unprepared for modern war,” the Times wrote.

What the NYT didn’t do in its article was “conspire to overthrow, put down, or to destroy by force the Government of the United States,” which is how seditious conspiracy is defined under 18 U.S. Code § 2384.

The last people convicted of seditious conspiracy in the U.S. were leaders of the far-right Proud Boys and Oath Keepers, who stormed the Capitol during the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection. Trump pardoned all those convicted in connection with the insurrection on his first day back in office.

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an 4 26

CNN unloads painful supercut of Trump being wrong - Alternet.org

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President Donald Trump’s Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, recently mused aloud that he looks forward to billionaire David Ellison taking over CNN. For the same reasons that Hegseth is excited about this prospect, CNN employees and advocates of free journalism are filled with dread.

“Since 2015, the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker has documented more than 3,500 anti-press social media posts from Trump,” The Washington Post reported on Sunday. “Hundreds of them specifically mention CNN.”

The paper added, “The cable news network is currently run by the British-born Thompson, the former chief executive at the New York Times who took the helm in 2023 after Chris Licht’s tumultuous turn. Staffers generally expressed faith in Thompson, who has emphasized building a consumer subscription business without repeating the mistakes of CNN+ or scaling back the existing cable offering.”

Yet even though Thomas wants to stay in charge of CNN, it is quite possible that people will leave the company despite their widespread faith in his abilities. The Post reported pervasive fears that, despite their reassurances to the contrary, Ellison will follow the wishes of Trump, Hegseth and others in MAGA world by turning the ostensibly objective network in a more pro-Trump direction.

“Everyone had 24 hours to worry about Paramount, but then all hell broke loose,” a reporter told the Post, with the “hell” in question being Trump’s decision to invade Iran. Yet reporters remain aware of the president’s looming influence, such as when Trump called CNN’s Kaitlan Collins a “worst reporter” who needed to “smile” more after she asked him about files related to his link to the late child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.

“Kaitlan Collins is an exceptional journalist, reporting every day from the White House and the field with real depth and tenacity,” a CNN spokesperson told the Post.

Trump is also hostile to CNN anchor Brianna Keilar, who despite the president’s animus continues to offer unflattering coverage. Last week Keilar pointed out that Trump has offered no exit strategy for the Iran war during a speech intended to serve that purpose, and that his statements about gas prices being bearable contradicts people’s lived experiences. In fact, states which supported Trump in the 2024 election are seeing disproportionate rate increases, such as Utah rising by $1.46 or Arizona rising by $1.37.

“How long can people really bear that?” Keilar asked former Trump advisor Stephen Moore. When Moore tried to spin the increases as caused by “inflation,” Keilar pushed back.

“Can we just be clear? This isn't inflation,” Keilar told Moore. “This is the effect of a foreign policy decision [Trump’s war] on something that people can't avoid.”

Meanwhile CNN analyst Harry Enten, who once received Trump’s praise when he cited a poll showing 100% of MAGA Republicans back his war in Iran, has recently shared much less flattering data.

“If I was in the White House, I'd be shaking,” Enten said. “I'd be shaking in place because there'd be nowhere to hide. And of course, if I was in Congress running at the end of this year, I'd be shaking as well.”

After all, Enten noted that only one out of five independents approve of Trump’s handling of gas prices.

“You can't win elections when only one in five independents approve of you on gas prices,” Enten said, adding that the president’s gas policy does not even have the support of three out of five people in his own base. “I mean, my goodness gracious, we're talking about Joe Biden levels right here l when it comes to approving of Trump on gas prices.

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AN 3 26

President Donald Trump has lost his appeal in his libel lawsuit against the cable news outlet CNN.

The appeal went before the full panel of judges at the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, which covers Alabama, Georgia and Florida cases. Trump had specifically asked for the decision be en banc, meaning the full panel would rule on it. The reason may have been that many judges were appointed by Trump himself to the appeals court. Still, the verdict was unanimous, Politico legal reporter Josh Gerstein posted on X.

Trump filed the lawsuit in 2022 as a private citizen after the network used the term "Big Lie" to refer to false claims about fraud around the 2020 election.

The case was thrown out first in 2023 by one of Trump's own appointed district court judges. Trump appealed to the 11th Circuit, where the case was thrown out again. Trump's lawyers then requested that the full panel reconsider, and he was denied there, too.

The one-page response makes it clear that not only did Trump lose the first judge in the district court, but he also lost six of the 12 Trump-appointed judges on the court of appeals.

"The Petition for Rehearing En Banc is DENIED, no judge in regular active service on the Court having requested that the Court be polled on rehearing en banc," the court said.

It's unclear whether Trump will appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court in an effort to silence the use of the phrase "Big Lie" on television, but he has been known to take his lawsuits all the way to top. Justice Clarence Thomas is the Supreme Court Circuit Justice responsible for overseeing the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. It means Thomas could review the case and decide whether or not the high court should rule on the matter.

The one major barrier, however, is that Thomas has been "decisive" in First Amendment expression cases, the Free Speech Center said. However, when it comes to the press, Thomas has been a long-time critic of the 1964 case New York Times v. Sullivan, which set a higher bar for public figures to claim libel. Both he and Trump agree on the issue.

Trump has sued the Wall Street Journal and owner Rupert Murdoch personally, the New York Times/Penguin Random House, the BBC, The Des Moines Register, the Pulitizer Prize Board, writer Bob Woodward and his publisher Simon and Schuster, as well as his case against CNN.

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AN 3 26

CNN reporter brings receipts after press secretary accuses her of double standard

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March 2, 2026, edition of Fox News' America's Newsroom

JENNIFER GRIFFIN (CORRESPONDENT): I was in the Pentagon briefing this morning, but we were not called on for a question. We had assigned seats and Fox News was put in the back row. And there was no outside-cuts camera allowed to show who was asking the questions. The Pentagon wanted to control all of that.

These are the questions I would have asked if called on: Why was this an imminent threat? Oman's foreign minister said there was progress in nuclear talks. Was there any evidence that Iran was planning a preemptive strike? U.S. officials now say that was not the case. Do you know where the highly enriched uranium is? That is the question Sec. Hegseth did not want to answer last summer after claiming Iran's nuclear program had been obliterated in Operation Midnight Hammer. The secretary said this war is not about regime change, even though the president called on the Iranians to rise up and remove the regime.

My follow-up would have been how are unarmed Iranian civilians expected to overthrow Iran's security forces? And is this success if the same regime stays in place after this war ends? One question that was shouted at the end and left unanswered: How do you keep this from becoming an insurgency?

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GRIFFIN: Sec. Hegseth would not rule out having U.S. troops on the ground in Iran but said it would not be 200,000 troops like in Iraq. The secretary said the four U.S. troops killed yesterday took a direct hit to the tactical operations center they were manning and took offense when reporters asked him to articulate why the American people are sending their men and women to war and if he is concerned about it spiraling into a longer war.

The Reliable Sources newsletter had more information about the Pentagon press briefing, with CNN's Brian Stelter writing, “Hegseth only answered questions from his chosen outlets. I'm told he had a pre-selected list of questioners, and all the reporters were in assigned seats, so he knew who to call on”:

The Pentagon has severely restricted access to information in the past year. You'll recall that Pete Hegseth credentialed a MAGA media “press corps” last fall after traditional news outlets rejected new press pass rules that media lawyers said criminalized routine reporting. The MAGA crew does relatively little reporting, so most coverage of the US military is now happening from outside the Pentagon's five walls.

Journalists from traditional outlets were allowed to attend this morning's press conference with Hegseth and Gen. Dan Caine. But Hegseth only answered questions from his chosen outlets. I'm told he had a pre-selected list of questioners, and all the reporters were in assigned seats, so he knew who to call on.

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an 2 26 Fox News just distorted CNN's documentary on Christian nationalism - Alternet.org

Fox News just distorted CNN's documentary on Christian nationalism

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MMA

Trump escalates his corrupt campaign to gift CNN to the Ellisons

02/23/26

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an 2 26

President Donald Trump, in what appeared to be an attempt to pressure two major cable news networks, warned against booking two prominent former officials from his first administration.

Trump targeted CNN and MS NOW — formerly MSNBC, which he called “MSDNC” — while denouncing attorney Ty Cobb, a former member of the White House legal team who reported directly to the president, and former Department of Homeland Security Chief of Staff Miles Taylor.

The president called Cobb “one of the Worst Lawyers in Washington, D.C.,” and a “WHACKJOB, who I hardly knew,” and said Taylor is “another major Loser … who I have no idea who he is.”

He charged that both “make livings talking about me like they know me well.”

“So, when you watch these two guys on Television, which, fortunately, doesn’t happen often because there’s very little audience at either CNN or MSDNC,” he wrote, “remember, they know nothing about me — Just two DOPES trying to make a ‘buck’ by pretending to know something about someone who turned out to be very famous.”

Trump already was the president when they served in his administration.

“These two Networks are forewarned not to put them on the air again, because they have no knowledge or credibility with respect to anything have [sic] to do with DONALD J. TRUMP.”

Discover moreDiversity inclusion trainingRepublican Party newsLGBTQ rights updates

Last month, Cobb “claimed President Trump is experiencing a ‘significant decline’ in his mental faculties,” according to The Hill.

“I think the dementia and the cognitive decline are, you know, palpable, as do many experts, including many physicians,” Cobb said.

Trump’s social media post came just about the same time that he or someone with access to his social media account deleted what many, including several prominent Republicans, denounced as a racist meme that depicted former President Barack Obama and former First Lady Michelle Obama as apes.

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AN 2 26

Earlier this week, President Donald Trump sat down with NBC News reporter Tony Llamas for a wide-ranging interview on multiple subjects. However, Llamas often let the president lie without pushing back. Now, CNN is taking Llamas to task for not doing his job — while debunking Trump's lies.

In a Thursday article, CNN's Daniel Dale did a point-by-point fact-check of Trump's biggest lies, and admonished Llamas for doing little to counter what he called Trump's "rapid-fire dishonesty." The CNN fact-checker observed that while NBC published a fact-check of Trump's claims after the interview, Llamas himself frequently responded to Trump's outright falsehoods with "right" or "yeah," and sometimes "didn’t acknowledge them at all."

"Llamas’ hands-off approach to the president’s falsehoods left people watching the interview on television and through social media clips without immediate corrective information on a variety of pressing subjects," Dale wrote. "An exchange about inflation, for example, was littered with a bunch of inaccurate Trump figures and assertions that Llamas let pass by with the word 'right.' And in one case, when Trump claimed it’s only 'very few' product prices that have stubbornly refused to fall during this presidency, Llamas initially responded with a comment that made it sound like he was endorsing the false claim: 'Yeah, very few. I get it.'"

When it came to Trump's insistence about presiding over an increase in prices of consumer goods, Trump insisted to Llamas that the increases are limited to "very few" items. But Dale wrote that the Consumer Price Index was actually 2.7 percent higher in December 2025 compared to December 2024, and many more products have become more expensive since Trump's second term began than have become cheaper.

Dale also disputed Trump's claim to Llamas that he "inherited the worst inflation in the history of our country." The all-time highest inflation rate of 23.7 percent was actually set in 1920. And while former President Joe Biden saw the inflation rate jump as high as 9.1 percent under his watch in 2022, that was a 48-year high. Dale credited Llamas for telling Trump that Biden had to contend with the Covid-19 pandemic, which was the chief cause of high inflation rates.

Trump also told the NBC reporter that gas prices were "$1.99 a gallon" in 2026, though Dale found that the average price for a gallon of gas was $2.89 per gallon according to data published by AAA. GasBuddy head of petroleum analysis Patrick De Haan told CNN that out of more than 150,000 gas stations, only 18 to 34 offered gas prices under $2 per gallon. Dale reminded readers that Llamas' only response to Trump's claim was "yeah."

"An average over those dates would be 28 stations over the course of the week, or 0.018% of all U.S. stations. I think I’d rather find the needle in the haystack at that point," De Haan said.

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AN 1 26

CNN staff finally revolt over conservative commentator Scott Jennings

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AN 1 26

CNN slammed for employing 'Scumbag Scott' Jennings after he was caught misquoting Tim Walz

Carl Gibson

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MMA

CNN hosts climate scientist to explain to President Trump why extreme cold doesn’t disprove global warming}:

:{:{01/26/26}:

January 25, 2026, episode of CNN This Morning Weekend

:{:{VICTOR BLACKWELL (ANCHOR): We're seeing the impacts of that winter storm across multiple states. This is Kansas City from our affiliate KMBC. You can see the roads covered in snow there. We'll keep you updated on the storm and where it's headed throughout the day here on CNN. Now, President Trump says that he's pulling the U.S. out of the global U.N. Climate treaty. The move would leave the U.S. out of international climate change talks and is likely to raise tensions even more with allies.}:

The timing of the announcement is notable, as tens of millions of Americans are facing an enormous and potentially catastrophic winter storm. Let me bring in Robert Kopp. He's a climate scientist at Rutgers University and is lead author on U.N. climate assessments. Mr. Kopp, thank you for being with me. Let me first talk about the overlap between the big story of the day, the storm that's hitting so many Americans, and climate change. The president posted on Truth Social. We can put it up on the screen, "Record cold wave expected to hit 40 states. Rarely seen anything like it before. Could the environmental insurrectionist please explain – Whatever happened to global warming?" Suggesting that the two were divorced from one another. What does he need to know?}:

ROBERT KOPP (CLIMATE SCIENTIST, RUTGERS UNIVERSITY): Well, he needs to know that the United States is not, in fact, the world, and global warming is a global phenomenon. Just because it's cold where I am, you know, it’s about 15 degrees outside here in New Jersey, doesn't mean it's cold everywhere. In Greenland, in fact, its highs today are above freezing. They're about 25 degrees above average. And in parts of south Australia there are 120 degrees. We also know that it's cold in winter, and it will continue to get cold, even as the average temperature of the planet increases.

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  1. ### Covering Hurricane Melissa’s landfall, national TV news networks largely neglected the storm’s links to climate change

10/30/25 2:18 PM EDT

  1. ### National news media outlets nearly silent on potential Trump family self-dealing pharmaceutical scheme

10/16/25 10:45 AM EDT

  1. ### National TV news coverage of Hurricane Katrina’s 20th anniversary was solemn and respectful but largely elided the structural inequalities the storm exposed

09/04/2

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AN 12 25

On Sunday, President Donald Trump declared that he will “be involved” in the federal government’s decision on whether to allow the streaming service Netflix to buy mass media and entertainment conglomerate Warner Brothers Discovery. On Monday, Paramount Skydance, another mass media and entertainment conglomerate, announced a hostile takeover bid for WBD — with news soon following that Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner’s private equity firm is part of the Paramount offer.

“Paramount is telling WBD shareholders that it has a smoother path to regulatory approval than does Netflix, and Kushner’s involvement only strengthens that case,” Axios reported. “Paramount is led by David Ellison, whose billionaire father Larry is a major supporter of President Trump.”

Axios added that Kushner’s firm, Affinity Partners, “was not mentioned in Paramount’s press release on Monday morning about its $108 billion bid, nor were participating sovereign wealth funds from Saudi Arabia, Abu Dhabi and Qatar.”

Fortune reported that “Affinity and the other outside financing partners have agreed to forgo any governance rights, which Paramount said means the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States would have no jurisdiction over the transaction.”

But Axios’ Sarah Fischer wrote on social media: “Ask yourself, why would anyone want to put money into an investment of this caliber and have no governance rights or board seats?”

“Essentially,” she added, “people want to have control/access/political power behind the scenes.”

“Reality is,” Fischer explained, this hostile takeover is a good explanation “of how capitalism/democracy can be exploited for political gain,” with “Paramount essentially betting our open system incentivizes shareholders to take [the] best financial deal even if it means giving soft power” to three sovereign wealth funds, the President, and his son-in-law.

Critics are blasting Kushner’s and Trump’s involvement.

U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) remarked, “Donald Trump said he’ll ‘be involved in’ deciding if Netflix can buy Warner Bros. Is that an open invite for CEOs to curry favor with Trump in exchange for merger approvals? It should be an independent decision by the Department of Justice based on the law and facts.”

Award-winning journalist Sophia A. Nelson, responding to trump’s remarks, observed: “This is ridiculous. Corrupt. And NOT what a President gets involved in.”

Professor, investor, and marketing executive Adam Cochran wrote: “Trump is talking about him personally being involved in deciding the fate of the Netflix-Warner Brothers deal, and how it’s ‘bad.’ Meanwhile his son-in-law is financing the competing offer. There has truly never been a more corrupt administration in US history!”

Alexander Vindman, former Director of European Affairs for the United States National Security Council (NSC), wrote: “F– NO to another corrupt Trump deal. Nepobaby, Jared’s, involvement would deliver CNN to MAGA.”

NewsNation’s Kurt Bardella, a communications advisor and media relations consultant, asked: “Alexa, what is a ‘conflict-of-interest’?”

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The year the media oligarchs bowed to Trump

Written by Matt Gertz

Published 12/03/25

We warned last year that Donald Trump’s second term as president would turbo-charge the political right’s burgeoning media-intimidation complex. Republican officials and right-wing billionaires were already trying to secure their political agenda by using their wealth, lawfare, and government power to silence journalists. And Trump, we wrote, using his authoritarian strategies, would force media moguls to choose between the journalistic integrity of the news outlets they oversee and their broader business interests, with the fate of the free press in the balance.

Twelve months later, it is clear that many of these corporate media owners have made their choice: They are damaging celebrated news outlets like CBS and The Washington Post out of some combination of personal preference and political expedience. While journalists at their outlets are still producing important stories that reveal the corruption and malfeasance of the Trump administration, it’s anyone’s guess how long they will be permitted to do so.

Trump has spent the last decade at war with the press. He has no regard for free speech, treats all dissent as inherently illegitimate, and uses every available tool to curtail critical journalism. The president’s years of anti-media diatribes have achieved their goal of destroying the credibility of potentially damaging reporting among his supporters, and in his second term, he has backed up those verbal attacks with a flurry of actions.

He and his administration have supplemented or even replaced members of the traditional press corps in favor of MAGA influencers and Trumpist outlets; defunded public media outlets in the U.S. and sought to dismantle them abroad; sued reporters and news outlets for publishing content he dislikes; and terminated rules protecting journalists from prosecutorial scrutiny, while targeting them with retaliatory immigration enforcement.

But Trump’s most unnerving assaults on the press involve his administration's use of state power as leverage against oligarchs who control broadcast and cable news operations and major newspapers. For billionaire owners or top executives at massive multimedia companies, news outlets typically represent a tiny fraction of their overall business interests. And those broader holdings create potential vulnerabilities — like regulatory scrutiny of mergers, federal contracting, and criminal investigations — that an authoritarian president can manipulate to encourage media moguls to cudgel their news outlets into line.

Trump’s strategies resemble those of Victor Orban, the Hungarian autocrat many on the American right take as a model, who has dismantled his country’s independent press and forced the sales of outlets to his allies. Trump's desired result is a cowed journalist corps that will produce Fox News-style propaganda venerating his successes and covering up his corruption and failures.

America’s media oligarchs often resisted Trump’s corrupt abuses of power in his first term, either enduring his attacks without constraining their news outlets or beating his administration in federal court. But in his second term, while some media organizations (including Media Matters) have fought to protect the First Amendment against Trump and his administration, certain wealthy magnates have chosen the path of cowardice, submission, and collaboration.

David and Larry Ellison

David Ellison is the son of Larry Ellison, the Oracle co-founder who is one of the richest men alive and a close friend and ally to Trump. The younger Ellison took control of CBS News in July after the Federal Communications Commission approved his Skydance Media’s purchase of CBS parent company Paramount. Trump-appointed FCC Chair Brendan Carr acted only after Paramount agreed to pay $16 million to settle an absurd lawsuit Trump filed over CBS News’ editing of an October interview with then-Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris — and after he secured pledges from Skydance to push the network’s coverage to the right.

Ellison followed through on his promise. The new ownership appointed “anti-woke” champion Bari Weiss as CBS News’ editor-in-chief and Kenneth Weinstein, a Trump-supporting right-wing think tanker, as its ombudsman. An October wave of layoffs hit nearly 100 CBS News employees, gutting the network’s teams focused on climate change and race and culture. Trump certainly seems happy with the changes — in a November 2 interview that marked his first appearance on the network since 2020, he praised Weiss as a “great new leader” and “great person” and described David Ellison’s takeover of CBS News as “the greatest thing that’s happened in a long time to a free and open and good press.”

With the CBS News takeover as proof of concept, Ellison and his father are each making moves to seize additional media outlets and move them in a Trumpy direction.

David Ellison is trying to buy Warner Bros. Discovery — and the administration is reportedly signaling that other bidders will face grueling oversight from federal regulators. “Trump wants WBD in the Ellisons’ hands, and insiders say it’s because he wants favorable coverage from its CNN news channel,” wrote the New York Post.

Larry Ellison has even reportedly “engaged in a dialogue” with the White House “about possibly axing some of the CNN hosts whom Donald Trump is said to loathe, including Erin Burnett and Brianna Keilar,” if the sale were to go through.

The Trump White House is also trying to broker a deal in which the social media giant TikTok, a news source for one-fifth of American adults and 43% of those under 30, would be sold to a coalition including companies controlled by Larry Ellison as well as fellow pro-Trump magnate Marc Andreessen.

Bezos owns The Washington Post, but his massive fortune comes from founding Amazon, the online retailing and web service giant, and he also owns the space technology company Blue Origin. During Trump’s first term, Bezos bore numerous potshots at what Trump termed the “Amazon Washington Post,” as well as his administration’s apparent retaliation against Amazon’s operations. But Bezos signaled that things would be different in a second term even before Trump’s election when he barred the Post’s editorial board from endorsing in the 2024 contest, blocking the publication of its piece supporting Harris.

The decision began a deterioration of Bezos’ relationship with the Post, accelerated further by his February demand that the paper’s Opinion section advocate without exception for “personal liberties and free markets.” Opinion editor David Shipley resigned rather than execute that pivot; his replacement, Adam O’Neal, an undistinguished reporter and editor previously at The Economist and The Wall Street Journal, has overseen buyouts and layoffs of the section’s veterans (my wife Alyssa Rosenberg, the section’s former letters and community editor, was among those who took the buyout) and hired several conservative writers, leading one of the paper’s right-wing columnists to boast, “We’re now a conservative opinion page.” The dramatic changes seem to have blown a hole in the Post’s subscriber numbers, with NPR’s David Folkenflik estimating “a net loss of a couple hundred thousand subscribers” at the end of February. With revenue plummeting thanks to Bezos’ decisions and the owner unwilling to eat the losses, more layoffs are reportedly on the way.

But defanging the Post — and finding a way to put money in the Trump family’s pockets — seems to be working out well for Bezos. His rewards include plum seats for Trump’s swearing-in, federal contracts for Blue Origin and Amazon Web Services, and the president publicly applauding him for “trying to do a real job with The Washington Post, and that wasn’t happening before.”

### Patrick Soon-Shiong

Like Bezos, Los Angeles Times owner Soon-Shiong has other business interests that left him vulnerable to Trump’s retaliation; he made his fortune in the biotech industry, and his medical patents and products are subject to federal oversight. Whether due to fear of retribution or a shift in his own political views, Soon-Shiong stepped up his oversight of the Times last year, beginning with the cancellation of a planned endorsement of Harris.

He subsequently shilled for Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s confirmation as secretary of health and human services; announced a remaking of the editorial board, beginning with the addition of pro-Trump CNN commentator Scott Jennings; killed an editorial that criticized Trump’s Cabinet picks; announced the addition of an AI-powered “bias meter” to the paper’s opinion pieces, which was pulled after it downplayed the Ku Klux Klan; floated a conservative version of The View featuring right-wing actor Rob Schneider; launched “LA Times Studios,” a multimedia studio featuring influencers reading AI-generated scripts; sat for interviews with right-wing commentators including Tucker Carlson and Megyn Kelly; and put forward an ill-starred initial public offering plan which led The Hollywood Reporter to ask, “Does Patrick Soon-Shiong Want to Turn the L.A. Times Into a MAHA Memestock?”

As with Bezos’ actions at the Post, Soon-Shiong’s changes to the Times have resulted in plummeting circulation, an exodus of talent, and the diminishment of the paper’s influence. But his medical patents are still getting approved by the federal government.

Iger, who as the CEO of Disney oversees its subsidiary ABC, was at the center of two of the most craven media moves since Trump’s reelection.

First, his December 2024 decision to sign off on a $15 million “blood sacrifice to Trump,” settling a defamation lawsuit that ABC News’ lawyers thought they would win, only looks worse over time. The capitulation made clear to ABC staff that Iger would not support them in a stand-off with the president and set a precedent that media companies and other major corporations would knuckle under to his demands.

Second, after Carr threatened Disney and ABC’s affiliates with FCC retribution if they failed to “take actions” against Jimmy Kimmel over one of his monologues in September, Iger folded by suspending Kimmel’s show within hours. Carr’s threats made a mockery of the First Amendment — but Iger wasn’t willing to fight to uphold those rights in court. Iger relented and returned Kimmel to the airwaves only after an outcry by Hollywood talent and a spike in Disney+ cancellations.

What did Iger’s cowardice bring ABC? When ABC News chief White House correspondent Mary Bruce dared to ask Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman a question about his role in the brutal murder of the U.S.-based dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi during a joint Oval Office appearance with Trump, the president became enraged, lashing out at the journalist and calling her outlet “fake news” and “one of the worst in the business.”

“I think the license should be taken away from ABC because your news is so fake and it’s so wrong,” he later added, threatening to shut down a U.S. news outlet for producing reporting he doesn’t like in front of a foreign dictator who represses his own country’s media.

“And we have a great commissioner, a chairman, who should look at that," he added.

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Corporate broadcast news covered this year’s COP30 global climate summit for 2 minutes — cable networks covered it for just over 3 hours

Fox News used COP30 to attack Gavin Newsom and undermine climate science

Special ProgramsClimate & Energy

Written by Allison Fisher

Published 11/26/25

COP30 — which proceeded without an official U.S. delegation — opened on November 6 while the main sessions got underway on November 10 and concluded on November 21.

This year’s conference sought to address numerous issues, creating a roadmap to phase out fossil fuels and a landmark declaration on the threat of disinformation in addressing climate change and a newly proposed initiative to reduce deforestation.

As in previous years, the gathering was met with protests by Indigenous and civil society groups calling for stronger climate action. This year, although 2,500 Indigenous people gathered in Belém, Brazil, for the summit, only 14% (360 individuals) received credentials to attend negotiations. (No members were part of Brazil’s official delegation.) By contrast, fossil fuel lobbyists were overrepresented at the COP30 climate negotiations to the chagrin of climate organizers and Indigenous climate activists. In one demonstration on November 14, indigenous groups blocked the entrance to the conference and demanded to speak to Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.

Reporting on the protests by TV news outlets was sparse, while the attendance of California Gov. Gavin Newsom was widely covered. CNN and MSNBC discussed how the U.S. is falling behind in the clean energy technology race while China gains ground. Additionally, 22% of segments mentioned Bill Gates’ controversial climate memo to world leaders. Meanwhile, Fox News coverage attacked Newsom and undermined climate science.

Two brief headline reports, one from ABC and one from CBS, focused on the protests at the conference. Much of the broadcast coverage focused on a fire that broke out in one of the convention halls on November 20 — though none of the coverage of the fire offered more details about the climate conference.

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From the November 21, 2025, edition of NBC's Today

CNN’s coverage of COP30 featured several experts, including Christiana Figueres, a Costa Rican diplomat who was the executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change during the 2015 Paris climate accord negotiations; Margaret Barry, a climate litigation fellow at the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia University; Kim Cobb, climate scientist and director of the Institute at Brown for Environment and Society; as well as former vice president and climate advocate Al Gore.

A key narrative through CNN’s coverage was the state of the clean energy transition and China’s role in it.

In an interview with CNN’s Christiane Amanpour on November 8, Figueres explained some of the progress since the landmark Paris agreement in 2015: “Ten years ago, one in every hundred vehicles that were being sold was electric. Now, we have one in five. We have two times as much investment into renewable energy as we do into fossil fuels. Solar has been deployed 15 times faster than we ever expected 10 years ago, and on and on and on. There are many proof points that there is a new economy rising.”

Amanpour also interviewed Al Gore, who pointed out the cost of the U.S. ceding the clean energy economy to others.

“China is now exporting to other countries more green technology like electric vehicles and windmills and solar,” Gore said. “The value of their green tech exports now far exceeds the exports from the United States to the rest of the world. … We’re seeing this transition away from fossil fuels and toward renewable energy and electric vehicles and batteries and these exciting new technologies that are pollution-free, they create three times as many jobs per dollar spent compared to the old dirty fossil fuels, and that’s where the economic future is.”

Climate scientist Kim Cobb made a similar argument on CNN Newsroom With Fredricka Whitfield*:

“China, of course, [is] transitioning its economy very, very quickly to clean energy sources. About 84% of the demand last year in China for electricity was met by clean energy sources. They are owning EVs, batteries, and solar cells to the tune of 78% of global manufacturing taking place in China for a $2 trillion industry. So right now what we’re looking at is China taking a very bold leadership role and charting its clean energy future. The U.S., in the meantime, swimming very much upstream against the global currents of deployed renewables, which are cheaper than fossil fuels right now.”

While MSNBC covered the climate conference for roughly 13 minutes, its coverage included similar narratives about clean energy. On his November 16 show, host Ali Velshi noted: “Now, in America's absence, China is stepping up as a global leader in climate science. The Center for Research on Energy and Clean Air reported last week that China's carbon emissions have been flat or falling for 18 months straight. Part of that is attributable to a record amount of renewable energy expansion in China. In 2024, the country installed 333 gigawatts of solar power capacity — that's more than the rest of the world combined.”

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From the November 12, 2025, edition of Fox News' The Five

Discussing COP30 earlier in the same segment, Greg Gutfeld declared that the “climate agenda has been fully discredited” and that “the climate computer models have been shown to be corrupt.” He went on to falsely claim, “They are wrong on predicting everything from the temperature increases to the snow or ice melting.”

Laura Ingraham announced that scientists’ warnings on climate change have been “total scams.”

The network also hosted its usual round-up of climate contrarians and skeptics including Marc Morano, Bjorn Lomborg, Michael Shellenberger, and Victor Davis Hanson, and Fox coverage continued to cite the controversial October 28 climate memo from Bill Gates to global leaders ahead of COP30 to suggest that climate change is no longer considered a crisis requiring immediate action.

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From the November 15, 2025, edition of Fox News' The Journal Editorial Report

“I think what Bill Gates is really saying is something reasonable,” Lomborg agreed. “Talk about how you think about climate — he’s saying sure, it’s a problem, but it’s not the end of the world.”

In reality, 2025 is set to be the “second or third warmest year on record,” the World Meteorological Organization reports. The warmest year overall remains 2024, which was likely “the first calendar year with a global mean temperature of more than 1.5°C above the 1850-1900 average.”

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an 11 25

An appeals court upheld a lower court’s decision to dismiss President Donald Trump's years-old $475 million defamation lawsuit against CNN, deeming it "unpersuasive" and "meritless," reports *The New Republic*.

Trump sued the cable news network in 2022, for using the term “the Big Lie” in its coverage of "Trump’s debunked claims of sweeping election fraud that supposedly robbed him of a second term in the White House in 2020," The New Republic writes.

“Trump has not adequately alleged the falsity of CNN’s statements. Therefore, he has failed to state a defamation claim,” wrote 11th Circuit Court of Appeals Judges Adalberto Jordan, Kevin Newsom, and Elizabeth L. Branch in an eight-page filing.

“Trump’s other arguments are likewise meritless," the judges wrote.

Trump nominated both Newsom and Branch, as well as District Judge Raag Singhal, who first dismissed the case in July.

Trump also accused CNN of using “the Big Lie” to create a “false and incendiary association” between him and "Adolf Hitler, who originally coined the term in Mein Kampf," The New Republicexplains, "But the lower court ruled that “bad rhetoric is not defamation when it does not include false statements of fact.”

The panel of appeals court judges ruled that Trump’s argument was “unpersuasive,” because the term “Big Lie” did not "constitute a statement of fact," they report.

“This assumption is untenable,” the judges wrote, adding that "Trump’s argument hinges on the fact that his own interpretation of his conduct — i.e., that he was exercising a constitutional right to identify his concerns with the integrity of elections — is true and that CNN’s interpretation — i.e., that Trump was peddling his ‘Big Lie’ — is false. However, his conduct is susceptible to multiple subjective interpretations, including CNN’s."

This is the latest in a series of failed lawsuits Trump has issued against media companies reporting on his lies, including a $15 billion defamation suitagainst The New York Times that was dismissed in September.

“We have held that, by using ‘Big Lie’ to describe Trump, CNN was not publishing a false statement of fact. Therefore, whether CNN used ‘Big Lie’ one time or many is irrelevant to the question of falsity,” the judges said.

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MSNBC host Lawrence O'Donnell accused CNN of hiring a "paid liar" for President Donald Trump in a scathing rebuke of the network's controversial conservative contributor, according to The Daily Beast.

O'Donnell tore into CNN's "Trump-supporting CEO Mark Thompson" and singled out the network's Scott Jennings for "his unscrupulous views," they report.

"Everyone who remains has become much more careful in anything they might even think of saying about Donald Trump,” O’Donnell said on "The Last Word."

Jennings, in particular, O'Donnell noted, is someone who CNN “eagerly pays to lie every day and every night for Donald Trump."

And while Jennings emerged on TV as a more moderate conservative, over time, O'Donnell noted, he has become less moderate and more MAGA.

"When he first started appearing on television, he was capable of criticizing some of the more extreme Trump positions. ButScott Jennings figured out where the money is, and how he could get his own podcast, and decided to become the JD Vance of CNN," O'Donnell said.

Thompson has defended Jennings as "good TV" despite, The Daily Beast says, "being the object of ridicule during his many appearances on the network."

"Scott’s like d’Artagnan. He’s got his sword out and he’s got about four Democrats against him, but he spiked them all off,” Thompson said, comparing Jennings to the protagonist of the Three Musketeers.

“That’s much more like it. I think he’s a worthy opponent, as it were, for the Democrats in the room. And it makes not just good television, but also, in some ways, a slightly deeper testing of the ideas all the way around the table," Thompson said.

O'Donnell used his own show's ratings to dispel that rationale, saying, "Here’s how bad that television is that they make over there. The show that Scott Jennings frequents the most is on opposite this program. And that show, on a good night, gets half the audience of this show.“

"This program usually has an audience triple the size of the terrible, terrible television that Scott Jennings is delivering on the absurdly degraded version of CNN, presided over by the man who thinks lying for Donald Trump on TV is an honorable pursuit," O'Donnell said.

Jennings laughed it off onX, saying, " “No, Lawrence, I don’t have time to save your show.”

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AN 11 25

Ronald Reagan Republican and GOP strategist Frank Luntz says the word “capitalism” has become a dirty word that Republicans must avoid if they want to win election in the aftermath of Zohran Mamdani.

With communication strategist Luntz, winning elections is primarily about messaging, and the word ”capitalism” is no longer a winning message as billionaire “capitalists” accrue most of the wealth and leave Americans worrying about their rent and food pantries. Just recently, the Top 10 U.S. billionaires’ collective wealth grew by nearly $700 billion and analysts warned government policies are driving inequality to new heights.

“Is it fair that some people's children will be born billionaires without having to work a day in their life, while others will work two or three jobs just to put food on their table and a roof over their heads,” Luntz asked CNN anchor Michale Smerconish. “Second, is it fair that some schools have all the technology, all the resources, and others can't even afford books or chalk?”

“Why do I ask that? Because you can see it. You can visualize it,” said Luntz, who correctly predicted Tuesday’s off-year elections would “go badly” for the Republican Party. “And third, does everyone … who works hard and plays by the rules — shouldn’t they have a genuine shot at the American dream? These are the questions that you ask at the beginning to bring audiences over to you. And without asking those questions, you're cutting people out.”

“[Democratic socialist Sen.] Bernie Sanders is on Line 2 for you because he's finding this pretty convincing,” Smerconish responded, and then asked Luntz if the U.S. would “be properly cast as a democratic socialist nation” by 2050.

“It’s already happening,” said Luntz. “I work with young people all across the country. Under age 30, they prefer socialism to capitalism already. The 30s, they are about dead even. It's only when you get to be older 40 that you become more supportive [of capitalism].”

“We should be calling it ‘economic freedom,’ not capitalism, because capitalism is about CEOs,” Luntz added. “It's about billionaires, and it's about Wall Street. Economic freedom is about Main Street, about the workforce and about the opportunities for the future. And I want to give you one bit of language that whoever wins this wins the entire debate, whether it's capitalism or socialism.”

Whether or not they vote that way, Luntz advised Republicans to sell America as “a place for new ideas, better solutions and where good people thrive if we want to move forward as a country … and no one is left behind.”

“Whoever controls that language wins the debate,” he said.

“I think AOC, Mamdani and Bernie are all going to be clamoring for your services after the first part of our exchange,” said Smerconish — but Luntz jettisoned any notion that he stood behind the policies of the three politicians.

“They won’t get it,” Luntz said.

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AN 10 25

CNN anchor Pamela Brown sparred with U.S. Rep. Lisa McClain of Michigan, the Chair of the House Republican Conference, who was blaming former President Joe Biden for soaring prices nine full months into the Trump administration. Trump during the presidential campaign promised to lower prices on day one.

“This isn’t a quick fix, right?” Congresswoman McClain told Brown on Monday. “The past four years dug a very deep hole for the American people.”

“It’s gonna take us a hot second to get out of it,” she insisted, “but I have all the confidence in President Trump that he absolutely is working for the American people to get us out of that devastating inflationary period under the last administration.”

Brown was not receptive.

CNN Anchor Pamela Brown sparred with U.S. Rep. Lisa McClain of Michigan, the Chair of the House Republican Conference, who was blaming former President Joe Biden for soaring prices nine full months into the Trump administration. Trump during the presidential campaign promised to lower prices on day one.

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“This isn’t a quick fix, right?” Congresswoman McClain told Brown on Monday. “The past four years dug a very deep hole for the American people.”

“It’s gonna take us a hot second to get out of it,” she insisted, “but I have all the confidence in President Trump that he absolutely is working for the American people to get us out of that devastating inflationary period under the last administration.”

Brown was not receptive.

“But this administration is nine months in,” she reminded the Michigan lawmaker, “and President Trump had vowed to lower prices from day one, from very early on in the administration. So at what point is it?”

“Gas is down,” McClain declared. “Eggs is down.”

“I mean, we don’t talk about the price of eggs anymore,” she added. “Um, come on.”

“But those other areas,” Brown responded. “Other areas.”

“It’s gonna take a half second,” McClain insisted.

“Okay,” Brown said, moving on. “All right, Congressman.”

“I mean,” McClain continued, “if there was a silver bullet to get us out of this mess that was created under the Biden administration, I have the ultimate faith that President Trump could do it.”

“Unfortunately, there is a lot to unravel, and I don’t think you’re being quite as fair as he has — gas prices are down," she added.

“I did say that,” Brown replied, “No, no, I am being fair.”

Earlier, Brown had pointed to remarks U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) had made about the high cost of living, lamenting, “inflation crushed people in the past four and a half years, and the costs have not come down.”

“I myself can tell you, my apartment here in Washington, D.C., the electricity bill is $100 more than it was last year, ’cause you can look at your own bill and look at costs,” Greene said. “Prices have not come down.”

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September 17, 2025, edition of MSNBC's All In with Chris Hayes

CHRIS HAYES (HOST): So given that context, I want you to look around the U.S. right now and see what's been happening here, right in front of our eyes. In July, the Trump FCC — that's the entity that Brendan Carr controls — approved the sale of Paramount, with it CBS, to Skydance Media, which is controlled by the family of pro-Trump tech billionaire named Larry Ellison. It was his son, actually, who's buying it. Now that approval only came after Paramount paid Trump $60 million to settle the president's obvious frivolous, ludicrous lawsuit against CBS News and 60 Minutes for editing interviews, and after the Ellisons agreed to eliminate DEI programs, and after they agreed to install an executive formerly from a conservative think tank to essentially act as a sort of ideological minder at CBS News for political bias. So they did all those things, then they got the approval for this very, very large merger. After that, CBS canceled Stephen Colbert's top-rated late-night show, which was notorious for its criticism of the sitting president.

Last week, after Larry Ellison officially leapfrogged another pro-Trump billionaire, Elon Musk, to become the world's richest man, the new Paramount conglomerate made another media bid, this time for Warner Brothers Discovery, which just so happens to own CNN. So there's a possibility that they could purchase that and roll that up as well. Then yesterday we got this news about TikTok, perhaps you've seen it. Do you remember the Chinese-owned app that was banned as a security risk because of a bipartisan vote in both houses of Congress and signed into law by Joe Biden? And then Donald Trump just literally ignored the law while he searched for a U.S. buyer. Well, yesterday there was news of a framework of a deal. Interesting. Let's see what the deal is — gives Americans an 80% stake in TikTok. Which Americans? Well, you'll never guess. Yes, Larry Ellison is one of them, along with far-right venture capitalist, Trump donor, DOGE consultant, MAGA-backer Marc Andreessen.

As Talking Points Memo noted, if all those deals all go through that would mean the Murdoch family controlling Fox News, the Journal, New York Post, its other properties. Twitter, TikTok, CBS, CNN and more owned by Elon Musk and the Ellison family. The Washington Post owned by Jeff Bezos. The Trump administration is threatening to bring the government down on free speech and use it against dissent. It is also facilitating the sale of some of our biggest private media outlets to Trump allies, and is a very obvious attempt to consolidate power over free expression.

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07/23/25 9:56 PM EDT

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Jimmy Kimmel and the MAGA strong-arming of American media

Written by Matt Gertz

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As with so many of the Trump administration’s excesses, a simple recitation of the events leading to Jimmy Kimmel’s suspension sounds like something out of dystopian fiction. ABC’s Wednesday night announcement that it was putting Jimmy Kimmel Live! on indefinite hiatus in the face of White House threats is the latest sign that U.S. media are increasingly coming under the control of President Donald Trump and his MAGA movement.

Trump had been targeting Kimmel and ABC for months. In the wake of frequent administration critic Stephen Colbert’s July announcement that his late-night show was ending, the president gloated that Kimmel would be “NEXT to go.” Last month, Trump argued that the Federal Communications Commission should revoke the licenses of ABC stations because it broadcasts too many “BAD STORIES” about him and provides “unfair coverage of Republicans.” And on Monday morning, he threatened ABC News reporter Jonathan Karl, saying that Attorney General Pam Bondi might target him and his network for purportedly airing anti-Trump “hate speech.”

Kimmel inaccurately suggested during his Monday night monologue that the alleged killer of Turning Points USA founder Charlie Kirk was part of “the MAGA gang.” Under ordinary circumstances, such a statement could result in a correction and apology. But Kimmel’s remarks occurred in an environment in which Trump and his administration are eager to punish political speech they dislike.

Brendan Carr, the FCC’s Trumpy chair, wielded Kimmel’s monologue as a cudgel against his network during a Tuesday appearance on right-wing influencer Benny Johnson’s show. Carr accused Kimmel of “an intentional effort to mislead the American people” and threatened Disney and ABC’s affiliates with regulatory retribution in response, saying: “We can do this the easy way or the hard way. These companies can find ways to change conduct and take actions on Kimmel, or there's going to be additional work for the FCC ahead.”

He specifically suggested that affiliate networks should tell Disney that they would not run Kimmel’s show “until you straighten this out” and insinuated that they could face “license revocation from the FCC” if they did not.

Carr’s threats appear to be a clear violation of the First Amendment — but that matters only if Disney and the affiliate networks are willing to fight to uphold those rights in court.

Instead, Nexstar Media Group, which needs FCC approval for its proposed purchase of the stations owned by media company Tegna, said its affiliates would immediately preempt Jimmy Kimmel Live! Shortly after, Disney announced that it was putting the show on hiatus. And Sinclair Broadcasting Group, owned by the pro-Trump Smith family, said it would not return Kimmel’s show to its airwaves until ABC committed to “appropriate steps” and called for the late-night host to make a “meaningful personal donation” to Kirk's right-wing political group.

Carr subsequently joined Fox News’ Sean Hannity to take a curtain call and praise Nexstar and Sinclair for following his dictates.

It’s worth pointing out that neither Johnson nor Hannity could operate under Carr’s stated standard — but they had no objections to his statements because they understand that his actual goal is enforcing MAGA political correctness norms by which they already abide.

This capitulation is only the latest sign of increasing MAGA control over the free press

Trump has long benefited from a massive parallel right-wing ecosystem, from Fox News to talk radio to a host of MAGA streamers and influencers. But since Trump won election last fall, more and more of the corporate titans who control the U.S. media have come under his thumb.

When Trump attempted similar extortion tactics during his first term, the heads of media companies and owners of news outlets were willing to fight him in court. But since his election in November, executives at companies like Disney have proved far more willing to bend to his will.

Other news outlets either are owned by businessmen who have become more Trump-friendly (perhaps due to fears of retribution), like The Washington Post and Los Angeles Times, or have been taken over by businessmen with close ties to the president, like CBS News’ new Trump approved-owner David Ellison. More such consolidation is under way, with Ellison seeking to take over CNN and the Trump White House effectively nullifying the law as it tries to broker a deal in which TikTok would be sold to a coalition including companies controlled by his father, Larry Ellison, and fellow pro-Trump magnate Marc Andreessen.

Reporters at those outlets can and have continued to do vital reporting about the Trump administration under those circumstances. But they do so with knowledge that their ultimate bosses will not stand behind them in a pinch.

Other potential corporate targets like Comcast, which Trump has previously threatened over the coverage of NBC and MSNBC, have not yet faced the same level of retaliatory scrutiny. But their day will inevitably come, particularly after Trump and Carr saw how quickly Disney folded in the face of their Kimmel attack.

The New York Times is among the few major news outlets that has no choice but to stand up for its output and a free press because its ownership does not have other substantial business interests. But Trump is targeting them in a different way — this week, he launched a $15 billion defamation lawsuit over reporting that questioned his business acumen.

And in a sign that even regime-aligned owners will face punishment for critical reporting, Trump filed a lawsuit against The Wall Street Journal and its corporate parent’s chairman, Fox founder Rupert Murdoch, seeking $10 billion in damages over the paper’s coverage of his ties to disgraced financier and deceased sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

Trump’s endgame is clear. He wants to ensure that media outlets don’t produce coverage that criticizes him or his administration, but instead convey an endless stream of propaganda about his accomplishments.

He wants every outlet to be Fox News. And at this rate, he may get it.

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08/25/25 12:40 PM EDT

10/29/24 9:09 AM EDT

09/09/25

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After Kirk shooting, right-wing media revive false narrative about attack on Minnesota legislators

Written by Matt Gertz

Published09/17/25

In the wake of the killing of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk, many on the right have claimed that all political violence comes from the left, an argument used to justify a broad crackdown against their political enemies. The June shooting of two Democratic state legislators in Minnesota is the most prominent recent evidence against that argument (though hardly the only such case).

But several right-wing media figures have found a rhetorical solution by suggesting that the alleged Minnesota shooter — who reportedly had a “hit list” of dozens of other Democratic leaders and was, according to his friend and roommate, a supporter of President Donald Trump — is actually a leftist.

In fact, the right-wing media bubble is so impermeable to facts that contradict its narratives that prominent Republican figures, including Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Attorney General Pam Bondi, have pushed the same claims.

The right’s false narrative about the Minnesota shootings

Federal prosecutors allege that Vance Boelter committed “targeted political assassinations” when he shot and killed Minnesota House of Representatives Speaker Emerita Melissa Hortman and her husband, then shot and wounded Minnesota State Sen. John Hoffman and his wife, in the early morning hours of June 14.

:{:{Boelter, like many alleged perpetrators of political violence, seemed to be suffering from mental illness that muddled the clarity of his views. But his preferences appear to be with the political right — he was reportedly an evangelical Christian who preached against abortion and the LGBTQ community, and according to his roommate and longtime friend, he “supported Trump and tuned in to programming from Alex Jones’s conspiracy-filled Infowars site.”}:

And his targets were universally on the political left: Hortman, and Hoffman’s legislative district, were reportedly named in a “hit list” that law enforcement subsequently recovered from Boelter’s vehicle; the list also included Gov. Tim Walz, dozens of other Democratic lawmakers from Minnesota and elsewhere, and “figures with ties to the abortion rights movement, including Planned Parenthood.”}:

None of these facts should suggest that the political right or the Republican Party as a whole bear responsibility for Boelter’s alleged political violence or that their repression is justified to prevent similar attacks. They are relevant, however, to the question of whether political violence is solely directed from the left toward the right.

But while those facts were trickling out in the days following the attack, MAGA influencers were spinning up a narrative in which Boelter was actually a leftist. Some even suggested that the attacks may have been ordered by Walz, perhaps as retribution for the legislators supporting legislation the governor opposed. This argument rested on two ludicrously thin pieces of evidence. First, Walz had, in 2019, reappointed Boelter to a workforce development advisory board that reportedly “has about 60 members, many of whom are not politically connected or would have meaningful access to the governor or interactions with him.” Second, police found flyers with “No Kings” written on them in Boelter’s vehicle, which they said could have indicated he planned to target anti-Trump protests scheduled to take place later that day.

The right revives the false Minnesota narrative following Kirk’s killing

Many prominent right-wing figures seem to have either never heard any information about Boelter outside of those initial conspiracy theories, or learned of it but decided to hide the facts from their audiences. And now, in the wake of Kirk’s killing by an apparent leftist whose alleged motive was to stop Kirk’s “hate,” the false narrative has been revived by MAGA commentators who are trying to push back against arguments that the Minnesota shootings were a case of political violence from the right.

Fox & Friends co-host Brian Kilmeade, while listing recent cases of politically motivated killings on September 13, described the Minnesota shootings as follows: “And then, June 14, these Minnesota legislators were killed, something to do with what’s going on locally — they didn’t like what Tim Walz was doing, or a former staffer of Tim Walz.” Neither Kilmeade nor Fox’s graphic identified the legislators as Democrats.

Fox host Will Cain claimed on his Tuesday broadcast that “essentially bullets are flying in one direction,” but the left is trying “to make this a both-sides problem of political violence” by falsely attributing cases like the Minnesota shootings to the right.

“What we know about that particular suspect’s motivations remains somewhat unclear, but we do know that he had with him flyers that had No Kings Day protests solicitation on them,” Cain said. “There is also some suggestion he was upset about the way Hortman voted when it came to illegal immigrants and health care. Before we assume it is both sides, let’s get the facts on each instance.”

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From the September 16, 2025, edition of Fox News' The Will Cain Show

Newsmax host Rob Finnerty offered a similar explanation on his show later that night. “They're trying to pretend that what happened to Charlie Kirk has nothing to do with the left, that this happens all the time on both sides, which is not true,” he said, before turning to the Minnesota shootings.

“The problem with that, Melissa Hortman was a Democrat, and while her death was tragic, she was actually killed by another Democrat,” Finnerty claimed. “Not only that, a Democrat who worked directly for Tim Walz, was appointed by Tim Walz, the governor of Minnesota, Kamala's running mate, meaning that in this case, a Democrat literally assassinated another Democrat.”

“Because that's the left,” he continued. “That's what they do as a party, and it's not being covered by the rest of the media. It's being covered up.”

This narrative about the Minnesota shooting is so prevalent in right-wing media — and the GOP’s leaders are so ensconced within the right-wing media bubble — that Republican politicians have promoted it.

Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT), who is pathologically online, had posted shortly after the June attack that the shooter had been a “Marxist.” He later deleted his posts after being confronted by Sen. Tina Smith (D-MN), who had also been on the alleged “hit list.”

But three months later, their colleague Cruz also linked the Minnesota shooter to the left.

When Cruz called political violence “a left-wing problem” during a CNN interview on Tuesday, host Kaitlan Collins responded by pointing to the Minnesota shooting.

“You need to get your facts right,” Cruz replied. “The assassin there was not a right-wing assassin acting on a political motive. The assassin there was someone who had been an appointee of Tim Walz, and he was a deranged lunatic.”

Likewise, asked about the Minnesota shooting on Monday, Bondi said of the alleged killer, “I believe they said that they were supporters of Gov. Walz."

As I wrote last week, we can’t have a real conversation about political violence if we can’t admit that it has come from both sides. But many on the right just don’t seem capable of doing that, and they’re backfilling whatever explanations they can conjure up to avoid admitting the existence of political violence from the right.

// MMA

09/12/25 1:22 PM EDT

06/16/25 12:50 PM EDT

06/20/25

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AN 9 25 SCOTT JENNINGS

'Didn't work for you': CNN analyst confronts Trump's favorite pundit on political violence

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MMA EVLONDO C

The Trump administration’s repeal of the Environmental Protection Agency’s endangerment finding marks one of the most consequential climate and environmental rollbacks in modern U.S. history. In the aftermath of the announcement, CNN aired interviews with EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin and Energy Secretary Chris Wright, which are among the only major network appearances by either official since the repeal. Zeldin and Wright have seldom appeared on non-Fox outlets; their recent CNN interviews presented the network with rare opportunities to question senior officials directly about a coordinated policy campaign that threatens to undermine decades of climate and public health protections.

There is precedent for how the media can falter during these high‐stakes moments. For example, in 2018, after the first Trump administration attempted to bury a major federal climate report on Black Friday, all five Sunday morning political shows covered the story. However, much of that coverage featured climate denial, soft‐pedaled the findings, and framed the issue narrowly as partisan debate. The following month, in response to the outcry, then-host of NBC's Meet the Press Chuck Todd opened an episode dedicated to climate coverage by declaring that the program would no longer debate the existence of climate change, acknowledging that such framing misleads audiences and undermines urgency.

Unfortunately, in August 2025, as the Trump administration moved to erase the legal foundation for regulating climate pollution, those same dynamics resurfaced. CNN’s interviews with senior officials framed their positions as one side of a conventional political debate rather than as part of a governance strategy with immediate, material consequences for the climate, public health, and environmental enforcement.

CNN was offered rare access to top Trump climate officials at a moment of extraordinary policy consequence

CNN’s interviews with Wright and Zeldin aired a few days after the administration proposed repealing the EPA’s 2009 endangerment finding — the legal foundation for regulating greenhouse gas emissions. Rescinding the finding would gut the agency's core climate authority and open the door to deregulating emissions across multiple sectors.

These segments represented a rare opportunity for direct, public-facing accountability outside of the protective ecosystem Fox News creates for Trump administration officials. Media Matters has documented how Fox has repeatedly provided Zeldin a friendly platform to reframe deregulatory moves as economic reform and to portray climate funding as partisan waste. Fox has played the same role for other senior Trump officials, most recently including Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, who used the network to defend FEMA’s response to catastrophic flooding in Texas.

These appearances, in which administration officials have often gone unchallenged, serve to reframe and defend policies that weaken environmental protections, limit federal disaster response accountability, and risk significant harm to public health. CNN’s interviews were among the few opportunities to press the officials advancing this agenda at a moment of extraordinary policy consequence.

Chris Wright’s CNN interview allowed him to spew climate denial under the guise of scientific neutrality, while Zeldin's reframed a regulatory gutting as legal housekeeping

During the August 5 episode of CNN’s The Source with Kaitlan Collins, Energy Secretary Chris Wright used a solo, prime-time interview to promote an anti-science Department of Energy report — one designed to undercut the climate consensus and is already being cited to justify rollbacks on environmental protections. The report disputes the urgency of climate change, downplays sea level rise, and frames increased carbon dioxide as beneficial for plant growth. Wright echoed and amplified these points in the interview, adding that “nobody who is a credible economist or scientist” sees climate change as a major threat and repeating that carbon dioxide is “a fertilizer.” The interview aired again during the August 9 episode of The Source: Weekend.

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From the August 5, 2025, episode of CNN's The Source with Kaitlan Collins

Collins raised substantive issues: the report’s rushed timeline, hand-picked, climate-contrarian authors, the fact that “the EPA is already using this [report] to change its policy,” and that scientists said their work was misrepresented. But these points were handled in isolation, without sustained follow-up to clarify that the DOE document diverges sharply from the consensus positions of federal agencies such as the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, as well as the Fifth National Climate Assessment, which was produced by the U.S. Global Change Research Program.

Wright sidestepped Collins’ EPA point by insisting the report wasn’t “radical” and was in “the conventional lines,” invoking the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report citations to give the appearance of rigor and alignment with established science, even as its conclusions distort that science. He leaned on process language — “open for public comment,” “part of a dialogue” — to shift the frame toward procedural disagreement, casting objections from scientists as normal debate rather than evidence of distortion. Collins’ choice to frame those objections as “some people say” made them easier for Wright to dismiss and reinforced the idea that this was simply another area where reasonable people can disagree.

Instead of forcing a clear accounting of the report’s aims and its role in advancing anti-climate science policy, the interview became mired in procedural talk. That shift blurred the stakes for viewers and left the core of the report — an ideologically driven, anti-science document already being used to justify rolling back climate and environmental protections — largely unexamined. In the absence of sustained scrutiny, Wright was able to present it not as a political weapon against climate science, but as a credible contribution to policymaking.

During the August 4 episode of CNN’s State of the Union, guest host Kasie Hunt opened her interview with EPA Administrator Zeldin by explaining the purpose of the EPA’s endangerment finding and asking Zeldin about climate science. She also raised the issue of the insurance crisis tied to climate risk and, toward the end of the interview, noted that Zeldin had the power to leave the rule in place. Although Hunt pressed for clarity around certain questions, most of them landed as isolated challenges rather than part of a sustained effort to correct or contextualize misleading claims.

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From the August 3, 2025, episode of CNN's State of the Union

When asked about rising insurance costs, Zeldin pivoted, saying that “there has been a greening of the planet that’s been taking place” and “it’s important to note that emissions have been down.” The first statement reframes rising carbon dioxide as a net benefit, sidestepping the severe and widespread harms associated with climate change. The second tacitly concedes the desirability of reducing emissions, yet uses that very point to argue against retaining the EPA’s core climate authority. These two points undercut each other, but more importantly, both misrepresent the stakes of the repeal. Hunt did not press Zeldin to reconcile the contradiction or to explain how either point justified removing the agency’s central regulatory tool.

The interview ended with Hunt asking, “Do you think the federal government should have a role in trying to combat climate change?” followed by her observation that Zeldin was “taking an action” and “could just leave it alone.” By then, the moment to draw clear lines between his rhetoric and the consequences of his policy had passed. Without sustained clarification, viewers were left with Zeldin’s account — one that misrepresented both the scope of the endangerment finding and the implications of its repeal.

In both interviews, the hosts surfaced substantive issues but left them as isolated exchanges, allowing senior Trump officials to reframe the stakes, deflect from the core science, and leave viewers without a clear accounting of how their actions would weaken climate protections.

A pattern of deference lets Fox-fortified narratives pass unchallenged

CNN’s handling of the Wright and Zeldin appearances reflects a broader pattern in which media figures conducting high-stakes interviews with senior Trump officials avoid sustained challenges to the administration’s narratives. During Earth Month this year, CBS’ Face the Nation hosted Zeldin and asked about his efforts to clawback $20 billion in climate funding — but offered no pushback when he relied on vague economic justifications, procedural deflections, and claims that had already been dismissed by a federal judge. The exchange also never addressed the environmental justice consequences of Zeldin’s actions or the public health costs of EPA workforce cuts.

In June 2024, Face the Nation gave Doug Burgum space to deny that then-candidate Trump had asked oil executives to direct campaign contributions to him. Fox News later celebrated the segment as a rhetorical win for Burgum, citing the host’s passivity as proof he had neutralized the issue. That reaction underscores how Fox functions as both a refuge for Trump officials and a megaphone for their preferred narratives. For years, the network has given these officials space to frame regulatory rollbacks as economic reform and climate funding as partisan waste.

When administration officials appear on mainstream platforms, the bar must be higher

Although CNN and other major TV outlets have produced strong reporting on the administration’s anti-climate actions, that reporting did not surface during these interviews. Instead, Wright and Zeldin were not pressed on documented harms or contradictions. When mainstream interviews fail to apply sustained, adversarial questioning, they create accountability gaps that allow harmful narratives to go unchallenged.

Live interviews with senior officials driving climate rollbacks are rare moments for direct, public accountability. These are also moments when weak framing or deference can shape public understanding long after the segment ends. The stakes are material: The decisions under discussion affect emissions, public health, and the resilience of vulnerable communities. Here are a few dos and don’ts for meeting those stakes in real time.

Don’ts:

Dos:

Holding the most powerful decision-makers to account in these moments is not just good journalism — it is essential to making the stakes of their actions visible to the public.

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  1. ### Fox News shields EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin as he promotes the most destructive climate rollback in EPA history

07/31/25 12:45 PM EDT

  1. ### In March, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin denied NY Times reporting that the agency would eliminate its research arm. On Friday, the EPA did just that.

07/21/25 5:18 PM EDT

  1. ### Fox News runs defense for Trump administration on its delayed response to Texas flooding

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August 13, 2025, edition of CNN's Inside Politics

DANA BASH (HOST): This week, the Trump family's crypto firm announced a $1.5 billion dollar digital coin deal, another investment in a venture that's already raked in millions for President Trump and his family. But crypto is just one of many ways the first family is making money: there are merch sales, a meme coin, social media platform, of course, real estate projects in the Middle East. It's a dizzying number of deals that leave a huge question, quote "The number, How much is President Trump pocketing off the presidency?" That is the title of the piece you see there in The New Yorker, where staff writer David Kirkpatrick tried to answer that question. And David joins me now. Thank you so much for being here. Did you get an answer to your question? What is the number?

DAVID KIRKPATRICK (NEW YORKER): I came up with the best answer I could at press time, and it was $3.4 billion dollars. Astonishingly, it's probably gone up since then.

BASH: Okay, so let's break down that eye-popping number. More than $3 billion with a B. Crypto, that's where you identify most of the profits. How much have the president and his family made in crypto, and how?

KIRKPATRICK: Well what's most remarkable is the number of transactions, the number of deals, the number of ways that the family has sought to make money. And I should tell you, when I set out my method here was first look at some stream of income and decide one, Is it coming from the presidency? Does it depend on the presidency? And two, how much are they made out of it? So in that category, Truth Social and the company that holds it, Trump Media and Technology Group, is definitely depending on the presidency.

In the last month, the biggest chunk of what I'm calling their money from crypto has come through Trump Media and Technology Group. It has a stock that is basically a kind of financial indicator of the mood about the president. It's a meme stock in other words — stock trades only on how people feel about the president. But they've taken that meme stock and they've swapped it for cash and Bitcoin. So they have $3.1 billion dollars of cash and Bitcoin on the books. The president holds 42% of that company. His share of that is, you know, more than a billion dollars. So that's a that's a $1 billion bump in his net worth just in the last couple of months.

BASH: Eric and Donald Trump Jr. responded to your reporting about all of this. They were on Fox this morning. I want to play what they said and get your response.

[START CLIP]

ERIC TRUMP: It is infuriating. We had nowhere to go. Capital One stripped 300 bank accounts from me, 300 in the middle of the night. We didn't have a damn choice.

DONALD TRUMP JR: Trump was the only guy that was actually a businessman before that. Are we supposed to stop running our businesses? Are we supposed to stop doing anything? He's not involved in these things. We are running those businesses as we have.

[END CLIP]

BASH: David.

KIRKPATRICK: Well, you know, those are those are points that the families made before in the first part, in a kind of a garbled way, what Eric Trump saying there is that they got into crypto because they feel they were blackballed by the big banks. What he's leaving out is the banks that stopped doing business with the family did so after the attack on the capitol of January 6th, and other banks did step in.

The other point that Don Jr. is making, which is that, you know, they're a business family, they should be able to stay in business. When I went through their income streams, I set aside all the money that's their old business, you know, the hotels, things like the hotel, all the deals that grew out of their old business. Okay, fine. You know, a lot of people might say they should have divested from that, but fine.

But I'm only talking about ways that they're trying to monetize the presidency, ways that in one way or the other, they're trying to cash in specifically on the fact that Donald Trump is in the Oval Office. Nobody's done that before. And that's what's so exceptional here.

BASH: That is such an important distinction. I'm glad that you differentiated between the fact that, as Don Jr. said, he was a businessman. Of course he was. And the businesses he had before he ran for office. And what they have done since.

Speaking of that, there are a lot of big real estate deals that you wrote about. There are smaller ventures as well. Private merch sales. In fact, you point out in your piece, you can buy a $40 MAGA hat here on his official campaign site, which that money goes to the campaign. Or you can buy it via the Trump organization for $55. That money does not go to the campaign. I don't think I realized that you can buy it on Trump or, you know, as part of his business, the clearly political merch.

KIRKPATRICK: Yeah, I was really dumbstruck when I realized that on his financial disclosure forms, disclosing his personal income, he's including sales of what looked like campaign merchandise, the kinds of things that were I, a Trump supporter, I would buy thinking I was supporting the MAGA cause and his candidates. But it's actually going into his own pocket. That's, I'm pretty sure, unprecedented.

You know what readers are going to want to know after they read the article is, you know, all these payments. Is any of them an effort to buy influence, a kind of quid pro quo? And those things are very, very hard to prove. But for me, the takeaway is that given the astonishing rate at which they're making this money, given the obvious zeal to make more money, it does make the question more pressing: If you're making a payment to them, do you have reason to believe that they're going to give you something in return?

BASH: David Kirkpatrick, just fascinating reporting.

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AN MAY 25 2X? FACT CHECK

'Debunked': Rapid-fire CNN fact check quashes Trump’s new oval office claim - Alternet.org sa WHITE GENOCIDE

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AN 7 25

CNN analyst Daniel Dale says the president lies. He lies a lot.

“President Donald Trump told a story on Monday about how he 'made a correct prediction’ about the outcome of the United Kingdom’s 2016 Brexit referendum while he was visiting his golf course in Scotland ‘the day before the vote,’” Dale said.

“It didn’t happen,” said Dale. Trump actually visited Scotland the day after the Brexit referendum, and he’d made no public predictions on the outcome of that vote.

READ MORE: Trump has only one way out of this mess

It would be trivial if it didn’t happen all the time, said Dale, but it’s “part of a pattern – a long line of similarly fabricated tales from the president about his own history and world history.”

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Dale included an eight-point list of lies from just over the last two months, including Trump’s false claim that he issued a “don’t go in” warning against the 2003 invasion of Iraq, his lie about a supposed conversation with his late uncle about the Unabomber, and his dishonest claim that it was he who deployed the National Guard during civil unrest in Minneapolis in 2020, among many others.

“I actually did say, ‘Don’t go in [to Iraq], don’t go in, don’t go in.’ But I said, ‘If you’re going to go in, keep the oil.’ But they didn’t do that,” claimed Trump.

He didn’t, said Dale

READ MORE:'Do it!' Trump orders top Republican to bulldoze obstacle stopping far-right prosecutors

“[Ted] Kaczynski [the Unabomber] was one of [my uncle’s] students,” said Trump, who then went on to fabricate an impossible conversation between Trump and his uncle about Kaczynski.

Dale said it was impossible because Kaczynski was not known to be the Unabomber at the alleged time of the conversation.

“That city was burning down, Minneapolis – it was burning down, it was gonna burn to the ground – and [Gov. Tim Walz] wouldn’t call the Guard. And I waited for a long time, and I called the Guard, and I saved it.” Trump claimed of civil unrest in Minneapolis following the death of George Floyd by city police.

But it was Gov. Tim Walz, not Trump, who called out the guard.

And as for Trump’s claim that South Korea persuaded Biden to let it abandon paying for U.S. military protection from North Korea? Lies.

READ MORE:'An internal scapegoat': Here's how Trump could try to 'end the scandal'

“In fact, Biden’s administration signed two cost-sharing agreements with South Korea, one in 2021 and one in 2024, that included South Korean spending increases – meaning South Korea twice agreed to pay more than it did during Trump’s first term,” Dale said.

So, why does he do it? Dale said the lies all serve the purpose of exaggerating Trump’s alleged expertise, embellishing his biography and his record and to “diminish his political opponents.”

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AN BADASH 7 25

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is under fire after posting a hostile and defensive social media statement late Wednesday afternoon, lashing out at damning CNN reporting that exposed FEMA’s delayed response to the deadly Texas floods. Intended as a rebuttal, the DHS post instead confirmed several of CNN’s alarming findings. At least 120 people are confirmed dead, and over 160 remain missing.

Central to FEMA’s late response: Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem has instituted a new rule that contracts and grants over $100,000 require her personal signature. Under Noem, DHS’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency (ICE) as of last month was $1 billion over budget, leading some, including members of Congress, to question the legality of her actions.

CNN reported that “even as Texas rescue crews raced to save lives, FEMA officials realized they needed Noem’s approval before sending [in] additional assets. Noem didn’t authorize FEMA’s deployment of Urban Search and Rescue teams until Monday, more than 72 hours after the flooding began, multiple sources told CNN.”

READ MORE: Trump Dodges, Denies and Deflects Questions as Ukraine Weapons Scandal Grows

Sending in critical search and rescue teams days after the flooding began was not the only damaging finding.

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CNN also reported that “the additional red tape required at FEMA added another hurdle to getting critical federal resources deployed when hours counted,” noting that “Texas did request aerial imagery from FEMA to aid search and rescue operations, a source told CNN, but that was delayed as it awaited Noem’s approval for the necessary contract.”

Also, “FEMA staff have also been answering phones at a disaster call center, where, according to one agency official, callers have faced longer wait times as the agency awaited Noem’s approval for a contract to bring in additional support staff.”

In its social media statement (below), DHS posted the CNN headline and wrote: “This is a FAKE NEWS LIE from CNN.” The headline read: “FEMA’s response to Texas flood slowed by Noem’s cost controls.”

“This reporting is an unapparelled display of activist journalism and distracts from the robust, coordinated federal response led by Secretary Noem that has saved over 900+ lives,” the DHS statement reads.

“President Trump approved a Major Disaster Declaration, hours after Governor Greg Abbott’s request. By Tuesday, FEMA had deployed 311 staffers, providing support and shelter for hundreds of people.”

The flooding started Friday. Tuesday is four days later.

CNN also reported facts that DHS’s statement called “fake news,” but then confirmed in its own statement.

“By Monday night, only 86 FEMA staffers had been deployed, according to internal FEMA data seen by CNN — a fraction of the typical response for a disaster of this scale,” the news network reported. “By Tuesday night, the federal response expanded to 311 staffers deployed, the data showed.”

DHS wrote: “By Tuesday, FEMA had deployed 311 staffers, providing support and shelter for hundreds of people.”

CNN also reported: “Multiple FEMA officials told CNN that they were taken aback by the agency’s relatively limited response in the immediate aftermath of the disaster.”

RELATED: ‘Secretary Chaos’: Hegseth Running ‘Absolute Clown Show’ Critics Say, Amid Calls to Resign

Noem’s “office has delegated little authority to acting FEMA Administrator David Richardson, who, as of Wednesday morning, has yet to visit Texas since the flooding began, multiple FEMA officials told CNN.”

A DHS spokesperson in a statement to CNN and other news outlets wrote: “DHS and its components have taken an all-hands-on-desk approach to respond to recovery efforts in Kerrville.”

Critics pushed back against DHS’s statement, at times mocking the department’s remarks.

CNN’s Aaron Blake, whose byline is not on the report, on social media wrote: “This statement doesn’t actually dispute the reporting. In fact, it says, ‘By Tuesday, FEMA had deployed 311 staffers …’ Tuesday is, quite notably, after the 72-hour window.”

“Again,” offered Jason Kinney, a public affairs consultant and political communications expert, “this is what happens when your Administration lives in an alternative reality where improv lying is standard operating procedure. No one believes you, even when it’s really important stuff.”

“NONE of this below responds to the problems & delays CNN reported in its detailed, sourced article,” wrote Robert Elisberg, a political commentator. “CNN did not say FEMA did nothing. But that they didn’t do some important things they usually do. DHS has long lost credibility, & sadly their note below doesn’t improve on that.”

Mediaite reported: “DHS’s over‑the‑top rebuttal underscores the power of CNN’s reporting. The statement reinforces — not refutes — the 72‑hour timeline. That leaves us with a rhetorical shell game: furious denials wrapped in the very narrative they aim to quash.”

Former Bloomberg Opinion economics writer Noah Smith wrote of the DHS post: “This is just absolute cringe.”

Read the DHS post below or at this link.

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mma

June 29, 2025, edition of Newsmax's Savage Nation

MICHAEL SAVAGE (HOST): I also want to talk today about the bombing, the most successful bombing of — the most successful bombing mission in history, which was immediately debunked by the vermin at CNN, which to me is sedition. I looked up what sedition is.

If it was up to me and I was president, I'd rip them out by the hair and I'd arrest them for what they did. Right after the most successful bombing campaign of our life with the B-2 bombers, took out the nuclear facilities in Iran, they leak a fake report. The bombs did nothing. You hear this? Do you have any idea what the force and power is of these bombs that were dropped? Each bomb? Do you know what the TNT level is? What it does? One bomb went into the Earth, burrowed a hole. The other one went into the tunnel that was dug by the first bomb and exploded. And they're saying it had no effect on Iran's nuclear capacities.

Look, I studied what sedition is. If it was up to me, I would arrest the — excuse me, the ownership of CNN for letting this go out on the air. They've undermined America in a time of war against radical Islamic terrorists who would kill all of us.

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AN 6 25

Although President Donald Trump is known for avoiding e-mail and text messaging, he is an avid social media user. Trump constantly used Twitter, now X, during his first presidency. But these days, his primary social media outlet is his own Truth Social platform — where he angrily raged against his media foes late Wednesday night, June 25.

Trump was especially angry at CNN.

The U.S. president, who was in The Hague, Netherlands to attend the 2025 NATO Summit, posted, in all caps, "FAKE NEWS CNN IS SO DISGUSTING AND INCOMPETENT. SOME OF THE DUMBEST ANCHORS IN THE BUSINESS!"

READ MORE: 'Unnecessarily chaotic': How red state Republicans are quietly fighting back against Trump

Trump singled out CNN reporter Natasha Bertrand, calling for her to be fired.

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Trump posted, "She should be IMMEDIATELY reprimanded, and then thrown out 'like a dog.' She lied on the Laptop from Hell Story, and now she lied on the Nuclear Sites Story, attempting to destroy our Patriot Pilots by making them look bad when, in fact, they did a GREAT job and hit 'pay dirt' — TOTAL OBLITERATION!"

The 79-year-old president added, "She should not be allowed to work at Fake News CNN. It's people like her who destroyed the reputation of a once great Network. Her slant was so obviously negative, besides, she doesn't have what it takes to be an on camera correspondent, not even close. FIRE NATASHA!"

But CNN, according to the Daily Beast's Cameron Adams, said, in an official statement, that they are '100 percent' behind Bertrand.

READ MORE:'Time for action': Republicans beg Trump to use obscure law to deport Democratic candidate

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RWW

06/02/2025

by

Kyle Mantyla

Last month, Right Wing Watch reported that Christian nationalist activist Floyd Brown had been appointed to serve as a vice president at the Kennedy Center, which President Donald Trump took over shortly after returning to the White House earlier this year.

Last week, CNN's Andrew Kaczynski reported on Brown's position and his history of bigoted and controversial statements. Kaczynski's reporting, in turn, quickly led to Brown's dismissal from his position.

On Friday, Brown appeared on "The Lance Wallnau Show" to discuss his firing, which he blamed on Satan.

Brown began by complaining that his controversial statements had all been made before he was appointed to serve as the Kennedy Center and therefore his dismissal was unjustified and unfair.

"First of all, I made those comments about three years ago, long before President Trump was chairman of the Kennedy Center and long before I accepted the position at the Kennedy Center," Brown said. "So, it really didn't have to do with my Kennedy Center job; you know, what I said in the past at a Christian conference."

"I wasn't going to disavow any of my Christian beliefs around traditional marriage," he added. "This video triggered a lot of the people that work in the higher up levels of the Kennedy Center and so it led to me being dismissed because of my beliefs and I think that's wrong."

"I was doing the job and I was doing it well," Brown insisted. "Every day that I went to work there, I was praying for Ambassador [Richard] Grenell. I was praying for the staff of the Kennedy Center. I was praying circle prayers around the building. I was praying hedge of protection prayers.

"I knew from day one, because of the discernment given to me by the Holy Spirit as a believer, that I was contending in a spiritual battle and that I was near the top of the mountain, I was near the gates, and I was contending with those spiritual powers at that gate," Brown declared, using language reflective of the Seven Mountains Dominionism theology that he promotes.

"I think the closer that I got to the gate and the more Christians I brought in the door, the more Satan was pushing back against what I was doing," Brown said. "We were making real progress, not only in the natural but in the spiritual, and so Satan counterattacked and I really think that's the main reason that I was fired."

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4 25

Several MAGA media personalities who have recently been given press access to the White House recently had a run-in with CNN journalist Donie O'Sullivan — who covers the far right.

The Daily Beast reported that Sullivan cornered Real America’s Voice Chief White House Correspondent Brian Glenn, LindellTV White House reporter Cara Castronuova and Bannon’s War Room Co-Host and White House Correspondent Natalie Winters for a segment that aired Wednesday. O'Sullivan began the conversation by asking Winters: "Do you consider yourself a journalist?"

When Winters — who was the subject of a flattering New York Times profile written by Daily Caller alumnus Andrew Trunsky — responded that she did, O'Sullivan then asked her if she would "call it out" if the president "messes up."

READ MORE:'Eroding': Major GOP donor warns it could take a 'lifetime to repair the damage' from Trump

“Yeah, and we have, I think time and time again, particularly on the...issue of immigration,” said Winters, who politically identified as a "populist nationalist" in the vein of her boss, Steve Bannon. “We are not for stapling green cards to diplomas.”

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O'Sullivan put Castronuova — who went viral for beingoverly complimentary of Trump's appearance during a daily White House press briefing — into a particularly tight spot. The LindellTV correspondent — who called herself a "Trump fan" — told O'Sullivan she wouldn't have any problem disagreeing with Trump if the moment presented itself.

"I’m sure things will happen that I disagree with," Castronuova said. When O'Sullivan pressed her, she demurred, saying: “I’m not going to — let me put some thought into that for a second ... Um, I’m just overwhelmed with how well I perceive things to be going.”

Brian Glenn — the boyfriend of Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) who asked Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy why he wasn't wearing a suit in the Oval Office – defended his outburst as "a legitimate question that I just wanted to ask."

READ MORE:'Alito sounds nervous': Even notorious Trump enablers are sounding the alarm

Click here to read the Beast's full report (subscription required).

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an 4 25

Political commentators and journalists challenged Vice President JD Vance over his claim on the social platform X that there were 20 million undocumented immigrants in the Biden administration.

Lawyer and Democratic researcher Will Stancil called the Vice President's statement "an insane fabrication that overstates the real number by a factor of 20 or more."

Vance, while responding to another post on X, said, "[Former President] Biden overwhelmed the system with illegal migration. Is your proposed solution to give a jury trial to all 20 million illegal aliens (more if you count those already here)?"

ALSO READ:'Absurd and unlawful': JD Vance slams Denmark to promote Trump’s Greenland takeover bid

"You are hiding behind 'due process' while ignoring that your actual solution means the ratification of a Biden border crisis that was rejected at the ballot box," he added.

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"Vance is a treasonous fool who is openly demeaning the Constitution, but don’t overlook that his claim of 20 million undocumented immigrants in the Biden administration is an insane fabrication that overstates the real number by a factor of 20 or more," Stancil wrote in response to Vance's post.

"Part of why due process is important is that without it, fascist fools like Vance can make claims like 'we need to suspend the rule of law and deport 20 million people under emergency conditions' and there’s no way to challenge the fact it’s an extraordinary and malicious lie," he continued.

"If you’re thrown in a foreign gulag, you become a terrorist, child predator, drug smuggler by default, because if you weren’t Trump and Vance wouldn’t have put you there. It’s completely authoritarian," he added.

ALSO READ:'Vance is lying': VP blasted for 'arguing with people on social media' to defend 'administrative error'

Sportswriter Pablo Torre also weighed in, calling Vance's argument "tragically desperate."

"The tragically desperate argument that the VP of this country is making in the replies here is that America does not have the resources to listen to the Supreme Court anymore," Torre wrote on X.

Vance often gets into arguments on X, defending the administration's policies.

On Tuesday, he had a similar exchange with renowned musician Mikel Jollett, over the Supreme Court ruling that ordered the administration to bring back a Maryland man who was wrongfully deported to a prison in El Salvador.

ALSO READ:'Pretending not to know': Musician corners 'Yale-educated' Vance for 'playing dumb' on SCOTUS ruling

"The entire American media and left wing industrial complex has decided the most important issue today is that the Trump admin deported an MS-13 gang member (and illegal alien)," Vance wrote on X on Tuesday, sharing a video from the Oval Office that showed the Trump team aggressively responding to CNN reporter Kaitlan Collins' question about the deported man, Kilmar Abrego Garcia.

In response to the vice president's post, Jollett wrote, "No, the most important issue is that the Supreme Court ruled by a 9-0 decision that you must return him."

Some political commentators on X agreed with Jollett's view that the vice president is simply pretending not to know what the Court ruling says.

"Intentionally obtuse. JD Vance thinks you’re too stupid to understand the facts. — he’s not a gang member — they’ve been ordered to facilitate his return — [El Salvador President Nayib] Bukele has already returned a dozen migrants — all they have to do is ask for him to be released and put him on a plane," wroteDemocratic strategist Sawyer Hackett.

ALSO READ:'Quite a metaphor': JD Vance brutally mocked after dropping national championship trophy

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attack media work the refs

an 3 25

An interview between a CNN host and a Republican member of Congress quickly grew heated as the two discussed budget cuts at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA).

On Thursday, CNN host Pamela Brown spoke with Donalds about President Donald Trump's administration slashing tens of thousands of jobs at the agency. She also asked him about Trump's decision to halt tariffs on Mexico until April 2, 2025.

“New employment data shows recession level cuts for February, with more jobs lost than any month in 15 years, are you worried about that?” Keilar asked.

READ MORE:GOP will 'hand gavel back to Schumer' after poll shows bad news for NC senator: Trump adviser

“Let's be clear about the numbers that you're reporting. The reason why the job growth numbers are down is because government workers are the ones who are starting to lose their jobs at the federal level," Donalds responded. "But the other elements of our economy are very, very strong, and they're going to remain that way."

Brown pushed back, noting that "consumer sentiment is down," and is "the lowest it's been in three and a half years." But Donalds insisted that the "tariff policy is one piece of the overall economic picture."

"You have deregulation at the federal level, which is critical for the future health of our economy,” the Florida Republican said.

“I just spoke to a farmer who said American farmers are being hammered by Trump's policies right now, and that will only cause the price of food for Americans to go up,” Brown countered. “How do you answer this farmer?”

READ MORE:'Dead on arrival': GOP lawmakers blast Trump's call for CHIPS Act repeal

“What I will say is that when you have to unwind the terrible inflation from the previous administration, you have to go through several processes," Donalds said, opining that South African centibillionaire Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, was the "first piece." And when Brown asked if he could assure his constituents who are veterans that the VA's cuts wouldn't affect their services, he said they "absolutely" wouldn't.

“The VA has been an albatross of an agency. It is heavily bureaucratic,” Donalds said.

Brown then pivoted to trade, and asked Donalds about the news that Mexico "will not be required to pay tariffs on any products that fall under the USMCA [United States-Mexico-Canada] agreement" inked during Trump's first term. She then asked Donalds if "Trump's back-and-forth decision" was "the right call, especially given the volatility of markets."

“Well, look, I'm going to repeat myself a little bit here. It is important that we stabilize not just our economic relationships around the globe, but also the fact that we got to secure our border and we got to stop the flow of fentanyl, give Donald Trump the opportunity to actually negotiate with the Mexican president, and with Canada, and with China. You've gotta give him that opportunity," he said. "Because when prices we're rising in the United States, I didn't hear CNN talking about that much, and as a matter of fact, you ignored it. That’s not my opinion. That’s a fact. Okay?”

READ MORE:Announced layoffs have 'jumped to levels not seen since the last two recessions': report

“[That’s] not a fact," Brown said, before ending the interview.

===

AN 2 25

CNN panel on Monday delved into the potential “constitutional calamity” awaiting the United States if the Trump Administration defies court orders from federal judges — which, some scholars argue, he's apt to do. During the segment, host Abby Phillip and guests clashed with Republican strategist Scott Jennings over the scope of Trump's executive power.

The panel was discussing reporting that indicates Trump is looking to defy court motions related to the two-term president's implementation of a spate of executive orders. [VID]

“Legal guru” and CNN senior legal analyst Elie Honighoned in on the distinction between a “constitutional crisis” and normal government function, suggesting it’s “not a constitutional crisis for a new president to come in and issue a spate of executive orders, even if liberals hate those executive orders."

READ MORE: 'Welcome to Trump’s America': 1 dead after Motley Crue lead singer’s jet collides with plane in AZ

“[It's] also not a constitutional crisis for scores of federal judges to block some or all of those," he continued. “That is the way our system is supposed to work."

“What happens next?” The CNN legal analyst asked. “We don’t have an answer to that. We are not at that point yet.”

Honig noted the Trump administration has gotten “a slew of really bad rulings” and is “making a lot of noise” about defying them.

Phillip pointed to an order from Rhode Island Chief District Judge John James McConnell Jr., who on Monday ruled the White House “has been violating his order to resume funding federal grants,” Politico reports. The CNN host asked Honig if that violation amounts to outright defiance from the administration.

READ MORE: 'Strategic bluster' or 'full-blown constitutional crisis'? Analysis warns of Trump’s 'nuclear option'

Honig replied that McConnell's order and the government response can be chalked up as “technical disputes,” which the analyst explained “are not uncommon in cases.”

Still, Honig pointed to a recent tweet by Vice President JD Vance that claimed “judges aren’t allowed to control the executive’s legitimate power." A constitutional law expert on Monday argued Vance is floating a constitutional battle that "will define Trump’s presidency."

Phillip noted Vance’s use of the word “legitimate” is “doing a lot of work here.”

Strategist Jennings, agreeing with Vance, claimed the actual “constitutional crisis” is actually “caused by” federal judges.

READ MORE: Judge 'hints at possibility of contempt' for Trump officials 'violating' order to resume funding: report

“Correct political control is between the executive and the Congress, not some federal judge,” Jennings said, later insisting he wants to “let the Supreme Court" decide on the constitutionality of Trump's directives.

“Pray tell, how do we get to the Supreme Court?” Phillip asked. “Can somebody tell me?”

Jennings then brought up former President Joe Biden’s fight with the Supreme Court over student debt relief.

“‘The Supreme Court tried to stop me but they never will, but they never will!'” Jennings said, ostensibly quoting the former president.

READ MORE: Welcome to James Madison's nightmare

“Who said that?" Jennings demanded. "Biden!”

Honig, the CNN “legal guru,” retorted that while he, personally, “hated the student loan forgiveness policy,” and thought it was "ridiculous” and “unconstitutional,” Biden did not ignore the courts and instead “went and tried under a different law.”

“So he ignored it,” Jennings retorted as the panel erupted in protests.

Asked by Honig how a president should reply to a court order, Jennings claimed if a judge “tries to usurp the authority of the chief executive of this country, [the president] should absolutely defy it.”

READ MORE: Judge says he’ll consider Arizona fake electors’ free speech defense

“If I want a policy decided, I’ll take it to the Supreme Court!” Jennings insisted.

Phillip then took issue with Jennings' “bizarre, broad generalities,” disputing the GOP strategist's notion that the courts are issuing “broad swaths of policy" over the president's head.

“When the court says, ‘Congress appropriated this money, you must unfreeze it while we litigate this,’ why can’t Trump comply with that?” Phillip asked.

“Saying that a judge should decide how and when money is spent and not the president of the United States!" Jennings exclaimed.

READ MORE: Trump quietly fired head of office that protects whistleblowers: new lawsuit

“Let me explain it a little bit more slowly,” Phillip replied.

“You don’t have to talk to me like that,” Jennings shot back. “I have a position on this, you have an opinion, we can disagree.”

“Listen to me on this, because you’re not listening, and you’re making claims that are not connected to the facts,” Phillip said.

“Maybe you are,” Jennings retorted.

READ MORE: Trump to stop enforcement of law banning bribery of foreign officials

Watch the videos below or at this link.

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MMA

Trump is trying to throttle the free press — and U.S. moguls are going along with it

Written by Matt Gertz

Published 02/04/25

President Donald Trump is wasting no time in carrying out his goal of throttling the free press. Over the first two weeks of Trump’s presidency, his appointees have wielded federal regulatory authority to punish outlets the president dislikes — and American media moguls are responding with submission.

Trump has turned standard conservative attacks on journalists into one of the hallmarks of his political agenda.

He takes as his model Hungary’s autocrat Viktor Orban, who has “effectively dismantled the news media in his country” as “a central pillar of Orban’s broader project to remake his country as an ‘illiberal democracy,’” as New York Times publisher A.G. Sulzberger noted in an extraordinary warning last year.

During his first term in office, Trump repeatedly tried to leverage state power against his despised “fake news,” and together with his Project 2025 allies has developed a playbook to attack, defund, and delegitimize news outlets in his second.

Major media companies began signaling before Trump took office that they were willing to play ball with his administration in order to preserve their business interests. But since Inauguration Day, as Trump’s appointees have begun showing their intentions, executives at several news outlets have gone into full retreat.

CBS News preps for a Trump settlement

In the final weeks of the 2024 presidential campaign, Trump denounced CBS News’ editing of a 60 Minutes interview with Vice President Kamala Harris as “the biggest scandal in broadcast history” and declared that CBS should be stripped of its broadcast license. But in addition to invective and threats, Trump also filed a lawsuit against the outlet for producing journalism which displeased him.

The suit, which alleged that CBS airing different portions of Harris’ answer to a question in different venues constituted “partisan and unlawful acts of election and voter interference,” drew derision from First Amendment attorneys, who described its legal theory to CNN as “ridiculous junk” and “a frivolous and dangerous attempt by a politician to control the news media.”

But over the past few weeks, reports have indicated that CBS News’ parent company, Paramount, may be preparing to settle the suit with Trump. Such a settlement would be “an extraordinary concession by a major U.S. media company to a sitting president, especially in a case in which there is no evidence that the network got facts wrong or damaged the plaintiff’s reputation,” as The New York Times put it.

But Paramount needs federal approval for its proposed merger with Skydance Media, the production company founded by filmmaker David Ellison, and apparently sees giving the president a payoff as a valid way to smooth the path. Pressure for the settlement is coming from top Paramount shareholder Shari Redstone, the Times reported, who “stands to clear billions of dollars on the sale of Paramount.”

LA Times’ biotech industry owner goes all-in for RFK Jr.}:

Billionaire doctor Patrick Soon-Shiong once drew plaudits for using a small fraction of the vast fortune he made in the biotech industry to purchase and sustain his hometown newspaper, the Los Angeles Times.

But Soon-Shiong’s involvement in the paper’s operations has become more heavy-handed since the final months of the presidential campaign, with the owner repeatedly weighing in on Trump’s behalf. Over the past few weeks, Soon-Shiong, whose medical patents are subject to federal oversight, has begun cheerleading for the confirmation of the anti-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as secretary of health and human services.

“‘I truly believe [Kennedy] has the American public's best interests at heart,’ Soon-Shiong tweeted Tuesday in a post he pinned to the top of his account on X, formerly Twitter, for much of last week,” NPR reported. “It was one of 18 messages promoting Kennedy that Soon-Shiong — a billionaire surgeon and medical inventor — posted over the course of four days, which included Kennedy's confirmation hearing on Capitol Hill.”

Soon-Shiong’s support for Kennedy appears to have bled into his paper’s operations as well. On Friday, an op-ed contributor accused the paper of deceptively editing the piece he submitted in order to remove his criticisms of Kennedy’s nomination.

Journalists at CNN regularly drew vicious attacks from Trump and his supporters during the president’s first term. During a tone-setting press conference shortly before he took office, Trump lashed out at then-White House correspondent Jim Acosta as “fake news” and “terrible.” And Trump’s salvos at the network went beyond just words — his Justice Department tried to block a merger involving CNN’s then-parent company..

This time, CNN’s corporate leadership appears less willing to leave the network vulnerable to Trumpian retribution. Network chief Mark Thompson led an editorial meeting the day before Inauguration Day in which he instructed CNN talent “to be forward-thinking and to avoid pre-judging Trump” and to avoid “expressing any outrage of their own” or “relitigat[ing] the past,” former CNN reporter Oliver Darcy reported in his Status newsletter.

As for Acosta, he left CNN last week rather than accept Thompson’s offer to anchor the network’s coverage from midnight to 2 a.m. ET.

The tip of the president’s anti-press spear is Brendan Carr, a Republican member of the Federal Communications Commission whom Trump elevated to chair. Carr authored Project 2025’s chapter on the FCC and has notably refused to reject Trump’s repeated calls for the commission to yank the licenses of broadcast networks whose reporting he dislikes.

Following his promotion, Carr sent a letter to Bob Iger, the CEO of ABC parent company Disney, in which he denounced the network for having “contributed” to the “erosion in public trust” and pointedly referenced the FCC’s regulatory power.

Carr also restored a right-wing group’s bias complaints targeting NBC, CBS, and ABC for purportedly biased coverage of the presidential campaign, which his predecessor had dismissed. In response to the CBS complaint, the FCC demanded that CBS News provide the unedited transcript and tapes of Harris’ 60 Minutes interview, adding government pressure to the benefit of Trump’s private lawsuit. The network ultimately submitted to what one legal expert described as a “highly partisan intervention” with “no historical antecedent.”

And on Wednesday, Carr announced a new FCC probe of underwriting announcements produced by NPR and PBS, “with an eye toward unraveling federal funding for all public broadcasting.”

The Pentagon announced Friday night that the defense correspondents at NBC News, The New York Times, Politico, and National Public Radio are all required to vacate their dedicated workspaces. Their spots will instead go to the right-wing One America News Network, New York Post, and Breitbart — and theoretically to the progressive HuffPost, which does not have a Pentagon reporter and did not request space.

The move came a week after the Senate confirmed former Fox News host Pete Hegseth as defense secretary.

//

Take Trumpist threats to jail journalists seriously

:{:{09/23/24}:

Donald Trump’s authoritarian playbook to crush the free press in a second term}:

:{:{10/29/24}:

“Fake News Networks”: Trump and Project 2025’s goal to attack, defund, and delegitimize the press}:

10/16/24

===

AN 2 25

NO LNX

On Monday afternoon, February 3 — two weeks after President Donald Trump started his nonconsecutive second term — he spoke to reporters inside the White House. And Trump forcefully defended his new tariffs, which include 25 percent across-the-board tariffs on any goods coming into the United States from Canada or Mexico. For goods coming from Mainland China, Trump imposed a 10 percent tariff.

Following the press conference, CNN's Daniel Dale gave Trump a comprehensive fact-check — pointing out Trump's ability to build on his own exaggerations and false claims.

Dale told CNN hosts Brianna Keilar and Boris Sanchez, "There's a concept I think of as Trumpflation, where he makes a false claim — and then, it keeps getting falser and falser over time. The numbers keep rising."

READ MORE: 'Congratulations, America!' Trump mocked over his response to WSJ’s scathing tariff rebuke

Sanchez noted that Trump previously claimed that the United States, under former President Joe Biden, was sending $50 million to Gaza to buy condoms for members of Hamas — a number Trump increased to $100 million during the presser.

Sanchez told Dale and Keilar, "Trump actually exaggerated his own made-up, exaggerated claim during this. He doubled it." And Keilar added that the $100 million figure "is doubly incorrect."

Dale, during the fact-check, pushed back against Trump's claim that Canada and the European Union (EU) aren't buying as many U.S. exports as they should be buying.

Dale told his CNN colleagues, "He said, when talking about Canada: They don't take our agricultural products, for the most part. In fact, Canada is the third largest export market for U.S. agriculture: about $28 billion in purchases in 2023. There is a dispute about milk exports that he referred to, but in terms of agriculture as a whole, it's not true."

READ MORE: Donald Trump’s tariff wallop demonstrates the brute power of an imperial presidency

Dale continued, "He said that the European Union doesn't take our farm products. The European Union is the fourth largest export market, about 12 billion per year. He said we have about a $350 billion trade deficit with the EU — another gross exaggeration. It's about 125 billion. And he repeated this claim about aid to Ukraine that he repeatedly makes: He said that the EU provides way less aid to Ukraine than the U.S. does — they need to catch up and so on. In fact, according to the latest numbers we have, the EU has committed about double the aid to Ukraine during this war than the U.S. has."

READ MORE: 'Big government populist demagogue': Right-wingers slam Trump tariffs as markets plummet

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rww

01/31/2025

by

Kyle Mantyla

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AN 1 25

While some prominent Democrats are calling on party to reconnect with the working class by embracing economic populism, Fareed Zakaria, the host of a CNN news show and a Washington Post columnist, argues in a recent op-ed that it’s lost cause:

“[The Democrats] have a solid base of college-educated professionals, women and minorities. Many of the swing voters who have helped them win the popular vote in seven of the past nine presidential elections are registered independents and suburbanites. Perhaps they should lean into their new base and shape a policy agenda around them, rather than pining for the working-class Whites whom they lost decades ago.”

It's eerily reminiscent of what Senator Chuck Schumer infamously said eight years ago just before Hillary Clinton lost to Trump:

“For every blue-collar Democrat we lose in western Pennsylvania, we will pick up two moderate Republicans in the suburbs in Philadelphia, and you can repeat that in Ohio and Illinois and Wisconsin.”

Zakaria, however, claims that Biden didn’t follow Schumer’s advice and instead enacted massive infrastructure investments that were intended to please the entire working class. Biden, he writes, “presided over the creation of almost 17 million jobs with inflation nearing the Fed’s 2 percent target….wage inequality is down…and wage growth is outpacing inflation.”

To counter the blooming oligarchy which appears to have planted itself firmly in both parties, working people need a new political home, one of their own making.

But despite all this economic assistance, the working class increased its vote for Trump. For Zakaria, the Democrats’ electoral failure illustrates the futility of pandering to the working class.

We might better understand working-class alienation if we look at how Zakaria cherry picked his facts and ignored those that didn’t fit his story.

Zakaria loads the dice because he is sure that the White working-class cares more about race, immigration, gender, and sexual preference than it does about its own economic well-being. Hillary Clinton in 2016 ungracefully called half of the Trump voters “deplorables.” Zakaria means much the same when he writes that the Democratic Party “has been slowly losing the votes of the White working class, largely on issues related to race, identity and culture.”

www.commondreams.org

Zakaria’s laments the Democrats leftward shift, but the Democrats have not in recent years put forth a strong populist agenda. (See “Are You Still Wondering Why Workers Voted for Trump?”)

Zakaria, nevertheless, has no trouble pushing these alienated workers into the MAGA movement. No big loss. But such abandonment is a loss for members of the working class. The MAGA oligarchs did not become billionaires by protecting the economic needs and interests of working people.

To counter the blooming oligarchy which appears to have planted itself firmly in both parties, working people need a new political home, one of their own making. Although the process is extremely difficult in our two-party system, working people and labor unions may have no choice but to build a new political formation of and by working people, just like the Populists did at the end of the 19th century to battle the robber barons of that era.

Their party’s name is as appropriate today as it was then: The People’s Party.

===

an 1 25

quitting?!

At the end of his show on Tuesday, CNN host Jim Acosta announced he was leaving the network. He used his farewell message to throw a jab at President Donald Trump without mentioning his name, and to urge viewers to take action.

Acosta said in the final minutes of his broadcast that he had given "careful consideration" to his decision, but that he had "decided to move on." He added that he was "grateful" to the network after a career spanning nearly 18 years, but that he would be declining a new role in which he would be moved to Los Angeles to broadcast at midnight Eastern Time. He then pivoted to asking viewers to defend the truth in the future.

"It is never a good time to bow down to a tyrant," Acosta said following a segment about former Cuban leader Raúl Castro. "I've always believed it's the job of the press to hold power to account. I've always done that at CNN and I plan on doing that in the future."

READ MORE:'Kid gloves': CNN CEO urged reporters to go easy on Trump ahead of inauguration

"One final message: Don't give in to the lies. Don't give in to the fear. Hold on to truth. And to hope," he said. "Even if you have to get our your phone. Record that message: 'I will not give in to the lies. I will not give in to the fear.' Post it on your social media, so people can hear from you too."

Trump celebrated Acosta being sidelined on his Truth Social platform, calling it "really good news." He wrote that the longtime reporter and anchor (who was a frequent Trump critic) was "dishonest" and a "major sleazebag."

"Word is that he wants to QUIT, and that would be even better," Trump wrote. "Jim is a major loser who will fail no matter where he ends up. Good luck Jim!"

The Associated Press reported that Acosta — who was a former White House correspondent for the network — leaving CNN came in response to the network moving him to a late-night role rather than his weekly morning slot. Acosta's 10 AM morning slot will now be filled by hosts Wolf Blitzer and Pamela Brown. The move to put Acosta in a lower-rated slot was interpreted as a demotion, and came on the heels of the network's CEO, Mark Thompson, telling on-air talent to hold off on criticizing Trump ahead of his second inauguration.

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an 1 25

CNN host refuses to back down from GOP rep claiming Trump denounced January 6 violence

Maya Boddie

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an 12 24

CNN's Kate Bolduan clashed with a conservative commentator over the role of experts in government.

More than 75 past Nobel Prize winners sent an open letter Monday to the U.S. Senate opposing Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s nomination to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, saying his lack of credentials and unconventional views on medical science "would put the public's health in jeopardy."

Bolduan asked conservative pundit Shermichael Singleton to comment.

"These aren't elites, though," Bolduan said. "I mean, these are world-renowned leaders in fields like medicine, chemistry, economics and physics. They include the men who were awarded this year's Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine for the discovery of microRNA. My thing about this is, I get we we are all very clear on what it feels like to, you know, play politics with whatever, but when did we start to stop listening to people who are actual experts on things?"

Singleton disagreed with the premise of her question, saying those experts had elite pedigrees, and he argued that their assumptions should be challenged by others outside their areas of expertise.

"Sure, I have respect for people who spent a lot of time mastering something and moving the needle forward in terms of our understanding of sort of rare or complex disciplines," Singleton said. "I think that that matters for us as a nation and for the world.

"However, let's look at some of the facts as it pertains to our health care system – 40.3 percent of Americans, according to the CDC, are obese. That number has increased since 2011. The United States, according to the same data, ranks 34th in terms of our health care system."

Bolduan cut him off, saying that Kennedy and other vaccine skeptics were putting American children at risk, and Singleton argued that scientific experts got some things wrong during the coronavirus pandemic.

ALSO READ:Agenda 47: Alarm sounded about Trump’s dystopian plans for his second term

"A lot of the rhetoric that we heard from many of the same experts during the Covid pandemic, where now you have millions of American kids who are significantly behind academically, they're going to struggle to catch up with the rest of the world, who are leaps and bounds ahead of us, and we listened to the experts," he said.

"Then we trusted the experts, then all I'm simply saying is, it's okay to ask questions. It's okay to have a healthy dose of skepticism."

Singleton continued to argue that Kennedy's promised challenges to assumptions about public health were valid because so many Americans were unhealthy, but Bolduan argued that many of the topics the Donald Trump nominee had promised to investigate were not considered to be controversial by scientists.

"You can ask lots of questions, and questioning Covid lockdowns is one thing," Bolduan said. "What is not in question is how many lives have actually been saved by things like the measles vaccine, the polio vaccine. What has happened, and that is what I'm getting at, because you're adding two things together.

"Lots of people can question how experts handled an unfolding pandemic in front of all of us. It's one thing to deny the data from decades of how many lives have been saved from vaccines that children do not suffer from, and what it would mean if that skepticism and the questions we're suggesting are out there, then start getting into the mindset of millions of Americans, once again, led by someone who has not only been a skeptic of vaccines, is a cynic of vaccines."

Singleton insisted that he was not personally denying the effectiveness of vaccines, but Bolduan seemed frustrated by his line of argument.

"These things, these are like apples and oranges, like questioning Covid lockdowns and saying, but, like, that's a good question to have," Bolduan said, as a producer urged her to end the segment for a commercial break. "But also maybe you should question vaccines because that's what's being added together. All right, clearly we've got to go because they're about to cut my mic. Guys, thank you so much."

Watch the video below.

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11/15/24 mma

November 14, 2024, edition of Fox News' Fox News @ Night

TRACE GALLAGHER (ANCHOR): When you talk about the editorial board, because -- when you tweeted, it seemed like you were going to get rid of the entire editorial board. They haven't all left. Is that the plan? To redo the entire editorial board or just fill in the people that have left?

PATRICK SOON-SHIONG (LOS ANGELES TIMES OWNER): Again, I think it's important for us to differentiate. The editorial board is responsible for these opinions on these voices. So right now we don't have an editorial board if we were a truly -- about ourselves -- that are balanced. And so I've gotten beaten up about fair and balanced. So I'm looking for people like Scott Jennings. Scott Jennings, who is on CNN and he's one out of six usually in the room, where we need to have all voices, the right, the left, and the moderate, the center. And I think it's important because the editors are responsible of stories that are told, stories are not told. Editors have this nuances of the word hatred versus could the president-elect make a real impact. And we need views from both sides and my goal is now to change the entire editorial board for that perspective.

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an 11 24

Donald Trump complained that presidential election results might not be known on Election Night, but CNN's Anderson Cooper said his suggested reform was already in place.

The former president called for using paper ballots and one-day voting to prevent the delays expected in Pennsylvania and some other key states, which he blamed on electronic and mail-in voting.

"If they used paper ballots it would be over by 10:00," Trump said at his polling place in West Palm Beach, Florida. "Paper ballots would only cost 8 percent of the cost. If they would use paper ballots, voter ID, proof of citizenship and one-day voting it would all be over by 10:00. It's crazy. They use very expensive computers and I am hearing in Pennsylvania they will not have an answer until two or three days from now. I think that is an absolute outrage."

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ALSO READ:'Bloodbath': Inside the MAGA playbook for mayhem after Election Day

Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) appeared on CNN a short time after Trump's news conference, and she criticized his closing message to voters and debunked his claims about paper ballots.

"Donald Trump to me has been spiraling down," Klobuchar said. "I know he claims the end to be appealing to women and he calls the woman leader the B-word. Somehow yesterday he decided to get into fluoride after the man he claimed he wanted to put in as [Health and Human Services] secretary said he wanted to limit fluoride or get rid of fluoride in drinking water, so I guess he is ending with more cavities. He has continued to deny the election results and, what you just said in your report, 97 percent of jurisdictions in America have backup paper ballots, and the only ones that don't are some counties in Texas and Louisiana. I can see the campaign spiraling."

Cooper agreed, saying doesn't know why Trump lied about paper ballots.

"It's nuts, this controversy of not having paper ballots," Cooper said. "Even voting machines have paper ballots, there are backup paper ballots. It's just not the case, it is a very strange thing that he continues to lie about."

Watch the clip below or at this link.

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an date?

'Humor me': CNN’s Jake Tapper drags Mike Johnson and Mitch McConnell in damning supercut

Carl Gibson

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mma

CNN’s commentary after Kamala Harris’ town hall demonstrates “the divergent planes upon which this election is being waged”

10/24/24

CNN anchor Dana Bash: “Some people have asked: Is she being held to a different standard? Maybe. But that's maybe the world that she's living in.”

Written by Kayla Gogarty

Research contributions from Payton Armstrong

Published 10/24/24

In their discussion after Vice President Kamala Harris’ October 23 CNN town hall, the network’s anchors admitted — but then dismissed — that mainstream media are holding Harris to a “different standard” than her Republican opponent Donald Trump.

Trump and Harris held one debate on September 11, after which Trump refused further debates. Due to this, CNN invited both Harris and Trump to participate in individual town hall events, an invitation Harris accepted but Trump declined. On October 23, Harris participated in a CNN town hall with undecided Pennsylvania voters.

Following Harris' town hall, CNN anchors engaged in what journalist Aaron Rupar called “theater criticism” of Harris' performance without even acknowledging that Trump refused to even show up to take questions from voters until roughly 10 minutes into their post-event discussion.

While a focus group CNN gathered overall had positive reactions, CNN immediately criticized Harris’ performance, even admitting — and dismissing — that they are holding Harris to a “different standard” and “it's inherently unfair.”

Video

CitationFrom the October 23, 2024, edition of CNN's CNN Presidential Town Hall Post Analysis

DANA BASH (ANCHOR): Some people have asked: Is she being held to a different standard? Maybe. But that's maybe the world that she's living in. And on the question of who she is, people are understanding that a little bit more. But what she will do, the question about her legislative priorities — name one. There wasn't one.

…

JOHN KING (ANCHOR): The personal part is sometimes missing. And again, it may be unfair to her, to your point about a different standard.

…

JAKE TAPPER (ANCHOR): And let me just take one second to acknowledge that when we talk about whether or not she is being held to a different standard, I mean, Donald Trump, we invited Donald Trump to be here. This was supposed to be a debate night. She accepted; he did not. So we said, OK. Let’s have two town halls. She accepted; he did not.

The reason that we are not critiquing Donald Trump's performance at a town hall this evening is because Donald Trump did not agree to participate in a town hall here in Delaware county, and she did, so, yes, it's inherently unfair. That said — we're journalists. We're going to keep talking about what we saw tonight.

BASH: No, no, no. And I’m glad you said that. Because when I — I just kind of glossed over saying is she being held to a double standard. We don't know what Donald Trump's health care plan is. He has “the concept of a plan.” We don’t know a lot of his plans are for the future. We know basic things like tariffs and others, but that's just not his thing, and the idea of Donald Trump as a president, maybe people are giving him more leeway because of what they saw in the past with the economy. Those who are very scared of what he can do in the future, they’re already not voting for him.

Writing about the town hall, The Bulwark noted these double standards:

If ever there was an illustration of the divergent planes upon which this election is being waged, it is here. It’s not just that different layers of scrutiny are being applied to Harris and Trump—in which one gets graded like a normal politician while the other sees his abnormal behavior excused or refashioned as a virtue—it’s that our collective expectations for their respective performance are galaxies apart.

Some examples of their commentary:

  1. ### CNN highlights Trump-linked pastor Jentezen Franklin calling himself a “Christian nationalist” at Trump rally

10/24/24 7:08 PM EDT

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mma 10 24

Trump and right-wing media are still lying about FEMA, and CNN is still fact-checking them

Weeks after Hurricane Helene hit southern Appalachia, Trump and right-wing media are still spreading lies that are harming aid efforts and attracting extremist groups to vulnerable communities

Special ProgramsClimate & Energy

Written by Ilana Berger

Published 10/24/24

On October 21 and 22, CNN News Central continued to debunk misinformation about FEMA that former President Donald Trump repeated at his October 21 visit to Swannanoa, North Carolina.

During the visit, Trump addressed victims of Hurricane Helene, which devastated western North Carolina in late September, including Swannanoa. He falsely claimed that FEMA’s “rescue effort was almost non-existent” in the state and that the Biden administration “spent a lot of money on bringing illegal migrants … so they don't have any money for the people that live here.”

Finally, Trump specified that the administration was spending money designated for rescue and recovery on “illegal immigrants … maybe so they could vote in the election.” Right-wing media have been amplifying these lies, and omitting the fact that in 2019, Trump used FEMA funds to respond to migrants at the border.

The rhetoric appears to have resonated, as a new poll released by Harvard's Center for American Political Studies and the analytics firms The Harris Poll and HarrisX, found that “two-thirds of Americans think the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) should not provide housing to undocumented immigrants.” FEMA funds have never been diverted away from hurricane aid for any other purpose, including housing for migrants.

FEMA, local officials, and the White House have been responding to a flood of misinformation related to both the causes of the hurricane and FEMA’s response in the impacted areas. Driven in part by lies like the ones Trump has repeatedly amplified, such as claims that FEMA is willfully ignoring hurricane victims because they are Republican, threats against the agency, and other outlandish conspiracies have proliferated online. FEMA has faced at least two armed threats on the ground during its response to Helene, and the threats are ongoing.

The Washington Post reported on October 23 that Veterans on Patrol, a group that the Southern Poverty Law Center calls a “hard-right” antigovernment militia run by a Christian nationalist, set up a distribution site at a grocery store to help residents of Lake Lure, North Carolina, but ended up intimidating them.

One Lake Lure volunteer told the Post that she was afraid and not sleeping because of the behavior of the group's founder, Michael Lewis Arthur Meyer, after she questioned his intentions. “It turned into people calling me last night, like, be careful. Be careful. Really, he’s talking a lot about you,” she said.

Video

CitationFrom the October 21, 2024, edition of CNN's CNN News Central

On October 21, reporting from Concord, North Carolina, correspondent Kristen Holmes told hosts Brianna Keilar and Boris Sanchez on CNN News Centralthat Trump promoted “disinformation around FEMA.” She called out the false and dangerous claim that Democrats purposely spent FEMA money on migrant housing rather than relief efforts because they “want migrants to be voting in this election.” The accusation comes as Project 2025 allies are actively organizing to steal the election.

Holmes emphasized the network’s dedication to setting the record straight, saying that reporters had “fact-checked this before, we’ll fact-check it again.” She repeated that “we know that FEMA has different pots of money. They do have money that goes toward migrant housing, that does not come from disaster relief money.” She also added that while speaking with governors and state officials in places that Helene impacted, “None of them complained really about the federal response or about FEMA.”

Video

CitationFrom the October 22, 2024, edition of CNN's CNN Central

The next day on October 22, CNN followed up with another fact check on Trump’s most recent tirade, where reporter Daniel Dale clarified that FEMA does still have disaster relief money, that there has been “no sign that anything inappropriate’s happening” with the allocation of FEMA funds, and finally, that “it is not true that the Biden administration ran out of money.”

Doubling down on Trump and right-wing media’s assertions about where aid is going, Dale said that it’s “not true that FEMA improperly diverted disaster relief money to house migrants” and that “FEMA itself has already provided more than $100 million in individual assistance to North Carolina residents” as well as “more than $300 million to the state in general” from the Biden administration overall.

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an 10 24

An interview between CNN host Jim Acosta and Georgia Republican Party Chairman Josh McKoon became unusually confrontational when the latter refused to admit the 2020 election was conducted fairly.

On Thursday, Acosta... to talk about early voting in the Southern battleground state with Election Day looming in less than two weeks. But their conversation grew testy when McKoon asserted that the prominence of ballot drop boxes led to "irregularities" in the Peach State during the 2020 election, which former President Donald Trump narrowly lost.

"I can't let you go on too long because you're saying there are voting irregularities," Acosta interjected. "The Republican secretary of state Brad Raffensberger said that the election in 2020 was fair and square and that Joe Biden won. You dispute that still?"

READ MORE:CNN host laughs out loud at guest who said Trump had permission from Biden to call Putin

McKoon pushed back and said that while he appreciated Raffensberger's position, he disagreed, once again pointing to a 2020 decision by the state's election board that allowed for more ballot drop boxes given the dangers of the Covid-19 pandemic. He noted that there had been "tremendous steps" taken by Georgia's Republican-dominated legislature and Republican Governor Brian Kemp to make sure Georgia's 2024 election was secure.

He added that it would be an "orderly election" in contrast to 2020, which Acosta again pushed back on. The CNN host asked McKoon to react to theaudio of Trump's call to Raffensberger, asking him to "find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have, because we won the state." McKoon characterized it as Trump simply asking Raffensberger to conduct an investigation into reports of convicted felons voting, which Acosta immediately challenged.

"Yeah, Josh, no. That's not what happened," Acosta said, as McKoon continued to attempt to talk over him. "Let's play it one more time just in case, maybe the Zoom is off or something. If we can, control room, let's play the sound one more time. Josh, let's listen to it one more time."

Acosta played the audio again despite McKoon's protests. He reminded his guest that in the full call, Trump talked about "shredding ballots" and "removing machinery." McKoon insisted that the former president was "talking about voters who should not have been allowed to vote in the election." He then pivoted into accusing Acosta of setting him up, saying he was "asked on this program to speak about early voting in Georgia in the 2024 election and President Trump visiting the state yesterday."

READ MORE:'Ripe for abuse': GA elections chief now allowing anyone to cancel a voter's registration

"This has been an entirely dishonest move to talk entirely about something that was not even discussed before I came on this program!" He said. "I know that y'all want to talk about 2020 because you know Trump's gonna win this election."

Acosta pointed out that the network was "well within our rights" to ask the Republican Party chair about whether he would accept the election result if Trump lost. He then asked again if he would accept the result of the Georgia election in November if it was unfavorable for Republicans.

"Look, I think this is a much more secure election than 2020. We don't have ballot drop boxes scattered randomly all over the state," McKoon said. Acosta then cut him off, reminding him that the state's Republican secretary of state "said that that was not the case and that it was a free and fair election and that it was secure."

"I'm just saying, Josh, what you're saying is horse crap," he said. "It's just horse crap."

READ MORE:[GOP voter fraud prosecutions only yielded 47 convictions out of tens of millions of ballots: report

Watch the exchange between Acosta and McKoon below, or by clicking this link.

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an 10 24

dull surogate dismaNtled by troye VP and spx on msnbc panel

An ally's attempt to defend Donald Trump after his onetime chief of staff alleged startling praise for Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler's generals was repeatedly shut down on CNN Wednesday morning.

Trump's former strategic communications director Marc Lotter faced off against The Grio senior vice president Natasha Alford in a dark debate about John Kelly's recent report to the Atlantic that the former president requested he be more like "Hitler’s generals."

"Voters need to listen to people who are in the inner circle," Alford said. "There's no reason to lie."

Alford's warning to American voters came in response to Lotter's claim that Kelly's words should be dismissed as "one man's perspective."

Lotter claimed he'd never heard the former president praise Nazi leadership's loyalty, accused Trump's critics of name-calling and told voters to put prioritize financial concerns and immigration policy over everything else.

ALSO READ:'He’s mentally ill:' NY laughs ahead of Trump's Madison Square Garden rally

"The world was safer when Donald Trump was in the White House compared to the mess we've got going on right now," Lotter said.

Lotter did not explain by what metric he measured safety and economic success. Under President Joe Biden's administration, violent crime has dropped to historic lows, inflation has decreased and jobs and wages increased.

This may be why Alford asked Lotter to check his numbers.

"This is about more than the dollar," Alford said. "We are talking about the ability to be able to do business, right, to do the business of democracy, going forward."

Alford praised Kelly's courage at stepping forward, urged other former Trump allies to do the same and voters to listen.

"Think about not just the public persona you see, not the charming sort of charismatic personality that Donald Trump may put on when he's trying to get you to vote for him," she said. "Think about how he will actually run the country behind closed doors."

Tempers flared at the end of the segment when Lotter made a call for unity and warned of darkness to come otherwise.

"How powerful would that message be if Donald Trump said that," Alford snapped. "He's not saying that."

Lotter cut in to blame Democrats for calling Trump a threat to democracy, a comment that spurred a fact check from host Sara Sidner

"It wasn't a Democrat in this instance," she said.

Added Alford, "Look at what John Kelly just said."

Watch the video below or click the link.

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an 10 24

One Republican member of Congress is now openly defending former President Donald Trump's call to use the military as a means of crushing American dissent.

Earlier this week, Trump told Fox Business host Maria Bartiromo that he wasn't ruling out deploying the U.S. military against "the enemy from within," which apparently includes "radical left lunatics." Trump even mentioned Rep. Adam Schiff (D-California), who is the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, when discussing "lunatics that we have inside." And on Tuesday morning, CNN host John Berman got Rep. Mike Waltz (R-Florida)on the record in favor of the former president's proposal.

"Do you think deploying the military against political opponents is something that's responsible to discuss from political candidates?" Berman asked.

READ MORE:'Ok, no': CNN host spars with far-right rep refusing to commit to peaceful transfer of power

"I think that's completely appropriate," Waltz said. "I think it's responsible to discuss deploying the National Guard, which is clearly part of the military, John, to keep our streets safe, to keep rioters out of the street. Everyone is welcome to protest peacefully. but when it exceeds that into violence as it did many times in 2020, then the National Guard was deployed and should be deployed and that has happened in a bipartisan way across many administrations separately."

Notably, Waltz also didn't differ from Trump when asked specifically about Trump describing Schiff as an "enemy from within." The Florida Republican referenced Schiff's censure by the GOP-controlled House of Representatives over his claims about Trump's 2016 campaign getting assistance from Russia, as well as former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's unfounded claim that Schiff leaked classified information.

"When you have senior members of the intelligence committee lying and leaking from from compartmented hearings when you have them lying to the public in an open hearing that is detrimental to our republic, to our democracy and public trust in our institutions and that's what he was talking about," Waltz said. "And that is not good for the country."

Waltz also insisted that Trump was put in unnecessary danger by commentators criticizing him over his repeated threats to democracy and the rule of law, suggesting that the two attempts on Trump's life were a byproduct of that rhetoric. Berman pushed back, saying Waltz has "tossed around" words like "socialism" and "Marxism" to describe his Democratic colleagues. Berman also mentioned to Waltz that former Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman General Mark Milley — whom Trump appointed to be the top U.S. military official in 2019 — called the ex-president "fascist to the core."

READ MORE:'Made violence his brand': Fascism scholar says threat of 2nd Trump term 'uniquely dangerous'

"Socialism is a longstanding political ideology. That's very different than saying someone is going to be — the world's most God, I mean, Godawful dictator in Hitler, and that clearly is radicalizing people to take action where they believe the ends justify the means to kill him," Waltz said. He additionally defended calling Vice President Kamala Harris a Marxist, saying: "there is Marxism that is underpinning many of her policies, including price controls."

"All I'm saying Congressman, is when Mark Milley says 'no one has ever been as dangerous to the country as Donald Trump, now I realize he's a total fascist,' he's saying that Donald Trump espouses fascist policies," Berman countered. "It's a political ideology. Fascism is a political ideology."

Waltz — who is a retired colonel in the U.S. Army — didn't acknowledge Milley's remarks about Trump. He instead suggested that America was on the brink of "World War Three" and referenced Russia's war on Ukraine and Israel's ongoing military campaigns in Gaza and in Lebanon as evidence of things being "pretty darn dangerous" under President Joe Biden's administration.

Watch the segment below, or by clicking this link.

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CNN 19 24

A North Carolina man was arrested over the weekend for allegedly threatening harm against FEMA employees responding to Hurricane Helene, according to the Rutherford County Sheriff’s Office.

William Jacob Parsons, 44, was arrested and charged with Going Armed to the Terror of the Public, a misdemeanor, Capt. Jamie Keever said in a news release issued Monday.

“Parsons was armed with a handgun and a rifle,” Keever said.

William Jacob Parsons

Rutherford County Sheriff's Office

The sheriff’s office began investigating Saturday after receiving a call that a man “made the comment about possibly harming FEMA employees working after the disaster of Hurricane Helene in the Lake Lure and Chimney Rock area.”

Parsons was found later that day after investigators received information about the color and license plate of his vehicle, according to the sheriff’s office.

Parsons was arrested in his car outside a grocery store that is functioning as a storm relief site, Keever said.

Parsons is now free on a $10,000 secured bond, the sheriff’s office said.

It was not immediately clear if Parsons had an attorney. CNN was unable to reach Parsons Monday at any of the phone numbers listed in his name.

Threat caused some FEMA offices to close

Aid to several communities impacted by Hurricane Helene was temporarily paused in parts of North Carolina over the weekend due to reports of threats against Federal Emergency Management Agency responders, amid a backdrop of misinformation about responses to recent storms.

Some FEMA teams helping disaster survivors apply for assistance in rural North Carolina are currently working at secure disaster recovery centers in counties where federal workers are receiving threats, a FEMA spokesperson told CNN on Monday.

“For the safety of our dedicated staff and the disaster survivors we are helping, FEMA has made some operational adjustments,” the spokesperson said in a statement. “Disaster Recovery Centers will continue to be open as scheduled, survivors continue to register for assistance, and we continue to help the people of North Carolina with their recovery.”

[

Related articleHow to apply for FEMA aid after Hurricanes Helene and Milton](https://www.cnn.com/2024/10/11/politics/fema-aid-how-to-apply)

On Saturday, FEMA workers had to halt their work in Rutherford County due to reports National Guard troops saw “armed militia” threatening the workers, CNN affiliate WBTV confirmed after reviewing messages sent to employees of a FEMA contractor. The threats were first reported by the Washington Post.

In the announcement of Parsons’ arrest, Keever said, “It was determined Parsons acted alone and there were no truck loads of militia going to Lake Lure.”

Rutherford County is southeast of the hard-hit Asheville area, and part of the mountainous region slammed by deadly flooding and landslides as Helene carved a path of destruction through the Southeast after making landfall in Florida last month. More than 100 people were killed in North Carolina and thousands of others were left grappling with catastrophic damage.

“We are aware of significant misinformation online and reports of threats to response workers on the ground and the safety of responders must be taken seriously,” said Jordan Monaghan, deputy communications director for North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper. “The Governor has directed the Department of Public Safety to identify with local law enforcement the specific threats and rumors and coordinate with FEMA and other partners to ensure safety and security as this recovery effort continues.”

Some FEMA operations were also paused Sunday in Ashe County, near the borders of Tennessee and Virginia, out of an abundance of caution, Sheriff B. Phil Howell said on Facebook. This included in-person applications for aid in at least two locations “due to threats occurring in some counties,” according to the county’s emergency management office. Those locations reopened Monday, the sheriff and emergency management office announced.

Howell urged residents to “stay calm and steady during our recovery, help folks and please don’t stir the pot.”

FEMA interruptions delay aid to victims

The delays to in-person work by FEMA will only slow down aid from reaching those who need it, especially in the complex terrain of western North Carolina, former FEMA administrator Craig Fugate told CNN.

Disaster applicants can start the process online and receive partial aid, but FEMA officials need to see the damage in person to finalize the request and get money into the hands of disaster survivors faster.

“Ultimately, they’re going to have to get inspectors in there and that could slow things down for people,” Fugate said. “Getting into these areas to verify this is where people live, this is their home, validate the damages caused by the disaster.”

FEMA continues to assess potential threats to its staff in impacted areas and the agency is coordinating with local officials on the safety of its employees and will make future adjustments as needed, the spokesperson said.

There were more than 1,200 FEMA staff providing support in North Carolina as of Saturday, according to an update from the agency. More than 250 Urban Search and Rescue personnel remained in the field and had rescued or supported more than 3,200 survivors, the update said.

Misinformation ‘unlike anything we’ve seen before’

Misinformation circulating about the federal response to Hurricanes Helene and Milton has hampered response efforts to the storms, CNN previously reported. President Joe Biden requested information last week on the federal government’s digital response, including how officials were remediating misinformation, an administration official said.

[

Related articleInside the White House’s desperate scramble to swat down hurricane misinformation](https://www.cnn.com/2024/10/09/politics/white-house-hurricane-helene-misinformation)

“The contours of this misinformation are unlike anything we’ve seen before,” a senior Biden administration official told CNN.

Fugate said individual FEMA personnel have received threats in the past but on a much smaller scale.

“In the field, it’s rare,” Fugate said. “This is unprecedented. I know we’ve had individuals but not an area or a group that’s threatening FEMA.”

Senior US officials have instructed public affairs teams at federal agencies to ramp up social media posts from government accounts with photos illustrating how federal workers are clearing debris and dispensing aid, a US official familiar with the effort said.

Earlier this month, the public information officer for Rutherford County, Kerry Giles, told CNN, debunking the rumors “did consume resources that could have been more effectively utilized in the recovery efforts.” Rutherford and surrounding counties have been posting photos and information about aid efforts to combat the misinformation.

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kns

Republican strategist's attempt to minimize former President Donald Trump's threat of "enemies within" spurred a swift fact check and heated debate on CNN Monday morning.

Conservative commentator Shermichael Singleton was checked by CNN anchor Jim Acosta as he tried to claim Trump's threat to sic the military on political enemies was limited only to those who live in the U.S. without citizenship status.

"I think he's talking about immigration," Singleton said. "And when you look at—"

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"No, no, no," interrupted Acosta. "He was talking about what he called radical left people in this country. Americans. Political opponents."

Singleton shrugged off what Acosta described as a "dangerous" threat — arguing Republicans cared more about policy than rhetoric — and in doing so outraged Democratic strategist Julia Roginsky.

"Let me just say something right now," Roginsky said. "This is not Donald Trump saying crazy stuff...he's done this before."

Roginsky argued Trump meant what he said at a Coachella rally over the weekend that he'd bully Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) into supporting his border control policies by threatening to withhold "fire money....for all the forest fires."

She pointed to recent reports from two former staffers who said Trump tried to block wildfire relief from reaching California in 2018 until he was shown voter data proving supporters lived there and raised a crucial concern.

"There were people around him [during his first term] to stop the worst impulses...they're not going to be there this time around," she said. "He's basically letting the voters know that, you know, this is what you're voting for."

When Acosta asked if Democrats needed to do more to call out Trump's authoritarian rhetoric, Roginsky replied with an incredulous shake of the head and a figurative finger pointed at his industry.

"The media has not done enough to call this out," Roginsky snapped back. "Here you have a fascist — and General Milley is right because all of the markers of a fascist exist in Donald Trump — and yet our news media has not done enough, by any stretch of the imagination, to call this out."

As proof, Roginsky pointed to intense media scrutiny of President Joe Biden's age and Gov. Tim Walz' (D-MN) location during the Tiananmen Square protests 35 years ago.

Singleton, given a chance to respond, interestingly did not slap back with a defense of his political party — but of colleagues in the media he argued could not be blamed for focusing more important issues than Trump's rhetoric.

"We have covered it," he said. "i just think there are far more consequential issues that impact people's day-to-day lives."

"With all do respect," Roginsky replied, "Take a look at the ratio. This is an existential problem."

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The good, the bad, and the ugly of Sunday morning political shows’ coverage of Hurricane Helene misinformation

Impacted states are pleading for bad actors to stop spreading deliberate misinformation

Special ProgramsClimate & Energy

Written by Allison Fisher

Published 10/07/24 mma

Misinformation related to the ongoing response to Hurricane Helene, which has created widespread devastation across six states and left at least 232 dead, is disrupting relief operations, and a number of local and state officials are calling on bad actors and the Trump campaign to stop spreading the lies.

The Sunday morning political shows attempted to address this hurricane misinformation with varying degrees of success. With the exception of Fox News Sunday, all the shows rightly pointed out the threat misinformation and unfounded conspiracy theories pose to the response efforts while flagging some of the most prevalent lies polluting these efforts.

The most prevalent misinformation has centered on the distribution of Federal Emergency Management Agency aid, specifically the false claims that federal assistance is limited to $750 per affected individual and that FEMA funds are lacking due to spending on immigrant assistance. Bad actors have also pushed an overarching falsehood that the response has been a failure.

Both ABC and CBS hosted good-faith actors who debunked the falsehoods while also confirming that the federal efforts have been strong. CNN and NBC hosted bad actors who refused to acknowledge the misinformation and continued to push the false claim that the federal efforts have been a failure even in the face of repeated fact checks by the anchors.

Even though the misinformation appears to be constructed to attack the response of the Biden-Harris administration, none of the networks provided the context that former president Trump has a track record of doing what he accused the federal government of, such as withholding hurricane disaster relief to North Carolina and Puerto Rico allegedly for political reasons or the recent revelations that Trump “refused to approve disaster aid for California after deadly wildfires in 2018 because of the state’s Democratic leanings.”

Material to misinformation around the adequacy of FEMA funds is the fact that Republicans, just days before Hurricane Helene made landfall, voted down additional FEMA funds requested by the White House, and House Speaker Mike Johnson has declined Biden’s request to convene Congress to consider a special relief package for impacted states. However, these facts were also absent from the coverage.

The good: ABC, CBS focused on misinformation and officials’ explanations that it can hamper recovery efforts

ABC’s *This Week* foregrounded an interview with FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell by reporting that “in North Carolina, they are still working to survey the damage and to reach survivors as a wave of misinformation from the former president and his allies hampers the recovery effort.”

They added: … “In the wake of Trump's various claims, FEMA launching an anti-rumor tool this week to combat those messages, with local officials calling on people to ignore online falsehoods. … Law enforcement is monitoring threats towards public officials prompted by disinformation and conspiracy theories, including specific individuals linked to FEMA and other recovery agencies.”

Video

CitationFrom the October 6, 2024, edition of ABC's This Week

In the interview, ABC anchor George Stephanopoulos asked Criswell whether they had the resources they needed. She responded:

“Absolutely, George. We, again, we moved resources in before this storm happened. We embedded our staff in the state to work side by side so we could quickly employ those resources to where they were needed, and as we continue to see how long we're going to have to provide this level of sustained support, we will continue to do that.”

Criswell also lamented about the misinformation that “we're putting politics ahead of helping people,” while emphasizing the danger. “I need to make sure I can get the resources to where they’re needed, and when you have this dangerous rhetoric like you're hearing, it creates fear in our own employees,” she said.

On CBS’*Face the Nation*, moderator Margaret Brennan reported that a North Carolina state senator had been “posting on Facebook asking people to stop conspiracy theory junk” and asked Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC), “Who or what is fueling that kind of misinformation and do you think it is harming recovery efforts?” He responded in part:

“Many of the observations are not even from people on the ground. I believe that we have to stay focused on rescue operations, recovery operations, clearing operations, and we don't need any of these distractions on the ground. It’s at the expense of the hard-working first responders and people that are just trying to recover their life.”

Brennan also questioned Tillis on the misinformation that Trump and others in right-wing media are spreading, such as falsely claiming that money intended for hurricane relief was being diverted to immigrants.

Tillis expressed disapproval of the administration’s border policy but capitulated that it was not impacting the hurricane response, saying: “We have the resources that we need. We're going to have to go back and pass more resources. We could have a discussion about the failure of this administration's border policies and the billions of dollars it’s costing. But right now, not yet is it affecting the flow of resources to Western North Carolina.”

“It has not been a factor, to be clear,” Brennan emphasized.

### The bad: CNN, NBC brought on Trump campaign spokesperson Lara Trump and Sen. Tom Cotton, and both spread misinformation

On CNN’s State of the Union, anchor Dana Bash tried to fact-check Trump’s misinformation in an interview with Lara Trump, but the Trump campaign spokesperson persisted in her false claims.

Bash brought up specific misinformation spread by the right-wing media and Trump, including that “FEMA is only offering $750 to Americans who have had their homes destroyed.”

“That's not true,” she clarified. “He's also echoing conspiracy theorists online who falsely claimed that the administration is redirecting disaster money for undocumented immigrants.”

In response, Trump doubled down on the false claims and repeatedly insisted that there is a relationship between the migrant crisis and the hurricane response, falsely claiming, “You have migrants being housed in luxury hotels in New York City. We have paid so much money from our tax dollars into the crisis that didn't need to happen. We could redirect money to help people immediately on the ground.”

Video

CitationFrom the October 6, 2024, edition of CNN's State of the Union

While Bash repeatedly fact-checked Trump’s response, she still provided a platform for the Trump campaign to push hurricane response lies and create the impression that the federal government’s relief efforts have been lacking.

Similarly, on NBC’s*Meet the Press* anchor Kristen Welker questioned Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) about hurricane misinformation, stating, “We know former President Trump has made, quite frankly, a series of baseless claims, including that the Biden administration is intentionally withholding aid from where Republicans live, also saying that FEMA funds are being redirected to migrants. Both those claims have been debunked. They’re false.”

Cotton twice claimed that Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp is calling the response “lackluster,” even after Welker corrected that Kemp “said we got what we needed.”

Cotton also falsely claimed that it took days to deploy helicopters and claimed that “there's not enough money left in the fund” while suggesting that the reason is because billions of dollars have been spent to put up migrants “in hotels and give them room service and maids.”

Welker fact-checked his response, saying, “Those funds are coming from a different federal fund, not from disaster relief, just to be clear. And what DHS Secretary Mayorkas said is that it has the money it needs for now, but not necessarily through the end of the year for future hurricanes.” But Cotton doubled down, saying:

“It is true that FEMA and the Department of Homeland Security have been spending billions of dollars on migrants. … I would note that this administration seems to have no problem finding money when they want to spend it on their priorities. When they need hundreds of billions to pay off student loans for graduate students in gender studies programs, they somehow find it. When it's trying to get helicopters to deliver food and water and cellular service and life-saving medicine into the mountain valleys, they somehow can't seem to find the money.”

Welker reiterated that the funds are different and that millions have already been distributed to those impacted.

In his newsletter, media critic Oliver Darcy asked about Cotton, “Why do news networks continue to invite the dishonest GOP senator on to abuse their platforms in the first place?”

Darcy was referring to Cotton continuing to lie about the 2020 election, but the point stands for his refusal to set the record straight on FEMA funding as well. Darcy went on to add:

As Jake Tapper — who also recently invited Cotton on his program — said years ago in the aftermath of the insurrection, “If you’re willing to lie about [the election], what else are you willing to lie about? And why should my viewers listen to you?”

### The ugly: Fox News Sunday glossed over misinformation and aired an inaccurate Trump statement without context

Fox News Sunday’scoverage of Hurricane Helene failed to cover the ongoing issue of misinformation altogether, instead focusing on the two presidential candidates’ recent comments on recovery efforts, reporting that Vice President Kamala Harris returned this week to North Carolina and “pledged ongoing federal support” and “former President Trump has said the current administration has done a lousy job.”

The show punctuated the statement with a clip of Trump saying: “They are doing the worst job on a hurricane than any administration has ever done.”

Video

CitationFrom the October 6, 2024, edition of Fox News Sunday

This is false: While the storm, made worse by climate change, is among the most deadly to hit the United States mainland, the response started even before the storm made landfall and is ongoing.

The Biden administration has approvedfederal assistance for multiple states, including Florida, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Alabama, Virginia, and Georgia. On September 29, the White House released an updated fact sheet detailing the administration's “continued response efforts to Hurricane Helene,” noting that tens of thousands of state and federal personnel are helping victims across several states. This includes 50,000 personnel helping to fix power outages, 3,300 personnel allocating federal resources and helping with search and rescue operations, and 200 medical responders providing health services.

On October 2, Biden approved deployment of up to 1,000 active-duty soldiers to support the delivery of food, water, and other critical commodities to impacted communities.

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'A distraction': CNN’s Tapper methodically debunks Trump’s lies about federal hurricane response

Maya Boddie an 10 24

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an 10 24

a longtime supporter and former adviser to Donald Trump was admonished "Don't do this" and to stop "yelling" when he want off on a rant about the Jan. 6 insurrection.

With the Jan. 6 riot taking center stage once again in the wake of a filing from special counsel Jack Smith accusing the former president of criminal acts, host Jim Acosta, Democratic strategist Karen Finney and conservative David Urban ended up engaging in a contentious debate that went off the rails when Urban claimed MAGA fan Ashli Babbitt was "murdered."

After Urban was told he was "moving the goalposts" to justify Trump's loss to President Joe Biden, Acosta bluntly told the conservative, "The last election was fine – he lost."

ALSO READ:The secret weapon Republicans use to win elections

When Finney added, "There are dangerous consequences because the president lied. People died on Jan. 6," Urban fired back.

"The only person who died on Jan. 6 was Ashli Babbitt who was murdered," he accused. "That's the only person who died, let's be straight, Karen, on Jan. 6."

When both Finney and Acosta attempted to push back, Urban shouted, "I'm not trying to minimize it," as Acosta said, "C'mon, let's not do that one."

"Jim, Jim!" the conservative guest yelled. "It's terrible, right?"

"David, David, none of that would have happened if Donald Trump had just been a man and accepted the election results in 2020," Acosta explained as Urban talked over him. "Just man up, that's it – that's the whole ballgame."

"Do you accept personal responsibility is the key in life?" Urban asked as Finney looked on in puzzlement. "When you were a kid and your mom said when you were out with your friends and you did something, you said, 'Well, Billy made me do it, mom,' she would. have said, 'I don't care what Billy did.' You know better and your mom taught you better."

"The people who broke into the Capitol, they're responsible for their activities, not Donald Trump, not my dog made me do it," he ranted as Acosta tried to reply.

"Okay," Finney interceded as she reached out for Urban's arm. "We don't have to yell, we don't have to yell."

Watch below or click here.

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CNN's Bill Weir challenges the media narrative that fracking is a presidential litmus test while highlighting its health impacts on PA communities

09/13/24 mma

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fact check jdv and an 9 24

Lara Trump, daughter-in-law to the Republican Party's presidential candidate and co-chair of its national committee, received a fact check on CNN Tuesday morning when she tried to backtrack misleading Truth Social messaging from her father-in-law.

Anchor Kasie Hunt demanded the Republican National Committee leader explain what exactly former President Donald Trump meant when he wrote Sunday that "20% of the Mail-In Ballots in Pennsylvania are fraudulent" — a claim he cited to an undated interview with an unnamed expert.

"Donald Trump," Lara Trump replied, "wants every voter no matter if you're voting Republican, Democrat or third-party candidate to feel comfortable ..."

"So," Hunt cut in, speaking over her guest, "why is he saying that 20 percent of them are fraudulent?"

This is a near-direct quote of Trump's messaging on his social media site, where he demanded the Federal Bureau of Investigation look into claims that Democrats were rigging votes.

"An interview by Tucker Carlson of an election expert indicates that 20% of the Mail-In Ballots in Pennsylvania are fraudulent," Trump wrote in his Truth Social post. "We will WIN Pennsylvania by a lot, unless the Dems are allowed to CHEAT. THE RNC MUST ACTIVATE, NOW!!!"

Trump appears to be referencing an interview Carlson, the former Fox News personality fired after the network settled an $787 million lawsuit over election fraud claims, held in April with Justin Haskins of the right-wing think tank Heartland Institute.

The study Haskins referenced was debunked by the Washington Post in December, when analyst Philip Bump explained a problem with conservative pollster Ramussen's survey of roughly 1,000 voters upon which it relied.

"This instantly fails the smell test," wrote Bump. "A fifth of voters said they voted in a state where they no longer live? About 6 in 10 Americans have never moved out of the states in which they were born. Half of the rest, we are meant to believe, committed an obvious form of election fraud three years ago."

On Tuesday, Lara Trump tried to pivot away from Trump's misleading messaging to her own political talking points.

ALSO READ:How the press corps is Trump’s assisted living program

"He's specifically referencing information from the 2020 election," Lara Trump said. "What we're talking about right now is making sure that every vote matters and every vote counts, and I've worked very hard—"

Hunt wasn't having it.

"What information do we have?" Hunt asked. "What evidence is there that 20 percent of the mail-in ballots were fraudulent?"

"I didn't see that report," Lara Trump said. "So I'd have to go back and look at it."

Watch the full interview below or click here.

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an 8 24 badash

:{:{Right-wing CNN pundit Scott Jennings is among the members of the media being scolded – and schooled – for alleging Vice President Kamala Harris’s first interview after accepting the Democratic presidential nomination should be solo, after she gave the highly-coveted confab to CNN.}:

Both Harris and her vice-presidential running mate, Governor Tim Walz, will share the screen Thursday night. Critics say a joint-ticket interview after a vice-presidential running mate announcement or after their party’s nominating convention is generally the rule and not the exception.}:

“Should CNN have insisted on a one-on-one interview with Harris and turned down a joint interview with Harris and Walz?” asked former CBS News White House Correspondent Mark Knoller. “Too tough to walk away from. But first question to Harris ought to be why should couldn’t appear solo.”

Scott Jennings, a former Karl Rove protégé and veteran of the George W. Bush presidential campaigns and White House, went far further Tuesday night (video below), after CNN’s Anderson Cooper asked, “Is the line now going to be, ‘well, why isn’t she doing it by herself?'”

“I think it’s incredibly weak – weak sauce – to show up with your running mate,” Jennings told Cooper (video below), before suggesting the Vice President didn’t have to power to make the decision.

READ MORE: ‘Campaign Stunt’: Did Trump Event ‘Desecrating’ Arlington Cemetery Violate Federal Law?

“The fact that they don’t have enough confidence in her to let her sit, herself, the actual top of the ticket, and do a single interview – in fact, I think the hand wringing and the gyrations over this over the last month show troubling lack of confidence in her political ability. Which also makes you wonder, as a voter, what kind of President would you be if this kind of a small -time decision? Can we do an interview or not? What does that look like for your decision making process? So yes, I think Republicans are going to think it’s pretty weak to show up with effectively someone to take up half the time.”

The Lincoln Project’s Stuart Stevens, a longtime political strategist and former Republican, responded on social media, asking Jennings, when Republican Mitt Romney and his 2012 vice-presidential running mate, Paul Ryan gave their “first interview together, was Ryan the support animal for Romney? Or is that @KamalaHarris is a woman & that makes it different?”

At the close of the Republican National Convention in July, Fox News host Jesse Watters announced he would be the first to interview Donald Trump on-camera post-convention, in a joint interview with his running mate, JD Vance.

Talking Points Memo’s award-winning founder and publisher Josh Marshall remarked, “It’s actually almost a rule that the first sit-down after a Veep selection is a joint interview with the ticket.”

READ MORE: Grand Jury Indicts Trump Again for J6: If He Loses ‘He’s Going to Jail,’ Expert Predicts

Social media users are posting photos of Romney and Ryan, Donald Trump and Mike Pence, Barack Obama and Joe Biden, and Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, all apparently from their first joint sit-down interviews.

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There appear to be two recent exceptions. In 2016, Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton gave her first post-convention interview, solo, to Fox News’ Chris Wallace. And in 2000, Democratic presidential nominee Al Gore gave his first post-convention interview, solo, to ABC News. Both candidates lost their election bids.

Watch Jennings below or at this link.

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READ MORE: ‘Unimaginable Is Difficult to Imagine’: Lincoln Project Explains New Dystopian Abortion Ad

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gingrich trash bias press pre-emption --> SOP; here false equivalence/ i am victim

an

May 23, 2024

US Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) was one of the 17 Texas Republicans who refused to certify the 2020 election results, according to the Texas Tribune.

During a Wednesday night interview with the GOP senator, CNN's Kaitlan Collins noted Cruz's refusal to acknowledge President Joe Biden win over Donald Trump in 2020, and asked whether the Texas leader plans to accept the November election results in the case Biden wins again.

"Do you plan to object or will you accept the results regardless of who wins the election?" Collins asked.

READ MORE:Ted Cruz slapped with campaign finance laws violation complaint

"Kaitlan, I got to say, I think that's actually a ridiculous question," Cruz replied.

"It's a yes or no question," Collins insisted.

"Let me explain why it's ridiculous question," the Texas leader said, asking, "Have you've ever asked a Democrat that?"

Collins replied, "Have you ever had a sitting president who refused to facilitate the peaceful transition of power, refused to acknowledge that his successor won the presidency?

Cruz claimed, "We had peaceful transfer of power, I was there on January 20."

"Barely," Collins replied, before noting that in 2016, when Biden was vice president, "he went to the Senate floor and certified the votes."

READ MORE:'Ted Cruz isn’t fooling anyone': Texas senator slammed over outreach to Democrats

Cruz said, "You only ask Republicans" this question.

Collins replied, "Because it was Republicans who tried to block the transition of power. You have to acknowledge that. We've never seen it on a scale of what happened in 2020. And We've never seen the president refuse. He wouldn't even let Joe Biden get classified briefings at the beginning.I recall that. So my question for you again: Free and fair election, will you accept the results regardless of who wins?"

The senator replied, "If the Democrats win, I will accept the result, but I'm not going to ignore fraud," before claiming there was voter fraud in 2020. Collins replied, "No there wasn't, and you still objected."

"Oh you know, for a fact, there were zero voter-fraud?" Cruz asked. "What's your basis for that? Show me your evidence.'

Collins said, "We've spoken with [Georgia Republican] Governor [Brian] Kemp. They did three hand recounts in the state of Georgia. the director of CISA [Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency] said that this was one of the safest most legitimate elections."

READ MORE:['Taking a lot of ribbing': Ted Cruz now the butt of senators’ jokes amid FAA bill markup

The CNN host emphasized, "Republicans are twisting themselves in knots."

Cruz claimed Collins never asks Hillary Clinton, Stacey Abrams, or Al Gore whether they will certify election results.

"I haven't had any of them on my show," Collins said. "We'll talk to them, but I don't remember there being a president who was refusing to turn over the transition of power."

Watch the video below or at this link.

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July 31, 2024, edition of CNN's *CNN News Central

DANIEL DALE (REPORTER): So the controversialness of the claims about Vice President Harris' identity will probably make the most headlines, but I think it's important to note that his claims on that subject are also false. You know, he said that Vice President Harris has only “turned Black” a couple of years ago and before that she was only promoting her Indian heritage. That is just not true. I quickly — just via Google and with the help of CNN's KFile team, Andrew Kaczynski and Em Steck — found multiple examples of her talking about her Black identity going back decades.

Her biography on the official website of the San Francisco district attorney page identified her as an African American woman. I found an article in Politico that quoted her talking about her Black identity and speaking out against anti-Black racism in 1989, as a law student. So this is not some sort of sudden identity conversion, that's just completely fictional.

And then, guys, it was just a laundry list of old Trump false claims. So, his claim that — well, he said she didn't pass the bar exam. You addressed that. She passed on a second try and was admitted to the bar a year after she graduated law school.

He talked about Democrats allowing the death of babies after birth, suggesting that there's some sort of post-birth abortion. Again, not true, illegal in every state.

He said, “everybody” wanted Roe v. Wade overturned, this issue returned to the states. No, that's not true. Roe was overwhelmingly popular with about two-thirds of the American public.

He talked again about foreign countries opening up prisons to send people here as migrants — has never provided any proof of that.

Talked about people coming here from mental institutions over the border. Again, provided no proof of that.

And he exaggerated numbers even that could work for him. So, talking about inflation, yes, has been a problem under President Biden, Vice President Harris. He said worst inflation in 58 years and then he said actually over 100 years. Well, it's not even the worst in 20 years right now. It's about 3%. And when it did hit a high under Biden and Harris in 2022, it was a 40-year high. So, he could just say we hit a 40-year high — instead, he made a 58 and then 100-plus, none of which is true.

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Newsmax's Greg Kelly: “Fact-checking is fake, and it's actually kinda dangerous”](https://www.mediamatters.org/greg-kelly/newsmaxs-greg-kelly-fact-checking-fake-and-its-actually-kinda-dangerous)

08/01/24 mma

July 31, 2024, edition of Newsmax's Greg Kelly Reports

GREG KELLY (HOST): Speaking of President Trump, he went to the National Association of Black Journalists today in Chicago, and everybody lost their mind when Donald Trump spoke the truth. Now one thing first, the National Association of Black Journalists, NABJ, I don't like it right off the top. Let's see here. It was founded in 1975, stated purpose is to provide quality programs and services and advocate on behalf of Black journalists. I just -- something that divides us.

I mean, I don't know. The National Association for White Journalists, can you conceive of such a thing? No. Nobody could. White people don't have anything really in common. Black people don't have anything in common. We don't look at it that way. Faith, sports, neighbors, jobs, a million other things bring us together or divide us actually other than race. So, and in my experience, Black, white, Asian, the media, they're pretty much all jerks. OK? It really doesn't matter.

Just before Donald Trump took the stage, I had a feeling things were gonna go south because this person here, Rachel Scott is her name from ABC News, laid down the ground rules.

...

Oh my gosh. You can't fact check political speech, rhetoric, I mean, opinion. You can't fact check it. And as we know, Google and all the search engines have now been rigged against conservatives. It sounds great. You hear the audience going crazy. It's not. Fact-checking is fake, and it's actually kinda dangerous.

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5 24 debates? trump muted but no fact check, biden fail

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an ah may

Democratic incumbent President Joe Biden and presumptive 2024 Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump have agreed to two debates: the first hosted by CNN in Atlanta on June 27, the second by ABC News on September 10.

June 27 is early for a presidential debate, as the Republican National Convention won't be held until July 15-18 in Milwaukee — and its Democratic counterpart isn't until August 19-22 in Chicago. Biden's supporters view the June 27 debate as a golden opportunity for the president, as it will give him a chance to hammer Trump issue by issue and, they hope, improve his poll numbers. Many polls released in May have showed Biden narrowly trailing Trump by single digits in key swing states.

But some far-right pundits at Fox News are furious about the debates, including Laura Ingraham, Sean Hannity and Jesse Watters.

READ MORE:Biden 'heavily' investing in these 3 states that are 'key to the whole election': analysis

Ingraham complained that Biden needs a "game changer" performance and is hoping to get it "with the help of" CNN hosts Dana Bash and Jake Tapper.

Watters sarcastically commented, "Both moderators say Trump's Hitler, so the debate will be fair and balanced. Is Tapper going to cut the cameras away from Trump to fact-check him? We'll have to see."

Watters also attacked ABC News' George Stephanopoulos, saying that he "praised the deep state and said Trump's a threat to democracy" and adding, "I’m sure they'll be calling balls and strikes.”

READ MORE:[Biden campaign hammers Trump over infamous COVID comment

Hannity slammed Tapper as a "radical left-wing partisan talk show host" who is "masquerading as a journalist" and claimed that CNN "is filled with left-wing hacks who we know hate" Trump.

The Daily Beast's William Vaillancourt observes, "It didn’t take long at all for some of Fox News' most-watched hosts to frame next month's debate between President Joe Biden and Donald Trump, which was announced Wednesday morning, as unfair to the presumptive GOP nominee."

Although Fox News hosts have been attacking CNN and ABC News as too biased to be hosting the debates, they haven't had a lot to say about the controversy that surrounded the right-wing cable news channel's coverage of the last U.S. presidential election.

Fox News was sued by Dominion Voting Systems and its competitor Smartmatic after promoting the false, thoroughly debunked claim that their equipment was used to help Biden steal the 2020 presidential election from Trump. In 2023, Fox News agreed to a $787.5 million settlement with Dominion, although Smartmatic's $2.7 billion lawsuit against Fox News is ongoing.

READ MORE:[How Fox News' Trump trial coverage became an exercise in 'unintended hilarity': columnist

In an op-ed published on May 16, the Daily Beast's David Rothkopf doesn't agree with far-right claims that CNN and ABC News are too biased to be hosting the presidential debates. But he does argue that the debates could be a golden opportunity for Biden, as Trump is "out of practice" when it comes to debating as well as "bad at it."

Moreover, Rothkopf argues, the debates give Biden a chance to hammer Trump on issue after issue.

"In the view of those close to Biden," Rothkopf writes, "Trump's got a serious problem on the issues. He's on the wrong side of the American public on many of the policy questions most important to them. For example, Trump keeps proclaiming he is the one responsible for the repeal of Roe v. Wade. "

Rothkopf adds, "Almost two-thirds of all women and over six out of ten men support legal abortion according to a recent Pew report.… (Trump) loves Vladimir Putin, for example. In a Pew poll last year, 91 percent of Americans indicated they have an unfavorable view of Russia, with 62 percent having views that are very unfavorable."

READ MORE:Mary Trump: Here's why Ivanka and Don Jr. haven't show up to their father’s 'tawdry' trial

Trump still knows how to fire up his hardcore supporters at MAGA rallies. But Rothkopf stresses that the debate format is problematic for Trump given his lack of self-discipline.

"Trump's defective character is so clear, and the danger he presents is so great, that the current president will have a hard time looking worse in comparison," Rothkopf writes. "The contrasts between the two men and their beliefs could not be starker."

*Read the Daily Beast's full Fox News coverage at this link and David Rothkoph's Daily Beast op-ed here (subscription required).

READ MORE: Fox News suggests Trump 'force' court to throw him in jail — by quoting him

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CNN debunks right-wing media's false claims about FBI raid on Mar-a-Lago

05/22/24

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mma 3 24

on February 25, CNN published a piece on electric vehicles outlining the reasons that sales, which are trending upward and reached record levels in 2023, are not as high as analysts once predicted they’d be. The next day, a new headline appeared above the article that radically altered the main takeaway of the story without any new information added.

Here are the two headlines that appeared on February 25 and 26:

Why did CNN change “No, electric vehicle sales aren’t dropping” to “How EVs became such a massive disappointment”?

The article describes an emerging industry responding to new challenges. The original headline, “No, electric vehicle sales aren’t dropping. Here’s what’s really going on,” aptly characterized the moment this technology is in: Sales of electric vehicles are still climbing, even as the auto industry experiences and responds to growing pains.

The following day a new headline accompanied the piece that radically changed its tone: “How EVs became such a massive disappointment.” To support the negative new framing, CNN added a line to the piece saying “But the EV market has nevertheless become a major disappointment.” The change recharacterized the main findings — that while some automakers are currently scaling back production, EV sales are “up 40% from the same quarter a year before” and “hit a record last year” — to emphasize the “disappointment” arising from the mismatch of expectations and reality.

And while a note on the changed article reads, “This story and its headline have been updated to reflect context about EV sales expectations,” no new information or data was added to the article that would support a different conclusion.

No, EV’s are not a massive disappointment. Here’s what’s really going on.

The article does a fair job assessing the challenges currently facing the EV industry, “including vehicle price, lack of charging capacity and confusing tax credit rules,” and discussing why, despite strong sales, the industry is lowering future estimates.

But for each one of these challenges, which are consistent with the speed bumps that inevitably come with the development of new industries and products, the article also details the proactive ways the industry is responding.

Regarding the challenge of vehicle pricing, CNN points out that “most electric vehicles currently on sale in America are on the more expensive side of the automotive market.” The article then addresses the industry’s response, describing how automakers are cutting prices to move current EV models and working to make future models less expensive.

The article describes “continued lack of public charging” as another challenge, while laying out the ways industry is responding to it:

Automakers are finally taking major steps to do something about that, tapping into newly available federal funds, plus their own money, to install more chargers.

BMW, GM, Honda, Hyundai, Kia, Mercedes-Benz, and Stellantis have come together to create a joint venture that plans to install about 30,000 chargers across the United States and Canada.

Also, to make things simpler for drivers, every major automaker in the US has agreed to switch over to the same charging standard used by Tesla, still the largest seller of EVs. That means that, in a few years, almost all EVs sold in America will have the same type of charging port and use the same type of charger.

CNN also acknowledges that confusion around tax credit rules is contributing to lower sales estimates. The article then explains how the industry is adapting in order to simplify the process for consumers, allowing more people to take advantage of credits that offset the cost of new electric vehicles.

The reality and response from the industry never suggest that EVs have become a massive disappointment, and it is unclear why CNN decided to characterize them this way after the article was published.

The altered headline was a gift to climate deniers looking to obscure the benefits of EVs

On X (formerly Twitter), some bad faith actors, including climate deniers Marc Morano and Steve Milloy, weaponized the new “massive disappointment” headline to bolster their attacks on Biden’s climate proposal to transition to electric vehicles.

The transition to EV’s is a key pillar of the Biden administration's plan to combat the climate crisis, as the transportation sector is one of the largest contributors of climate change-causing pollution. But the benefits of the technology don't end there. While upfront costs for EVs are currently higher than for gas-powered cars, they are often cheaper when comparing costs over the course of the vehicles’ lifespans. Furthermore, the production costs of EVs continue to fall, and in the next decade EVs are expected to become cheaper to produce than gas cars.

In addition to long-term financial savings, EVs offer health benefits, as well. Reporting on an Environmental Protection Agency proposal that supports EV growth, The Detroit News noted that by 2055, the proposed rules would “remove nearly 10 billion tons of carbon emissions … reducing fine particulate matter in the air that can have negative health effects and potentially saving up to $1.6 trillion.” Indeed, one recent study estimated that up to 20,000 people in the U.S. die each year due to “transportation air pollution.”

Finally, a transition to EV's would make drivers less vulnerable to high gas prices and the whims of the global oil market. Reporting on the EPA proposal, MarketWatch noted that it “would strengthen American energy security by reducing reliance on 20 billion barrels of imported oil.”

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2x?

:{:{Among TV news networks, CNN was alone in consistently connecting California deluge to climate change 02/08/24}:

(https://www.mediamatters.org/broadcast-networks/among-tv-news-networks-cnn-was-alone-consistently-connecting-california-deluge)}:

CNN's Jim Acosta hosts frontline community activist to discuss climate justice implications of Biden's decision to pause LNG export permits

:{:{02/01/24}:

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an 2 24

freshman U.S. Rep. Brandon Williams (R-NY) attempted to promote several falsehoods but was rebuffed by Jim Sciutto, after the CNN host urged him to be respectful.

Rep. Williams, whose social media bio reads “People over Politics,” attempted to claim that President Biden could address the border issue with executive actions, including “Remain in Mexico.” Sciutto noted that the courts had stopped several of then-President Donald Trump’s executive actions on the border.

“Joe Biden shredded the Remain in Mexico policy his first week in office. He did it very, with great flamboyance and he could reinstate that today simply with a pen,” Williams told Sciutto when asked about the now-dead border bill.

“As you know,” Sciutto interjected, “many of the moves President Trump attempted were challenged in courts. You had a Democratic president here, who is willing to give more –”

Williams cut him off, saying, “Remain in Mexico was not struck down by the court. That’s simply not true.”

“I’m talking about executive privilege,” Sciutto responded, “and powers that the House is saying the President could exercise, but as you know, this is a president who’s actually making concessions that previous different Democratic presidents didn’t make. I just wonder why is it safer for your constituents to have no increased security at the border, as opposed to that negotiated by your Senate Republican colleagues?”

READ MORE: ‘Freedom or Terror and Tyranny?’: Biden Takes Aim at Trump and Speaker Johnson

“Well,” Williams said, “I’m glad to hear you say that Joe Biden has provided no security at the border along with Secretary Mayorkas. I think that’s a bold admission.”

“Not exactly what I said, I did not say that,” Sciutto declared.

“That is exactly what you said,” Williams insisted.

After talking over Sciutto, the CNN host urged Williams, “Let’s talk as people who respect each other, I respect your service. I’m asking you why no deal is better for your constituents for the rest of the year, as opposed to a deal that significantly tightened up restrictions of the border?”

But Williams continued to push falsehoods and GOP talking points.

“Well because five, you know, permitting in, in the law, in the code 5000 per day, on average, over a period of time, to enter the country,” William replied, wrongly explaining the deterrents the bill would have provided to border patrol agents.

“That’s not true. It’s not true,” Sciutto told him.

“It is true, it’s a disaster,” Wiliams insisted.

As Sciutto explained the parameters of that portion of the defunct legislation, Williams again interjected: “I’m sorry. Is that is that respecting each other? Is that what you’re getting at here is respecting each other?”

“I will challenge you when you say something that’s not true,” Sciutto offered.

“I’m a member of Congress, you’re cutting me off,” Williams protested. “It absolutely is true.”

“Only when you say something not true,” replied Sciutto.

“Oh, I see. And you’re the arbiter of truth. I realize that CNN has a great track record on that,” Williams snarked.

READ MORE: ‘Treason’: Top Constitutional Expert Warns on Trump’s Attack on NATO

“Senator James Lankford, a Republican Senator, said that the 5000 per day talking point was false. So I’ll quote him if you won’t take my word for it,” Sciutto concluded.

Last year, then-Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy joined hands with more than a dozen House Republicans, among them reportedly including Rep. Williams, as he lead them in prayer at the National Gathering for Prayer and Repentance. That event was co-sponsored by several far-right Christian organizations, at least five of which appear on the Southern Poverty Law Center’s list of anti-LGBTQ hate groups.

Also last year, as Syracuse.com reported, Congressman Williams “unleashed a profanity-laced tirade … while threatening his former top staffer at a holiday party in Washington’s International Spy Museum.”

“Williams can be seen in a video angrily pointing his finger in the face of Michael Gordon, his former chief of staff and campaign manager,” the news outlet added.

Watch Williams and Sciutto below or at this link.

===

win defam

On February 8, climate scientist Michael Mann won a defamation lawsuit against two conservative writers Rand Simberg and National Review contributor Mark Steyn. Steyn was once a regular presence on Fox News where he appeared more than 300 times between 2017 and 2021, both as a guest and a guest host.

According to The New York Times, in addition to finding them guilty of defaming Mann, “The jury also found the writers had made their statements with ‘maliciousness, spite, ill will, vengeance or deliberate intent to harm,’ and levied punitive damages of $1,000 against Mr. Simberg and $1 million against Mr. Steyn in order to deter others from doing the same.”

On February 9, Mann appeared on CNN News Central to discuss the outcome of the trial. During his interview Mann explained how these ideological and politically motivated attacks "chill the discourse” and discourage scientists from sharing their findings. Mann said he hoped the verdict will “create some space where scientists feel a little bit more … comfortable in leaving the laboratory, in communicating their findings to the public.”

Video

CitationFrom the February 9, 2024, edition of CNN News Central

BRIANNA KEILAR (ANCHOR) Michael, what do you worry is the effect on whether it's public health, or even global health, the health of our planet, which affects us all, when you have people making bogeymen out of scientists like yourself?

MICHAEL MANN: Well, I really worry about that, right? Especially young scientists, who see the attacks on scientists like myself, scientists like Anthony Fauci and my good friend Peter Hotez. They look at that, and that chills the discourse. That potentially leads them to sort of withdraw into their laboratories. They don't want to get involved, get into the fray, and to be part of the effort to communicate their scientific findings to the public, out of fear that they will be attacked, that they will be viciously attacked, again, by those who have vested interest in discrediting science that's inconvenient to their economic interests or their political viewpoints. And so this is a message to my fellow scientists, that, you know, that it is not OK for people to attack you, to make false allegations against you, to defame you.

And hopefully, that will create some space where scientists feel a little bit more, you know, that they're more comfortable in leaving the laboratory, in communicating their findings to the public, because we rely upon the best available science, as you said, both when it comes to our own health and the health of this planet. What could be more important than the health of our -- of us and, and our fellow human beings, and the planet that we live on? That's -- those are really the stakes here.

KEILAR: Yeah. We don't want there to be that chilling effect. Michael, great to have you.

While Mann is certainly one of the most prominent climate scientists to be in the crosshairs of right-wing media, he is far from alone. Attacks against climate scientists have been on the rise the last few years, especially on Elon Musk’s Twitter/X where many scientists have left the platform due to harassment.

mma 2 24

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'That’s not factual': CNN anchor destroys Republican threatening to remove Biden from the ballot - Alternet.org

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READ MORE: CNN Host Debunks Mike Johnson’s False Hundreds of ‘Known Terrorists’ Claim in Real Time

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'Indicted him to protect him — got it!' CNN’s Tapper mocks Comer to his face over Hunter Biden inquiry - Alternet.org

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CNN anchor calls new Republican Speaker Mike Johnson a "blank slate" | Media Matters for America

John Knefel wrote earlier today about how mainstream news outlets are downplaying or outright ignoring the extremist history of the new speaker of the house, Rep. Mike Johnson:

Johnson is a four-term representative and constitutional lawyer who worked to overturn the results of the 2020 election by leading an amicus brief in a Texas lawsuit that would have delayed the electoral vote in Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. He also voted not to certify the election results in Congress.

Johnson has a long history of anti-LGBTQ and anti-abortion extremism, including working as senior legal counsel for the extreme anti-LGBTQ legal group Alliance Defending Freedom. (The group was formerly known as the Alliance Defense Fund.)

Since entering Congress, Johnson has introduced a federal version of Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” law, which would eliminate federal funding for libraries, schools, and other organizations that discussed aspects of gay and trans identities. In July, he argued against parents having access to gender-affirming care for their children, falsely claiming it constituted “abuse and physical harm.” As a member of the Louisiana legislature, he introduced a bill that could have permitted de facto discrimination against gay couples, including allowing landlords to deny rental applications or employers to fire someone in a same-sex relationship. A recent CNN report reveals that Johnson wrote op-eds in which he called homosexuality a “inherently unnatural” and “dangerous lifestyle,” and called for the criminalization of gay sex.

Johnson has also co-sponsored a bill that would ban abortion nationwide and sued Kentucky for religious discrimination on behalf of Ark Encounter, a creationist theme park. But major U.S. news outlets largely ignored Johnson’s record of anti-LGBTQ and anti-abortion positions following his nomination as the GOP House speaker-designate.

:{:{Video}:

CitationFrom CNN coverage on October 25, 2023

DANA BASH (CNN ANCHOR): But just starting out again, because we're going to be learning a lot about this man who is heading towards not only getting the gavel, but being second in line for the president of the United States, because this is obviously a constitutional position. The fact that he didn't have baggage in this climate was the plus –

REP. KEN BUCK (R-CO): I think it was really –

BASH: Personal baggage.

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John Knefel wrote earlier today about how mainstream news outlets are downplaying or outright ignoring the extremist history of the new speaker of the house, Rep. Mike Johnson:

Johnson is a four-term representative and constitutional lawyer who worked to overturn the results of the 2020 election by leading an amicus brief in a Texas lawsuit that would have delayed the electoral vote in Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. He also voted not to certify the election results in Congress.

Johnson has a long history of anti-LGBTQ and anti-abortion extremism, including working as senior legal counsel for the extreme anti-LGBTQ legal group Alliance Defending Freedom. (The group was formerly known as the Alliance Defense Fund.)

Since entering Congress, Johnson has introduced a federal version of Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” law, which would eliminate federal funding for libraries, schools, and other organizations that discussed aspects of gay and trans identities. In July, he argued against parents having access to gender-affirming care for their children, falsely claiming it constituted “abuse and physical harm.” As a member of the Louisiana legislature, he introduced a bill that could have permitted de facto discrimination against gay couples, including allowing landlords to deny rental applications or employers to fire someone in a same-sex relationship. A recent CNN report reveals that Johnson wrote op-eds in which he called homosexuality a “inherently unnatural” and “dangerous lifestyle,” and called for the criminalization of gay sex.

Johnson has also co-sponsored a bill that would ban abortion nationwide and sued Kentucky for religious discrimination on behalf of Ark Encounter, a creationist theme park. But major U.S. news outlets largely ignored Johnson’s record of anti-LGBTQ and anti-abortion positions following his nomination as the GOP House speaker-designate.

:{:{Video}:

CitationFrom CNN coverage on October 25, 2023

JOHN KING (CNN ANCHOR): Out of three weeks of chaos comes very important history. A man even many Republican senators knew nothing about this morning. And I would believe most Americans knew nothing about this moming.

He's about to be third in line to the presidency once he is sworn in as speaker of the House. Mike Johnson will be third in line to the presidency of the United States after the president and the vice president. He'll now be the leader of a very fractious Republican conference.

And we were talking earlier, the Democrats believe they can use him and Trump to run in the 2024 campaign. That will be a challenge. That's a huge difference between him and the Democrats.

But we're going to see the president in the Rose Garden in a few minutes. He's never negotiated with Joe Biden. He's going to have to now negotiate with the president of the United States. He's also never negotiated with Mitch McConnell.

This will also exacerbate because of the wing of the party he comes from. The differences we have seen play out in the last couple of years between House Republicans and Senate Republicans.

So it's a new face. It's a new leader. He's a blank slate. That is an enormous opportunity. The challenges are so many for a person who has zero experience at this level – doesn't mean he can't do it, but he has zero experience at what he inherits in just a matter of minutes, they'll tally the votes. He'll be sworn in as speaker. He will get the gavel and then, wow, we move into a next very big chapter.

CNN anchor declares that new Republican Speaker Mike Johnson has no "personal baggage" | Media Matters for America

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punked?

How the border-cop-to-pundit pipeline fuels anti-immigrant coverage | Media Matters for America

for Tom Homan, the answer is always simple, no matter the question: Harsh punishment and brutal tactics get the job done. As a lifelong cop and former acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement who has found a new career as a Fox News pundit, Homan deals in absolutes, regardless of his job title.

“Look, when it came to zero tolerance, it worked,” Homan said in a May 2020 interview, explaining and justifying the Trump administration’s family separation border policy, which he'd been advocating for since his time in the Obama administration. “Law enforcement uses zero tolerance across this country all the time, whether it’s drug enforcement or prostitution.”

:{:{Homan is one of three prominent border cops turned right-wing pundits who exert considerable influence in conservative media and policy circles. Along with Todd Bensman and Jaeson Jones, both former officers at the Texas Department of Public Safety, Homan pushes his hardline nativist messaging to any and all audiences that will have him. He and Bensman are both fellows at organizations founded by John Tanton, whom the Southern Poverty Law Center describes as “the racist architect of the modern anti-immigrant movement.”}:

...?

As ex-cops, Homan, Bensman, and Jones speak with a practitioner's authority. Their claimed expertise, supposedly gleaned from firsthand experience, allows them to mask xenophobia as hard-won knowledge about public safety. They provide a faux-empirical justification for anti-migrant policies, giving viewers a sense that they’re getting the unvarnished truth from people who have lived it. (In reality, border officers are frequently ignorant about basic immigration facts.) But the role these three play isn’t to inform; it’s to reinforce existing anti-immigrant prejudices and provide scaffolding for new laws and policies restricting immigration.

Tom Homan: From family separation architect to Fox News stardom

Of this cop-turned-pundit trio, Homan is the most influential. He has made at least 357 appearances on weekday Fox News since becoming a contributor in August 2018, affording him a massive platform to influence conservative thinking about immigration. Homan’s history in border enforcement — which dates back to 1984, when he became a Border Patrol agent and later joined the Immigration and Naturalization Service — is integral to the authority he commands among conservative activists, politicians, and audiences.

One Fox appearance from 2019 shows how Homan uses his sway to legitimize outlandish proposals — in this case, sending the U.S. military to Mexico to target drug cartels. In late November of that year, then-President Donald Trump floated the idea of designating Mexican drug cartels as terrorist organizations, which could potentially facilitate operations into the country. Days later, Fox News’ Brian Kilmeade interviewed Homan and asked about a recent mass shooting in Mexico that left 21 people dead.

“Tom, I know you say we should go help — but don’t we need to be asked?” Kilmeade said to begin the segment.

“Well, yeah. I think that would be great, and I think the Mexican president is going to ask,” Homan replied. “He has proven he can’t handle it. Mexico has failed at handling these cartels for the last three decades. They can’t succeed without us.”

Homan then approvingly referenced the U.S. invasion of Panama to oust its then-leader Manuel Noriega before arguing that Mexican drug cartels should be formally designated as terrorist organizations to empower federal law enforcement — and presumably the U.S. military — to wage war against Mexican drug cartels on their home soil.

“If we declare them [Mexican drug cartels] a terror group, what changes?” Kilmeade asked. “What does that legally let us do?”

“I think that helps the U.S. do some out-of-the-country operations to attack these organizations,” Homan responded.

If there was any confusion about where Homan stood, in its write-up of the interview, FoxNews.com characterized Homan’s remarks as “agreeing that the cartels should be designated as a terror organization by the U.S."

Homan wasn’t the only conservative pushing that idea, but he was an early adopter. Just as importantly, his years of appearances since then on Fox News have helped solidify the racist ideas used to justify the proposed terrorist group designation: that the United States is being invaded by migrants, and that those migrants are responsible for bringing a majority of the fentanyl that arrives in the country — which is factually incorrect.

Trump eventually backed off his threat to designate the cartels as terrorist organizations. But the idea of using such designations to confer authority on federal authorities to bomb or invade Mexico has essentially become a consensus position on the right. Nearly every candidate in the Republican presidential primary, for instance, sounds indistinguishable from Homan on immigration policy, with each of them pushing for hardline restrictionist policies that are justified by dehumanizing language about immigrants “invading” the southern border.

Nearly every candidate in the Republican presidential primary sounds indistinguishable from Homan on immigration policy.

Homan's hawkishness has been rewarded, as the conservative media and policy ecosystem has warmly embraced him since his departure from the Trump administration. In addition to his employment at Fox News, he was named a visiting fellow at the influential Heritage Foundation in 2022. He’s also a senior fellow at the Immigration Reform Law Institute, the nonprofit legal arm of the Federation for American Immigration Reform, a branch of the Tanton network that the Southern Poverty Law Center has designated as a hate group.

Given Homan's association with that Tanton-founded organization, it’s not surprising that he has repeatedly pushed the great replacement theory, the racist idea that liberal elites are bringing people of color to the United States to replace white people. On October 11, Homan appeared on the show of a Hitler-praising antisemite where he claimed that the Biden administration is trying to purposely destroy the country by opening the borders to bring in “millions” of “future Democratic voters.”

Homan has pursued commercial endeavors as well. In 2020, Hachette Book Group published Homan’s Defend the Border & Save Lives, complete with a front-cover blurb from his Fox News colleague Mark Levin. He is a featured speaker at JL Wilkinson Consulting, a right-wing talent agency that also represents far-right cops Sheriff David Clarke and Sheriff Mark Lamb.

Homan also founded Homeland Strategic Consulting, which pulled in over $83,000 in consulting fees for services provided to Arizona businessman and failed Republican U.S. Senate candidate Jim Lamon, according to Federal Election Commission filings. Money began flowing Homan’s way just four months after he publicly endorsed Lamon’s candidacy. (Homan denied that the endorsement was related to the consulting contract.)

Homan has extensive links to extremist organizations and individuals, beyond his affiliation with the Tanton network. Earlier this year, Homan spoke virtually at an event honoring Mel K, a QAnon influencer and conspiracy theorist who has spread lies about the murder of Democratic National Committee staffer Seth Rich and denied the results of the 2020 election.

In March 2022, HuffPost reported that Homan had been scheduled to speak at an event organized by white nationalist Nick Fuentes. When confronted by HuffPost about his appearance at the racist conference, Homan blamed his assistant for arranging the appearance and the fact that “so many names of conservative groups sound the same."

Homan then claimed that he left the conference after reading that Fuentes was supportive of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but he stopped short of criticizing the openly bigoted group. “I’m not saying this is a bad group,” Homan said, referring to Fuentes and his racist supporters, known as groypers. “I’m saying I don’t know."

Later that year, HTom Trentooman co-founded an anti-immigration organization that bears the same name as Homan’s book, Defend the Border & Save Lives, with fellow Islamophobe . In addition to helping Homan pilot the new group, Trento, who once told an audience at a 9/11 commemoration in 2013 that the goal of “all Islam” is to “get every single one of us to convert to Islam,” also runs an organization called The United West, which the Southern Poverty Law Center has designated as an anti-Muslim group.

This March, Homan was named CEO of election denialist organization The America Project, founded by far-right multimillionaire Patrick Byrne. In addition to his duties as CEO, Homan also heads the group’s Border911 initiative, which has sponsored anti-migrant events throughout the country. The organization frequently posts videos of its rallies on Rumble, an extreme right-wing YouTube clone. Newsmax’s Jaeson Jones is also part of Border911, and he spoke alongside Homan at many of the group’s recent events.

Homan frequently denies that he has any political agenda, instead couching his preferences simply as apolitical enforcement of existing laws enacted by Congress. In 2018, CNN’s Wolf Blitzer asked Homan if ICE’s “zero tolerance” family separation policy, a policy Homan was overseeing at the time, was “humane."

“I think it’s the law,” Homan replied.

“It may be the law, it may be the policy, but is it humane?” Blitzer asked again.

“I think it’s the law, and I’m a law enforcement [officer],” Homan reiterated. “I must follow the law.”

But for Homan, not all laws are meant to be followed. In April, he headlined a Border911 fundraiser with Donald Trump at the former president’s residence and club Mar-a-Lago to raise money for families of people who participated in the January 6 insurrection. Speaking to the crowd, Homan reminisced about an early conversation in which Trump told him to “enforce the laws, that's all I'm asking you to do.”

“We kicked ass,” Homan reflected. “We kicked ass.”

Todd Bensman: Not an expert on immigration, by his own admission

Like Homan, Bensman has leveraged his history in law enforcement into a new career as an immigration restrictionist pundit and writer. Most of his work appears on the website for the Center for Immigration Studies — another branch of the anti-immigrant Tanton network — but he’s also written two books, and has published pieces at The Daily Wire, the Daily Mail, the New York Post, and other prominent conservative news outlets. He’s been on Fox News and Fox Business combined at least 27 times since 2017, according to a search of an internal Media Matters database and Bensman’s official website.

As Media Matters previously reported, Bensman has also appeared on extremist streaming programs as well. In June, he appeared on The Stew Peters Show, whose eponymous host is a white nationalist. He’s also been on at least three programs or platforms with ties to the QAnon conspiracy theory, including: The Mel K Show, Making Sense of the Madness (hosted by QAnon supporter Sean Morgan), and The Debbie Aldrich Show, from Creative Destruction Media, an outfit that in addition to endorsing QAnon also posts racist and anti-LGBTQ content.

In 2018, the Center for Immigration Studies brought Bensman on as a senior national security fellow. From his first days at the organization, Bensman stoked fears about terrorist “infiltration” at the southern border, a framing he regularly returns to despite evidence that conservatives wildly overstate the perceived threat as a way to demonize migrants.

In mid-September, Bensman spoke at a conference that also hosted John Eidsmoe, a retired Air Force officer who once spoke at a conference organized by a white supremacist group and has praised Confederate leader Jefferson Davis and pro-slavery advocate John C. Calhoun. QAnon-promoter Alex Newman was also a featured speaker at the event.

A granular look at how Bensman’s misinformation traveled is instructive.

Bensman frequently adopts a flood-the-zone style of content production, using his Center for Immigration Studies-sponsored trips to the border to create images and videos that confirm the bigoted prior assumptions of his intended audience. One of his recent successful operations was seeding a myth that the Biden administration was providing all migrant families with $2,200 monthly cost-of-living checks. Experts fact-checked the claim as false in real time, and news organizations have long debunked earlier versions of the persistent rumor,but a granular look at how Bensman’s misinformation traveled is instructive.

On September 6, Bensman posted a video on X purportedly showing a Border Patrol agent saying migrant families “get a check every month” of “about $2,200.” Bensman characterized the imaginary program as a “scam,” but acknowledged that he would have “to independently confirm” its existence, which he did not do. Instead, Bensman repeated the false claim three days later, even while admitting the accusation was “short of details” and “unverified.”

In the meantime, the conspiracy theory-amplifying pipeline kicked into overdrive. The same day he first posted on X about the supposed checks, Bensman went on former Trump adviser Steve Bannon’s War Room podcast and continued to spread the myth.

Video

CitationFrom the September 6, 2023, edition of Real America's Voice's War Room

“The government gives them cost-of-living checks, for one family per month: $2,200. So if the father brings one of the kids and the mother brings another of the kids, and they just act like two families, they’re pulling in $4,400 a month, according to that Border Patrol agent,” Bensman told Bannon. Bensman again acknowledged he hadn’t confirmed whether it was true or not, but that didn’t stop him from spending more than two minutes spreading the misinformation.

On September 7, junk news site The Gateway Pundit picked up the story, citing Bensman as its primary source.

The same day, Fox host Rachel Campos-Duffy parroted Bensman’s conspiracy theory, telling Fox’s audience that the Biden administration was “paying $2,200 per family."

Republican politicians spread the myth even further. “We are literally subsidizing our own invasion,” Rep. Matt Gaetz said on X, reposting The Gateway Pundit’s story. Former Trump official and Christian nationalist Russ Vought, a well-connected policy adviser on Capitol Hill, then reposted Gaetz.

Rep. Lauren Boebert repeated the $2,200-per-month claim on X/Twitter without any sourcing. When asked by local 9News Denver where she got her information, Boebert’s press office sent a link to the Gateway Pundit story. (9News’s ruling on Boebert’s statement? “Not true.”)

IFrame Content

On September 10, Bensman obliquely walked back his initial claim, without clearly admitting he was wrong. He later defended himself to The Washington Post, saying: “I was hoping to get to the bottom of it. Maybe an expert would send a link or explain it.”

At least one element of Bensman’s story is true. As he inadvertently acknowledged, he is not an expert. He is a propagandist, and his distortions are all the more potent in right-wing media because of his history as a cop.

Jaeson Jones: Bringing the war on terror to Mexico

On May 19, Newsmax border correspondent Jaeson Jones posted a promotional video for The America Project and Border911 to his Instagram account. In the video, Jones, sitting alongside Homan, directly addresses Border Patrol agents.

“I’m Jaeson Jones, retired captain from the Texas Department of Public Safety, and someone who’s out there on the border every day working with you guys to try to get out what you’re going through to the American people,” Jones said.

No viewer would expect Newsmax, which has sought to outflank Fox News from the right, to adhere to journalistic standards of neutrality and balance, but it’s still remarkable that Jones would openly admit that his goal as a correspondent is to show what his fellow border cops are “going through” rather than gather facts. By his own admission, he’s not covering a story — he’s “working with” the Texas Department of Public Safety and Border Patrol agents.

When Jones, Homan, and Bensman speak, they are speaking on behalf of border cops and law enforcement writ large, acting as representatives of what journalist Jessica Pishko describes as a “baronial class” of public employees who enjoy special rights and privileges. These ex-cops are pushing the ideological and material interests of that class, with the end result of expanding law enforcement budgets and political influence. The explosion of federal spending on immigration and border enforcement stretches back for decades, but the fearmongering that Homan, Bensman, and Jones push has the predictable effect of directing ever more public funds to this repressive apparatus.

That dynamic explains, in part, why — like Homan — Jones has repeatedly called for the U.S. government to designate drug cartels as foreign terrorist organizations. Such a move would almost certainly open up vast resources for state and federal border officers, in addition to conferring more political power and legal authority on those departments.

In fact, Jones advocated for designating cartels as foreign terrorist organizations well before Trump ever publicly floated the idea.

Jones advocated for designating cartels as foreign terrorist organizations well before Trump ever publicly floated the idea.

During a June 18, 2019, interview with Lou Dobbs on Fox Business, Jones described cartels as “global violent networks who are acting as terrorist organizations around the world.” He added that several cartels had “gone through a quantum leap in capabilities,” in part because of “what they’ve learned from the FARC, which is a designated terrorist organization."

Jones was referring to the Colombian guerilla group that the United States designated as a foreign terrorist organization from 1997 to 2021, and the reference wasn’t incidental. In the early days of the war on terror, the group served a crucial role for another federal organization, the Drug Enforcement Agency.

As journalist Trevor Aaronson has described, in the wake of 9/11, the U.S. government began funneling money into any project that could be described as counterterrorism. With Washington focused on global terrorism, the DEA, a key combatant in the previous generation’s war on drugs, found itself sidelined and relatively starved of federal funds. To bolster its raison d'être, the agency invented a new category of crime — narcoterrorism — and used the FARC, a designated terrorist organization funded in part by drug trafficking, as a pry-bar to access all the counterterrorism money sloshing around Washington at the time.

Under the DEA’s new mission, agents and their informants pretended to be members of the FARC and engaged in elaborate sting operations targeting purported terrorists. Given the FARC’s designation as a terror group, the DEA could claim that it stopped a would-be terrorist if its undercover agents convinced FARC rebels to act on their behalf. (Nevermind that they would have manufactured those would-be terrorists.) With federal resources on the line, fighting terrorism was as much a bureaucratic turf war as it was about waging any other kind of war.

As a former counterterrorism official at Texas Department of Public Safety, Jones likely would have known that specific history. More broadly, he surely understood how the federal funding game is played, and he kept pushing the new line. In a July 2019 interview, also on Lou Dobbs Tonight, Jones was even more explicit in calling for cartels to be labeled terror groups, and again referenced the FARC.

“These are terrorist organizations that are no longer just drug trafficking organizations,” Jones said. “They have evolved into something much larger."

“The U.S. government has not transitioned yet to look at them as terrorists and to designate them as terrorists but yet, they employ the FARC — that is a designated terrorist organization,” he added.

Jones repeated his calls that August, September, October, and November — when Trump publicly contemplated moving forward — and then again the following December, February, March, and June, all on Lou Dobbs Tonight. In the September segment, Jones told Dobbs he had lobbied four members of Congress, “trying to get this foreign terrorist designation.” In 2021, he appeared on Tucker Carlson Tonight to push for the change, and he continues to agitate for it from his new perch at Newsmax.

The once-fringe idea is now largely accepted as conventional wisdom on the right. Jones and Homan played a significant role in normalizing it, specifically by appealing to their identities as former cops. If their pitch is successful under the next Republican administration, their former agencies would almost certainly benefit handsomely from their advocacy.

The porous border between the hard-right and mainstream media

Homan, Bensman, and Jones are not the only former cops in the right-wing media and think tank ecosystem. One of Bensman’s colleagues at the Center for Immigration Studies, Jon Feere, is a former ICE and DHS official whom NPR quoted in June. Randy Clark, a writer at Breitbart, is retired from Border Patrol. Mark Morgan, former acting commissioner of Customs and Border Protections, is a fellow at the Heritage Foundation and the Federation for American Immigration Reform, and is a member of Homan's Border911. The list goes on. These figures agitate for nativist immigration policies, channeling reactionary law enforcement attitudes into content served up in conservative media. The answer for them is always zero tolerance, harsher punishments, and more funding and discretion for cops.

The cop-turned-pundit pipeline isn’t unique to conservative outlets, but these figures loom especially large in their reactionary ecosystem given the centrality of nativist politics in the age of Trump. The programs where they appear, especially on Fox News, often set the tone for how mainstream outlets frame immigration, as mainstream outlets frequently adopt language that there is a “crisis” at the border.

One recent example perfectly illustrates how the Tanton network’s reactionary messaging seeps into mainstream news coverage. In mid-September, Washington Post columnist and CNN host Fareed Zakaria called for the president to “use the power he has in existing law to suspend entirely the admission of asylum seekers while the system digests the millions of immigration cases already pending."

To support this extreme and seemingly illegal position, Zakaria cited Nolan Rappaport, a former Department of Homeland Security official who now writes xenophobic op-eds at The Hill. Zakaria identified Rappaport only as “a longtime congressional expert on the issue,” but there’s much more to the story.

One recent example perfectly illustrates how the Tanton network’s reactionary messaging seeps into mainstream news coverage.

Rappaport, as it turns out, appears to be profoundly influenced by the organizations that employ Homan and Bensman. Rappaport blurbed Bensman’s first book, has cited him in at least three recent op-eds, and cited the Center for Immigration Studies in another. Rappaport frequently directs his stories, which he posts on X, at the Center for Immigration Studies’ policy director by tagging her username and at the account for Immigration Reform Law Institute, where Homan is a legal fellow. The Immigration Reform Law Institute then regularly reposts Rappaport’s stories to its own feed.

The pipeline from the Center for Immigration Studies and Bensman, and the Immigration Reform Law Institute and Homan, to Rappaport to Zakaria is invisible to the average reader. But Homan, for his part, sees it clearly.

“Please support CIS,” Homan said at the end of the conversation where he defended zero tolerance punishment against sex workers, people who use drugs, and families who crossed the southern border. He was speaking with Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies. “When I was the director of ICE, even when I was running ERO — Enforcement and Removal Operations, number three in ICE — CIS was a great help to the rule of law and helping ICE do their job."

“And they’re on the right side of the argument, folks, and we’re in a fight for our — we’re in a fight for our lives right now,” he continued. “We’re in a fight for this country. CIS gets it. They’re on the right side of the issues and they’re helping shape immigration in the future. So please support them.”

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https://www.mediamatters.org/jake-tapper/watch-jake-tapper-explain-connection-between-climate-change-and-more-extreme-storms

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8 23 morano on jesse kelly 1st tv ref to CNN

https://www.newsweek.com/james-okeefe-expand-his-war-cnn-lawsuits-more-video-1583722

no lnx

James O'Keefe to Expand His War on CNN With Lawsuits, More Video

BY PAUL BOND ON4/15/21

Controversial undercover journalist and scourge of the left James O'Keefe appears to be waging a full-scale war on CNN that includes not only the undercover videos he is known for, but also a series of planned lawsuits against the news network and its anchors over issues that may not even involve him or his nonprofit organization, Project Veritas.

O'Keefe told Newsweek he will soon sue CNN and two of its journalists, Brian Stelter and Ana Cabrera, for defamation in a report about Twitter permanently banning Project Veritas.

The February segment featured Cabrera accusing Project Veritas of "promoting misinformation" and calling the group a "conservative action-ist, activist," none of which O'Keefe says is true. Twitter reportedly banned Project Veritas over an anti-doxxing policy after the group confronted a Facebook executive outside of his home. In the same February segment, Stelter claimed Project Veritas violated "multiple rules."

Meanwhile, O'Keefe posted video of CNN allegedly confronting a woman outside of her home and accusing her of "being a Russian troll," as O'Keefe puts it, to show that CNN may have allegedly violated the same Twitter policy. The video includes a phone conversation between a legal representative of Project Veritas and CNN technology reporter Brian Fung, who accurately reported why the group was banned by Twitter, with O'Keefe intoning that either Fung is correct, or Cabrera is, though they are on the same network.

"We are suing CNN, Brian Stelter and Ana Cabrera and we are going to represent others in defamation suits against CNN. We're going to launch a division for lawsuits," O'Keefe told Newsweek.

James O'Keefe Project Veritas CNN Lawsuit Activist

[Project Veritas founder James O'Keefe speaks during the Conservative Political Action Conference in National Harbor, Maryland on March 1, 2019.

MANDEL NGAN/AFP/GETTY]

But the most visible indication of O'Keefe's battle with CNN are video recordings involving reported CNN technical director Charlie Chester saying things he thought were private that could be detrimental to the news network's reputation.

While two videos have already been released, O'Keefe is sitting on a third one that Newsweek has exclusively obtained.In this latest one, Chester discusses the Black Lives Matter movement and hate crimes against Asian-Americans.

The new video was filmed with a hidden camera while Chester believed he was actually on a date. In it, the alleged CNN employee appears to admit that the media prefers to cover crimes against Asians when they are perpetrated by white criminals.

"I haven't seen anything about focusing on the color of people's skin that aren't white," Chester tells his date, who is actually an operative of Project Veritas.

"I was trying to do some research on the Asian hate, like the people (who) are getting attacked and whatnot," Chester is heard saying. "A bunch of Black men have been attacking Asians. It's like, 'What are you doing? Like, we're trying to help with the BLM.'"

Chester adds in the clip that "the optics of that are not good."He says these things while being baited by a female companion on what he apparently believed was a date that he had set up through the Tinder app. His "date," who has not yet been identified, posed as a nurse while the two were chatting at a coffee shop where a hidden camera had been set up.

CNN did not respond to Newsweek's numerous requests for comment, or even to verify Chester is employed there. O'Keefe, though, said, "We stand by our reporting."

O'Keefe's usual method of operation is to release a single video, wait for attacks on his credibility, then release subsequent videos on the same topic to hammer his point.

In videos released earlier this week, Chester can be heard saying, "Look, what we did, we got Trump out. I am 100​ percent going to say it, and I 100​ percent believe that if it wasn't for CNN, I don't know that Trump would have got voted out."

Chester adds that he ​​"wanted to be a part of that ... Our focus was to get Trump out of office, right? Without saying it, that's what it was."

Thealleged CNN employee also said they brought in health experts to convey the "propaganda" that he was medically unfit for office.

"[Trump's] hand was shaking or whatever, I think. We brought in so many medical people to all tell a story that was all speculation—that he was neurologically damaged, and he was losing it. He's unfit to—you know, whatever. We were creating a story there that we didn't know anything about. I think that's propaganda," Chester says in one of the videos filmed with a hidden camera.

O'Keefe has also released video of Chester saying that CNN's focus once COVID-19 subsides will be climate change. "[Coronavirus] will taper off to a point that it's not a problem anymore. Climate change can take years, so they'll probably be able to milk that quite a bit ...Climate change is going to be the next COVID thing for CNN ... Fear sells," Chester is heard saying in the video.

O'Keefe's obsession with CNN has actually been years in the making. In 2019, under the guise of an #ExposeCNN campaign, his Project Veritas released undercover video of CNN employees accusing then supervising producer of CNN Politics, Steve Brusk, of inappropriate conduct. A month later, Brusk resigned.

And more than a decade ago, O'Keefe tried to fool a CNN employee, though it didn't go too well. At the time, CNN's Abbie Boudreau was working on a piece about O'Keefe's rising star in conservative circles and he arranged to meet her on a boat for an interview, though he planted hidden cameras and planned a Borat-like, ridiculous attempt to seduce her and somehow embarrass her by releasing secretly recorded video of her reaction. The then-CNN correspondent, though, sniffed out the setup and nothing came of the effort.

O'Keefe's detractors usually use that episode to discredit him, as they do his arrest after a plotted 2010 "sting" against then-Senator Mary Landrieu went awry. In that incident, O'Keefe sent three associates dressed as phone repairmen into Landrieu's office to try to prove she was ignoring calls from constituents who were upset about President Barack Obama's healthcare reforms. Later, O'Keefe, now 36, pleaded guilty to entering a federal building under false pretenses and he served three years probation and 100 hours of community service.

His detractors also claim that he doctors video in such a way as to fool his audience and make his targets look bad. O'Keefe counters, though, that his editing is no different than that of major TV news networks, including CNN, and that he sometimes goes the extra mile by posting hours of raw video online so that interested parties may judge for themselves how accurate or inaccurate his shorter videos are.

While he apparently isn't planning to do that for the Chester videos, he told Newsweek, "When I sue CNN for defamation, they will be forced to publish their raw materials, notebooks, emails, recordings, and so will I. I have nothing to hide."

In 2019, O'Keefe's Project Veritas was sued over undercover video of Democrat operatives allegedly admitting to placing agitators at pro-Trump rallies to make attendees look bad. Federal Judge Martin Reidinger ruled in favor of O'Keefe, though, saying that "if citizens and the media are handcuffed by a fear of liability, that's detrimental to political discourse."

More recently, Project Veritas sued the New York Times for five "purportedly false and defamatory articles" in 2020, about the nonprofit group's videos of alleged illegal voting practices. Last month, the Supreme Court of the State of New York County of Westchester ruled in favor of Project Veritas, which argued that the Times articles describing its videos as "deceptive," "false" and "without evidence" were "mere opinion incapable of being judged true or false."

"We've won every lawsuit we've litigated, including at jury verdict and on summary judgment," O'Keefe said to Newsweek. "Federal judges have defended our editing." He also speculated that CNN "does not want transparency into their operations. I don't mind that. I've been through it many times."

As much as O'Keefe is hated on the left, he is admired on the right. In 2019, at the White House Social Media Summit, President Donald Trump motioned to O'Keefe and said, "Somebody said he's controversial. He's not controversial; he's truthful."

READ MORE

Video Shows CNN Crew Member Hit by Water Bottle at Brooklyn Center Protest

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Joe Rogan: Project Veritas Has Proved 'CNN Is Propaganda'

Where Mainstream Fears to Tread

https://thepeoplesvoice.tv › News

Podcast host Joe Rogan credited Project Veritas with proving beyond a shadow of a doubt that CNN is the propaganda arm of the Democratic Party.

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fail

https://www.alternet.org/commentary/biden-impeachment/

no lnx badash an 8 23 no twt

cNN and one of its top reporters are facing criticism from journalists, attorneys, and other critics after publishing an article some say does little to shine truth on Republicans’ false claims, along with what some are calling a “bizarre” post on social media, both highlighting House Republicans’ plans to impeach President Joe Biden despite not having released any factual evidence that would support such an effort.

The post, on the social media site X, formerly known as Twitter, appears to imply House Republicans actually have grounds to impeach the President for what would have to be “high crimes and misdemeanors,” despite them having presented no such cause.

“A reason why many in House GOP believe Biden will face an impeachment inquiry in fall: Not moving forward now will create impression that House Rs have essentially cleared Biden of any wrongdoing over his ties to Hunter’s business entanglements,”CNN Chief Congressional Correspondent Manu Raju tweeted atop a post promoting his co-reported story.

The response to the social media post and CNN article Tuesday morning was swift.

“This is unbelievably irresponsible reporting. You could not be more complicit in a fascist project than this story,” charged national security and civil liberties journalist Marcy Wheeler in her analysis posted to social media.

READ MORE: DeSantis Boots Campaign Manager, Replaces With Conservative Aide Behind Governor’s Top Far-Right Policies

Wheeler continued, adding a screenshot from the CNN article.

She writes: “It is **25** paragraphs until CNN tells the targets of their propaganda that the GOP has no evidence AT ALL of wrongdoing.”

Wheeler also accuses CNN of publishing GOP talking points without stating they are false.

“I’m not sure why CNN thinks a GOP false claim that Biden lied is newsworthy, but all of James Comer’s demonstrable lies are not,” she adds, referring to the Oversight Committee Chairman who has spent a good part of the year making unsubstantiated claims against President Biden.

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“There will be an impeachment even though there is ABSOLUTELY NO EVIDENCE of wrongdoing, bc Hill reporters are really fucking easy to dupe with process stories based on totally made up propaganda,” Wheeler concludes.

Others also weighed in.

“Despite Manu’s bizarre tone, it’s important for readers to know Republicans actually haven’t identified any evidence of wrongdoing. Their bombshell document is a cordial note from Biden to a family friend regretting they didn’t get a chance to chat at a luncheon,” wrote attorney and author Luppe B. Luppen.

READ MORE: ‘May Tee Up the Issue of Her Fitness’: Experts Blast Judge Cannon for ‘Swinging at’ Special Counsel Jack Smith

“Reckless,” journalist and Sirius XM host Michelangelo Signorile charged. “Impeach for what? Media is so wrapped up in horse race and politics they don’t look at evidence or extremism of the GOP in even moving forward with this.”

Communications consultant Susan Bordson, a former TV news producer, wrote: “This @CNNPolitics congressional veteran reporter used his account to FEATURE the House GOP’s preferred copy vs the option to include the RELEVANT contextual point that no verifiable evidence of wrongdoing has yet been presented. But ‘impeachment’ scored a big mention win!”

“Seriously?” responded Daily Kos managing editor Barbara Morrill to Raju’s post. “No thoughts on the fact that there was no wrongdoing by Biden?”

Other social media users were also angered.

“Do you maybe want to add any context for your readers about there being zero basis for any sort of impeachment hearings and that no one on the right has articulated what they’re planning on impeaching him for or are you just a stenographer?” asked one.

“You had space in this tweet to say that it’s baseless and unwarranted. Please try to do better going forward. It’s ridiculous if the press just keeps saying “impeachment” over and over without giving any context,” observed another.

Still others focused on the House Republicans.

Award-winning Talking Points Memo founder Josh Marshall called it a “remarkable admission or reporting this as non-ridiculous. They have to impeach Biden or else people will realize they didn’t find anything in their investigations.”

Sirius XM host Joe Sudbay wrote: “epitomizes how deranged House GOP is AND how complicit so many in DC media are.” He added, “alleged GOP moderates will whine to complicit media about this, then vote with their fellow GOP extremists.”

Assistant professor of journalism and managing editor Josh Kranzberg: “Every time I’ve read a story about their investigations into Biden, I can only think of one line…You are not serious people. This story confirms it. They are not serious people.”

Attorney Ben Friedman: “So the GOP position is essentially ‘If we don’t keep up the charade, voters might figure out that our outrage was always fake.'”

Read the social media posts above or at this link.

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Scientists debunk RFK Jr.’s 'completely unfounded' claim that chemicals can make children gay

https://www.alternet.org/msn/rfk-jr-2662274116/

Alex Henderson July 13, 2023

The saying that "politics make strange bedfellows" has never been more accurate than it is in 2023.

On one hand, former Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyoming) — an arch-conservative neocon — gets a lot of respect from Democrats these days for aggressively calling out former President Donald Trump's efforts to overturn the 2020 election. At the same time, Democratic presidential candidate and conspiracy theorist Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. — nephew of President John F. Kennedy and son of the late Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, Sr. — is being praised by former Fox News host Tucker Carlson for his anti-vaxxer views.

RFK Jr. has drawn a great deal of criticism from medical experts for claiming that vaccines, including COVID-19 vaccines, are dangerous and that childhood vaccines can lead to autism. Now, according to CNN, medical experts are calling him out for promoting "unfounded conspiracies that man-made chemicals in the environment could be making children gay or transgender and causing the feminization of boys and masculinization of girls."

READ MORE: Tucker Carlson rewrites history with claim Big Pharma 'PR campaign' silenced RFK Jr.'s anti-vax lies

CNN reporters Abby Turner and Andrew Kaczynski, in an article published on July 13, explain, "Experts dispute the claims from Kennedy, an environmental lawyer and anti-vaccine activist, and told CNN's KFile his theories that 'sexual identification' and 'gender confusion' among children could be from their exposure to 'endocrine disruptors' found in the environment are completely unfounded."

Turner and Kaczynski report that CNN "spoke to multiple experts who said there is no link between endocrine disruptors and children's gender and sexuality." The journalists stress that although there are legitimate environmental concerns about the quality of drinking water in the United States, nothing in the water will turn a person gay.

"While sex in in frogs is determined by environmental factors such as temperature and chemicals, Dr. Andrea Gore, professor of pharmacology and toxicology at University of Texas at Austin, said the sex of humans is determined at the moment of conception, and cannot later be altered by endocrine-disrupting chemicals," the CNN journalists report. "The baseless claim that chemicals — particularly in tap water — could turn people gay has gained popularity with conspiracy theorists over the years, most memorably with conservative radio host Alex Jones, who said chemicals in the water were 'turning the friggin' frogs gay.'"

READ MORE: Journalist details RFK Jr.’s appeal to a 'crackpot collection of fascists and anti-progressive leftists'

Find CNN's full report at this link.

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mma 6 23

cNN's paid partisan commentators continually misled viewers about the supposed “double standard” faced by former President Donald Trump in his federal criminal indictment for allegedly mishandling and withholding classified documentsand obstructing federal law enforcement, which these CNN contributors falsely claimed to be no different than cases involving Democratic politicians — former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and President Joe Biden in particular — which did not lead to criminal prosecution.

On Friday, a criminal indictment against Trump was unsealed, alleging that he had intentionally retained hundreds of classified government documents at his Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida, was caught on-tape bragging to guests that he was in possession of classified documents, and knowingly packed the classified documents as he was preparing to leave the White House in 2021.

In the indictment, Trump faces 37 chargesrelated to conspiracy to obstruct justice, making false statements, and withholding or corruptly concealing documents in a federal investigation. These charges make Trump the first former president to be federally indicted. (Earlier this year, Trump became the first former president to face criminal charges in an unrelated case in New York, and he still faces additional legal jeopardy in ongoing state and federal investigations stemming from his failed effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election results.)

After he was indicted, Trump himself, his political allies, and sycophants in right-wing media were quick to invoke federal investigations into Biden and Clinton to defend Trump. But the three cases have three vastly different sets of facts, and these erroneous comparisons do not prove that Trump is being politically persecuted.

Trump's indictment substantially differs from investigations involving Biden and Clinton

While the Biden probe is ongoing, he, unlike Trump, has cooperated with the Department of Justice investigation into his handling of classified documents. He returned documents to the government after they were found and willingly allowed the FBI to search his properties for additional material.

As the indictment details, Trump actively worked to obstruct the DOJ’s investigation and lied to the government about what documents were in his possession.

The DOJ’s decision to not indict Clinton after the probe into her use of her personal email for work also does not prove “political persecution,” nor does it undermine the seriousness Trump’s indictment.

Political lawyer Robert Kelner said that there is no “plausible comparison between the Trump case and the Hillary Clinton case.” While he believes that the FBI’s investigation into Clinton “pulled punches,” Kelner also argued that the “fundamental difference” between the cases is that Trump allegedly sought to obstruct justice, while Clinton did not.

Ultimately, according to former federal prosecutor Robert Mintz: “This is not a case about what documents were taken, it’s about what former president Trump did after the government sought to retrieve those documents.”

CNN's partisan commentators ignored these differences

Despite these facts, CNN has repeatedly allowed two of its paid conservative commentators, Scott Jennings and David Urban, to push these bogus comparisons, both explicitly and implicitly, by false claiming that the Justice Department is being ‘weaponized’ against Trump.

Urban, whom CNN has inexplicably continued to employ and allow on-air in the face of his numerous, undisclosed conflicts of interest, additionally warned that when Trump surrenders to authorities on June 13, “the Brooks Brothers Riot in 2000 ... will look like a Boy Scout camp compared to what is going to happen on Tuesday.” CNN also hosted one of Trump’s lawyers, James Trusty, to talk about the indictment before he quit representing Trump the following day.

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https://www.mediamatters.org/cnn/outgoing-cnn-ceo-chris-licht-did-exactly-what-was-expected-him

6 23

Ousted CNN chief executive Chris Licht did exactly what his bosses wanted, ideologically repositioning the network in hopes of attracting Republican viewers. Now the network’s ratings are in the toilet, its reputation is damaged, and Licht is out after a devastating profile in The Atlantic — but there’s little reason to expect the situation to change.

Licht’s run at CNN ended on Wednesday after only 13 months. David Zaslav, the chief executive of CNN’s parent company, Warner Bros. Discovery, reportedly told staff at a meeting announcing the change that Licht “poured his heart and soul into this job” but that ultimately “for a number of reasons things didn’t work out.” Media accounts of Licht’s dismissal invariably point to the impact of a brutal Atlantic profile published on Friday, which triggered a newsroom revolt.

In that Atlantic profile, staff writer Tim Alberta detailed “the meltdown at CNN” under Licht, who comes across as an underprepared and ineffectual network president who is trying to undertake a doomed mission he does not seem to fully understand. Alberta writes:

When he took the helm of CNN, in May 2022, Licht had promised a reset with Republican voters—and with their leader. He had swaggered into the job, telling his employees that the network had lost its way under former President Jeff Zucker, that their hostile approach to Trump had alienated a broader viewership that craved sober, fact-driven coverage. These assertions thrust Licht into a two-front war: fighting to win back Republicans who had written off the network while also fighting to win over his own journalists, many of whom believed that their new boss was scapegoating them to appease his new boss, David Zaslav, who’d hired Licht with a decree to move CNN toward the ideological center.

Zaslav’sdesire to remake CNN by moving it toward the ideological right is shared by John Malone, a major Republican donor and Warner Bros. Discovery board member who has said he would like the network to be more like Fox News.

Their shared approach, as implemented by Licht, damaged CNN’s reputation by giving the right what it wanted. Licht fired harsh critics of former President Donald Trump, cozied up to Republican leaders, and made clear that he wanted a return to “both sides” journalism.

His work culminated with last month’s live town hall with Trump, who steamrolled CNN anchor Kaitlan Collins with lies and called her a “nasty person” on-air, as the live audience of his supporters cheered. The event drew devastating reviews from journalists inside CNN and out — but Licht staunchly defended it to his staff, and indeed, it seemed entirely in keeping with Zaslav’s vision for the network.

This version of CNN isn’t just journalistically indefensible — it’s also failed to attract an audience. In theory, catering to Republicans was supposed to lure viewers away from more right-wing outlets. In reality, there isn’t an audience for Fox Light: CNN’s viewership withered under Licht as viewers switched to MSNBC or away from cable news altogether. Zaslav and Malone don’t seem to care — they just want CNN to meet their ideological demands.

And that’s why Licht’s departure won’t end CNN’s problems. His successor may be canny enough not to put their office on a separate floor from CNN’s journalists, or to treat a reporter writing a profile like a personal therapist. But that person will likely get the same demands from Zaslav and Malone to move the network toward the right and away from the truth, and try to follow them.

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dingdong?

no lnx

wednesday morning, June 7, CNN's Kate Bolduan made a bombshell announcement: CEO/Chairman Chris Licht "is leaving the network," and "for now," a new "leadership team" will "take Licht's place."

Licht held that position for a little over a year, declaring that he wanted to purge CNN of what he viewed as too much liberal bias. And he had more than his share of critics, who attacked Licht's leadership as change for the sake of change and saw him as being much too rigid and dogmatic in his centrism.

Licht, for example, reportedly disliked the term "the Big Lie" — which has been used to describe former President Donald Trump's false, thoroughly debunked claim that the 2020 election was stolen from him. While Licht considered "The Big Lie" a "Democratic talking point," his critics countered that the term was simply accurate, factual reporting — as Trump's claim of widespread voter fraud had zero basis in fact.

READ MORE: CNN accused of 'platforming an insurrectionist' after inviting Trump to 'residential town hall'

Liberal Washington Post opinion writer Perry Bacon, Jr. discusses Licht's departure in his June 7 column, arguing that his tumultuous months at CNN underscore the problems with "anti-woke centrism."

"Licht's comments embody an anti-woke centrism that is increasingly prominent in American media and politics today, particularly among powerful white men who live on the coasts and don't identify as Republicans or conservatives," Bacon explains. "It's deeply flawed, and it's pushing some important U.S. institutions to make bad decisions."

The Post columnist continues, "By anti-woke, what I mean is skepticism of progressive causes and ideas, especially on issues of gender, race and sexuality. The term 'woke' is vague and imprecise."

Bacon isn't saying that centrists shouldn't have a voice in the media or politics. And he draws a distinction between Licht's centrism and President Joe Biden's centrism, noting that Biden "opposes some left-wing causes but doesn't spend a lot of time deriding people who support them."

READ MORE: CNN and Fox News shuffling primetime lineups ahead of 2024 race to favor Trump-friendly hosts

Bacon observes, "Anti-woke centrism is really about emphasizing differences with progressives, who are inaccurately cast as Twitter-obsessed college graduates who constantly use terms like Latinx and are out of touch with ordinary Democratic voters…. Licht and Elon Musk, who has expressed similar sentiments, control two hugely important media platforms. Their views matter. That they have become consumed by this anti-wokeism has meant that great journalists were fired at CNN for being too anti-Trump and that Twitter's verification system was disabled, it seemed, because Musk felt it gave too much prominence to left-wing people."

READ MORE: Don Lemon fired from CNN as network disputes claim no one in management gave him a heads up

Perry Bacon's full Washington Post opinion column is available at this link (subscription needed).

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mma 6 23

Blake Neff, a former writer for Fox’s now-defunct Tucker Carlson Tonight who resigned from the show in 2020 following revelations that he made racist and sexist posts in an online forum, has resurfaced on Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk’s radio show, apparently as a producer.

InJuly 2020, CNN’s Oliver Darcy reported that Neff, then the top writer for Tucker Carlson’s show, had been anonymously posting racist, misogynistic, homophobic, and other offensive content on an online forum for five years. Neff used racist and homophobic slurs, referred to women in a derogatory manner, andpushed white supremacist content while writing for Carlson’s show. Neff resigned after CNN contacted him for comment.

On the website for The Charlie Kirk Show, Neff is identified as “producer Blake.” In addition to appearing on that show, Neff has also joined Kirk on a new panel show called THOUGHTCRIME.

Neff appeared with Kirk on the first episode of THOUGHTCRIME, a new weekly panel show streamed live exclusively on Kirk’s Rumble channel that’s apparently co-hosted by Pizzagate conspiracy theorist Jack Posobiec. Kirk introduced Neff as “very high-IQ Blake,” saying, “And we’re really honored to have Blake on our team —he’s great. And the most, let’s just say, awful people in the world tried to destroy Blake’s life and we’re not going to let that happen.” Later he added, “We love Blake and he does a great job.”

In a prerecorded introduction attached to the audio-only version of the show, Kirk described THOUGHTCRIME as “R-rated,” with “rather graphic elements,” and “not homeschool friendly.”

On June 21, Neff appeared again on Salem Radio Network’s The Charlie Kirk Show to discuss the submersible vessel carrying four tourists and a captain that got lost while diving to the Titanic shipwreck.Kirk described Neff as “our resident submarine expert,” and a chyron identified Neff as “The Charlie Kirk Show Submarine expert.” Neff described the plight of the lost vessel story as “refreshing” as far as news cycles go.

After the break, Kirk referred to Neff as “part of” the new weekly panel show. Neff also said, “I don’t want to say, like, you should not” go on a submersible vessel seemingly operated on a video game controller.[vid]

during THOUGHTCRIME, the panelists repeatedly used an anti-trans slur and discussed the X-rated topic of “glory holes” in response to The Daily Wire’s Matt Walsh’s claim on Twitter that “Fox Corp is celebrating Pride by encouraging employees to read about ‘“glory holes.’” 

This type of talk stands out coming from Kirk, not only because of the raunchy topic, but also because of how it contrasts with  the self-righteous Christian nationalist rhetoric he’s embraced over the last year with the launch of Turning Point USA Faith, an initiative to propagandize young people by setting up Turning Point USA chapters in their churches.

“What is a glory hole?” asked Kirk.

“Oh my sweet summer child,” responded Neff.

Kirk then Googled it live on air.

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https://www.mediamatters.org/cnn/cnn-gave-republican-presidential-candidate-nikki-haley-platform-spread-abortion-lies

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https://www.mediamatters.org/cnn/warner-bros-ceos-comments-further-illustrate-cnns-lurch-right

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trump 2024

https://www.alternet.org/cnn-fox-shuffling-primetime-lineups/

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https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/durham-report-and-inevitable-end-foxs-anti-mueller-farce

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/fox-news-host-jesse-watters-calls-durham-report-joke

https://www.mediamatters.org/**cnn/right-wing-media-are-praising-cnns-misleading-coverage-durham-report

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https://www.mediamatters.org/angelo-carusone/watch-angelo-carusone-explain-how-trump-town-hall-exposes-cnns-willingness

https://www.mediamatters.org/donald-trump/right-wing-media-figures-celebrated-trumps-sexist-and-anti-abortion-comments-cnns-town

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https://www.mediamatters.org/cnn/cnns-disastrous-trump-town-hall-was-exactly-what-its-leaders-want

cNN’s predictably calamitous town hall with former President Donald Trump is the natural extension of the ideological vision cultivated by the network’s leaders.

You can tell that’s the case because even as the network’s journalists are describing the event as “awful” and “one of the worst hours I’ve ever seen on our air,” CNN CEO Chris Licht is singing its praises, reportedly telling his staff that “America was served very well by what we did last night."

My colleague John Whitehouse documented last night’s atrocities for MSNBC.com:

Some are trying to blame CNN’s Kaitlan Collins, who moderated the event. There were some glaring Trump lies that she didn’t correct. But on the whole, it’s impossible to deny that she tried to some degree, and that it wasn’t close to enough. Her colleague Jake Tapper gamely tried to clean up immediately after the event, before admitting that there wasn’t enough time in the night to fact-check every false statement Trump made. The format forced Collins to try to interrupt Trump with various fact checks, which only turned him and the audience more against her as the night went on. It culminated with Trump calling Collins “a nasty person” — to big applause from the audience.

In a statement, a CNN spokesperson defended Collins as “a world-class journalist” who “asked tough, fair and revealing questions ... and fact-checked President Trump in real time.” Yet primary fault for the disaster lies not with Collins, but with basic errors CNN made well before the town hall aired — decisions that guaranteed to push things beyond a breaking point. It’s no coincidence that Fox News and conservatives loved this event: It was, literally, classic Republican propaganda that Fox News co-founder Roger Ailes, who died in 2017, likely would have applauded.

The town hall debacle brings back disturbing memories of CNN’s coverage of the 2016 presidential campaign. Under Jeff Zucker — who had previously overseen Trump’s NBC reality show The Apprentice— the network’s spectacle-obsessed, horse race-focused treatment helped lift Trump to the presidency. CNN’s new leaders seem to be returning to old practices as they seek to move the network to the political right. And that bodes ill for the quality of CNN’s coverage as the 2024 presidential election looms.

CNN regularly built its coverage of the 2016 race around obsessive promotion of Trump's rallies, which the network frequently aired live and unedited. The network also hired a stable of unhinged pro-Trump contributors whose lies frequently turned segments into trainwrecks, including former Trump campaign manager and walking ethics disaster Corey Lewandowski.

None of this was enough for Trump, who prefers his propaganda purer. He regularly denounced the network as “fake news” and threatened on the campaign trail to halt the merger between its then-parent company Time Warner and AT&T.

Following Trump’s election, out of guilt or duty or (most likely) pursuit of an audience, Zucker’s network pivoted. There was still plenty to criticize about the network’s coverage, particularly its nonstop platforming of dishonest pro-Trump pundits. But it also provided an outlet for journalists and commentators like Brianna Keilar, Jim Acosta, Brian Stelter, John Harwood, Chris Cuomo, and Don Lemon to take on Trump and his Fox News megaphone. The president responded with fury, and his denunciations of the network were followed with action: Trump’s Justice Department tried to halt the AT&T-Time Warner merger, he seems to have tried to broker a sale of CNN to Rupert Murdoch, and his White House spiked Acosta’s press pass.

These external attempts to bring CNN under MAGA control were unsuccessful. But a second try from within appears to have gotten the job done. Following a corporate spin-off and a merger in 2021 and 2022, CNN is now part of Warner Bros. Discovery. Those developments were overseen by David Zaslav, the company’s CEO, and John Malone, a right-wing billionaire who was Discovery’s largest shareholder and has a seat on the new conglomerate’s board.

Malone, a legendary media investor who chairs Liberty Media, is a self-described libertarian and former member of the Cato Institute’s board. A frequent donor to Republican candidates and causes, he chipped in $250,000 to Trump’s inauguration fund, tens of thousands of dollars to Trump’s 2020 campaign and political committees focused on his reelection, and even “contributed to Trump’s ‘Save America’ PAC, which funded the January 6 rally” at which Trump encouraged the mob that stormed the U.S. Capitol, as my former colleague Parker Molloy reported.

Malone detailed his hopes for CNN in a November 2021 interview, as the corporate merger that would put him on the board of its parent company was underway. According to Malone, CNN needed to start emulating Fox News, which had spent the previous four years merging with Trump’s White House and serving as his right-wing propaganda organ.

“Fox News, in my opinion, has followed an interesting trajectory of trying to have news news — I mean some actual journalism — embedded in a program schedule of all opinions,” he explained. “And I think they’ve been relatively successful with that, with a service like Bret Baier, and Brit Hume before him, that tried to distinguish news from opinion.”

“I would like to see CNN evolve back to the kind of journalism that it started with, and actually have journalists, which would be unique and refreshing,” he added.

Malone has denied that he is “directly involved” in shaping CNN’s programming to that vision. But he doesn’t need to have a day-to-day role to influence the network. Licht, whom Zaslav hired as CEO of CNN last year after Zucker resigned over a relationship with a subordinate, seems to be operating from the same playbook.

Licht has engaged in a “strategy shift” geared at presenting “a new, more ideologically neutral CNN,” as The Washington Post put it. Stelter and Harwood lost their jobs while Keilar was demoted. Cuomo and Lemon are also out — albeit for much more credible reasons — with their prime-time slots now filled by coverage from the network’s anchors. These changes don't seem to be benefiting the business — CNN’s ratings have tanked under Licht — but he’s accomplishing Malone’s ideological goal.

Those decisions set the stage for Wednesday’s disaster. In a CNBC interview last weektouting the town hall, Zaslav made clear that his network was deliberately avoiding the lessons of the past. “Republicans are on the air on CNN, Democrats are on the air. All voices should be heard on CNN,” he said. “We've got a great political season coming. This is a new CNN.”

That sounds a lot like the old 2016-vintage CNN.It’s clear that’s what Licht, Zaslav, and Malone want — a more compliant network that treats Trump like any other candidate, lets him make his case to viewers regardless of how frequently he lies, and gets attention that might generate ratings.

It’s the Trump Show all over again. And we know how that one ends.

related

Right-wing media celebrate CNN’s town hall with Donald Trump

05/11/23

CNN should have known better than to give Donald Trump free rein to lie to a national audience

05/11/23

CNN’s on-air talent get the message

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an 4 23

during an appearance on CNN's "State of the Union" to praise House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) for getting his budget proposal passed by a very slim margin, a member of his caucus was confronted by hostDana Bashabout how the proposal will hurt his own constituents.

Majority Whip Tom Emmer (R-MN) was on to make the case that it is up to President Joe Biden to meet with McCarthy to resolve their differences which led the CNN host to dig into the details of how the proposed budget will impact the state he represents

"Let me quickly look deep inside what you did get passed this past week," Bash began. "The bill would cut all non-defense discretionary funding by 22% — that is a lot of money and I want you to look at what the administration would say it would mean for your home state of Minnesota."

Putting a graphic up, she continued, "Thousands would lose food, rental assistance, and they would pay more for college. Outpatient VA appointments for veterans could be cut. This will make a big difference if, what you want, this bill actually would become law. A big difference in the lives of Americans, especially those living paycheck to paycheck. What do you say to them?"

"Well, I actually challenge it," Emmer bristled. "You know, you've got a president who was just told by the Washington Post that his claims on the deficit get 22 Pinocchios."

"They're just not true and what you just said is just not true either," he accused. "You should scrutinize what the administration is talking about."

Watch below or at the link:

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https://www.alternet.org/2020/07/trump-storms-out-after-cnns-kaitlan-collins-puts-him-to-shame-for-promoting-a-quack-doctor

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an 4 23

6-8 all gop prz cand went 3? or sent video msgs

nikki ? said diverse then brutal pan of aud by cnn

https://www.alternet.org/oscar-winning-edit-nra-audience/

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https://www.mediamatters.org/cnn/cnn-gave-virginia-gov-glenn-youngkin-town-hall-spew-right-wing-talking-points-about-education

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david urban

https://www.mediamatters.org/cnn/cnn-commentator-lobbied-norfolk-southern-network-didnt-tell-its-audience-during-east-palestine

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no lnx

CNN fact checker knocks down more than a dozen false claims made by GOPers at CPAC

Meaghan EllisMarch 04, 2023

A CNN fact-checker recently slashed through more than a dozen false claims that derived from this weekend's Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) currently underway in Dallas, Texas.

On Saturday, March 4, CNN's Daniel Dale penned an analysis to offer insight and clarity on the claims. In his analysis, he began with a clear introduction about the false claims he intended to debunk.

Starting with the first day of the conference, Dale researched claims made by Reps. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) and offered corrections to refute their inaccurate remarks.

READ MORE: Fact checker reveals Trump stole credit from Obama with 1 outrageous lie 56 times in 2019

"The members of Congress, former government officials and conservative personalities who spoke at the conference on Thursday and Friday made false claims about a variety of topics," Dale wrote.

"Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio uttered two false claims about President Joe Biden. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia repeated a debunked claim about Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky," he added.

"Sen. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama used two inaccurate statistics as he lamented the state of the country. Former Trump White House official Steve Bannon repeated his regular lie about the 2020 election having been stolen from Trump, this time baselesly blaming Fox for Trump’s defeat," he wrote.

Dale went on to address claims from Reps. Kat Cammack (R-Fla.) and Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.)

READ MORE: 'Highly misleading': CNN brutally fact-checks Kevin McCarthy's latest series of unfounded claims

"Rep. Kat Cammack of Florida incorrectly said a former Obama administration official had encouraged people to harass Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. Rep. Ralph Norman of South Carolina inaccurately claimed Biden had laughed at a grieving mother and inaccurately insinuated that the FBI tipped off the media to its search of former President Donald Trump’s Florida residence," he wrote. "Two other speakers, Rep. Scott Perry of Pennsylvania and former Trump administration official Sebastian Gorka, inflated the number of deaths from fentanyl."

In total, Dale debunked 13 misleading claims made by Republican lawmakers during the conference.

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https://www.mediamatters.org/cnn/cnns-conservative-contributors-still-pushing-false-notion-fox-has-separate-straight-news-and

The latest filing in Dominion Voting Systems’ defamation lawsuit against Fox News further demonstrates that there is no difference between the network’s purported “straight news” and opinion divisions. However, during CNN’s coverage of the filing, conservative commentators, includingDavid Urban,Alyssa Farah Griffin, and Jonah Goldberg, continued to claim otherwise — contradicting CNN’s own journalists.

On February 27, the latest filing in Dominion Voting Systems’ defamation lawsuit was released to the public and revealed that Rupert Murdoch, the chairman of Fox News’ parent company Fox Corp., and other executives knew that claims about Dominion and election fraud during the 2020 presidential election were false, but allowed hosts and guests to continue to push them.

The filing also included new details about how decisions around reporting were made to appease the network's pro-Trump viewers, rather than on the basis of facts. In one instance, the filing revealed that Murdoch instructed Fox News CEO Suzanne Scott to fire then-Managing Editor Bill Sammon, who oversaw the network’s call of Arizona for now-President Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election and drew ire from former President Donald Trump, his supporters, and hosts such as Tucker Carlson. The filing also showed that Fox Corp. CEO Lachlan Murdoch complained that coverage of a Trump rally was too critical, telling Scott, “News guys have to be careful how they cover this rally. So far some of the side comments are slightly anti, and they shouldn’t be. … The narrative should be this is a huge celebration of the president.”

Since the release of the filing, which clearly laid out how Fox personalities on both the “straight news’ and opinion sides were influenced to deprioritize factual information, some mainstream media figures, including a CNN host and some reporters, acknowledged that Fox News does not truly have separate “straight news” and “opinion” divisions. Yet, some of CNN’s paid contributors, who have ties to the Trump administration, Fox News, or conservative circles, have continued to push the fiction that Fox distinguishes between real reporting and opinion.

CNN pundits are still pushing Fox talking points, saying that there is a distinction between “straight news” and opinion at the network 

Conservative CNN contributors Urban, Griffin, and Goldberg continued to defend Fox’s reputation as a news outlet during CNN’s coverage of the latest filing.

DAVID URBAN (CNN CONTRIBUTOR): You know what it was damaging? Their brand. Their price. How much the company — how much Fox was valued at, right? That’s what it was damaging. They weren't concerned about damaging the body republic. They were concerned about damaging corporate profits and that's what I think is the most troubling. And what Fox viewers, and what people don't understand is there's a difference between hard news and the entertainment it is, you know, 7 p.m. on, on Fox News, right. Hannity, Tucker, and those shows, which are purely — they’re the news equivalent of the WWE.

aLYSSA FARAH GRIFFIN (CNN CONTRIBUTOR): Donald Trump is a big part of this by the way, because he started to create the narrative after he spread the election lies that, you know, Newsmax is where we should go, One America News Network is where true believers are going. So there was a sense of fear within Fox that they were going to lose market share to the outlets. The reality is that they never even picked up enough that it in a major way affected the very high viewership that Fox News had. But you can just see sort of the fear he instilled in the big-time hosts, the prime-time hosts. And I just want to say, like there’s a lot of really good journalists at Fox. Dayside programming I don't have really any major problems with. But prime-time is where they make their money and it has descended into conspiracy-mongering. It is basically anything to get people to tune in and drive viewership and not risk losing to the fringier outlets.

CNN’s own journalists point out that there is little difference between Fox’s opinion and news branches 

Others at CNN, such as host John King and reporters Oliver Darcy and Phil Mattingly, have emphasized that the most recent Dominion filing shows Fox’s lack of news credibility because “news networks are supposed to inform viewers what's the truth.”

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https://www.mediamatters.org/cnn

random p1 of many

ARCHIVES

CNN

Cable News Network, the first 24-hour cable news channel

CNN was founded by Ted Turner in 1980 as the first 24-hour cable news channel and is currently owned by AT&T.

Featured

CNN bemoans a lack of civility after spending years hiring pro-Trump commentators

06/26/18

CNN keeps letting guests and paid commentators lie about climate scientists

11/27/18

burnett-robastorino.png

On CNN, new pro-Trump contributor confirms he is contractually forbidden from criticizing Trump

08/23/18 10:53 PM EDT

The Latest

CNN commentator lobbied for Norfolk Southern; the network didn’t tell its audience during East Palestine discussion

02/27/23 10:09 AM EST

Trump-East-Palestine

Study: 30% of cable coverage of Trump's visit to East Palestine cited his role in deregulating the rail industry

02/24/23 3:53 PM EST

On CNN, a trans teen and her father discuss the dangerous effects of youth gender-affirming care bans

02/22/23 3:30 PM EST

Boston Globe's Jackie Kucinich: Dominion filing showed Fox News' internal workings are “the antithesis of what journalism should be”

02/17/23 4:56 PM EST

CNN media reporter on Dominion filing: “These messages really just expose Fox News as a propaganda network. That's what they do at the core.”

02/17/23 12:32 PM EST

CNN's Bill Weir describes how the Trump administration gutted train regulations before the East Palestine disaster

02/16/23 10:15 AM EST

Chyron: "MISSED OPPORTUNITY: WH TURNS DOWN SUPER BOWL INTERVIEW WITH BIDEN"

CNN’s Kaitlan Collins suggests Biden “missed opportunity” for pre-Super Bowl interview on Fox, ignoring network's history of right-wing propaganda

02/13/23

Mainstream media’s extensive reporting on the GOP’s efforts to cut Social Security and Medicare undermines protests that the claim is “dishonest”

02/09/23 3:51 PM EST

CNN begins State of the Union coverage with a Republican strategist urging Biden to announce he won’t run for re-election

02/07/23 10:32 PM EST

CNN highlighting poor polling numbers for Biden as his "State of the Union challenge"

CNN attacks Biden’s State of the Union address hours before he delivers it

02/07/23

CNN lets DeSantis rewrite his anti-LGBTQ attack on Disney

02/07/23

Media, Trump campaign, and January 6

Media largely fail to mention Trump’s role in the January 6 Capitol insurrection while reporting on his 2024 presidential campaign

02/06/23

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powerful Chairman of the House Oversight Committee, James Comer (R-KY) is being highly mocked after declaring he will investigate President Joe Biden for “influence peddling” despite admitting there’s little if any evidence President Biden has engaged in influence peddling.

When pressed, he pointed to Biden’s classified documents and one alleged email from Hunter Biden’s laptop.

But when pressed again by a frustrated CNN host, asking why he’s not investigating ex-president Donald Trump, he couldn’t offer a valid reason, except to claim there no evidence of it.

Some were quick to point out the Trump’s tenure in the White House was filled with alleged influence peddlingoperations.

Here’s Chairman Comer with CNN’s Pamela Brown on Sunday. While the transcript is a bit simplified, it’s not far off.

JAMES COMER: We're investigating the Biden family for influence peddling\n\n

CNN'S PAMELA BROWN: But why not investigate the Trump family for the same?\n\nCOMER: We have no evidence\n\n

BROWN: What evidence do you have for Biden?\n\nCOMER: That's what we're investigating\u201d

— Aaron Rupar

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it's only been two weeks since Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) was elected House Speaker and already, CNN is taking swift action to correct inaccurate claims he's shared.

On Tuesday, January 24, CNN's Don Lemon aired a brief clip of the top-ranking Republican lawmaker's remarks about the debt ceiling.

In the clip, McCarthy could be heard saying, "Listen, when Trump was president and Nancy Pelosi was speaker, they became a debt ceiling agreement. And it was a cap agreement for two years to cap the spending and make those decisions."

READ MORE: Republicans withholding speakership support from Kevin McCarthy cite 'past and ongoing GOP failures'

Lemon turned the segment over toCNN Daniel Dalewho broke down the claims and pushed back against McCarthy's arguments.

"John McCarthy is wrong in two ways here. First of all, House Republicans didn't actually repeal anything they did vote to repeal. They passed a bill to repeal more than 70 billion in new IRS funding," Dale explained. "But that bill is not going to get through the Senate or President Biden. So they have not changed the law. Second of all, this frequent Republican talking point you hear about how Democrats are hiring 87,000 new IRS agents is just not true. It's an exaggeration.

He went on to discuss President Joe Biden's legislation to combat inflation.

"The inflation reduction act that Biden signed into law last year includes 80 billion in additional funding for the IRS that will very possibly allow the IRS to hire tens of thousands of additional employees," he said. "But not even close to all these employees, Don, will be agents. The people who conduct audits and investigations sometimes frighten people. Non-agents make up the vast majority of the IRS workforce."

READ MORE: Kevin McCarthy is being imperiled by the very 'extremists' he encouraged: ex-Reagan speechwriter

He continued, "And many of the newly hired employees we know will be in things like customer service and operations in it. And experts tell us that many of the new hires will be making up for attrition filling posts left by tens of thousands of retirements departures, not taking newly created jobs."

Dale added, "So the image McCarthy and other Republicans are trying to conjure, Don, of this army of 87,000 new agents coming to get you is not based on the facts."

READ MORE: Hakeem Jeffries rips Kevin McCarthy's apparent double standard' with committee assignments

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During a conversation about the mass shooting in Los Angles that took place late Saturday night and claimed at least ten lives, CNN "State of the Union" host Dana Bash called out at GOP lawmaker who attempted to brush off the need for new gun laws by pointing out gun violence in Chicago -- a favorite rightwing talking point.

Sitting down with McCaul to discuss what to expect now that Republicans have majority control of the House, Bash first asked about the latest gun-related bloodshed in California.

"I was a counter-terrorism federal prosecutor and I was chair of Homeland Security," the Texas Republican replied. "Chicago has probably some of the strictest gun laws in the nation, yet the highest murder rate. The way I look at it is we need the intelligence, we need information sharing, we need to connect the dots."

"Every one of these cases, and I guarantee you'll see it in this one as well, the shooter had warning signs along the way," he continued. "We just didn't respond or pick it up. In my judgment we can create a system. I introduced a bill that we can take published information on the internet, have an algorithm to stop the threat before it happens. That is a smart approach rather than violating Second Amendment rights. So, look, I hope we can get that passed -- we're seeing this movie way too many times."

"What about a red flag law? A federal red flag law?" Bash asked.

"In a way what i'm talking about are red flags," McCaul replied before adding, "Chicago, Illinois has red flags --"

"You keep bringing up Chicago, which I understand," the CNN host interjected before adding, "But the guns in Chicago come in from other places because there is a patchwork of laws across the country, there's no federal law."

'Right. Again, we stopped ---," he backtracked. "I saw it when I chaired Homeland, so many terror attacks because we got the threat information in advance and we stopped it. We can use the same formula here domestically, although it's a little different.The Constitution didn't apply overseas, but we can do that here and stop these threats before they happen."

Watch below or at this link:

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wildfire plus rain = mud slide

mma 1 23

bomb cyclone and mult atmos rivers!

According to The Washington Post,“While storms like this do periodically occur, heavy precipitation rates are made more likely by the effects of human-induced climate change, which is warming the atmosphere.”

However, a review of coverage by national TV news from December 31 through January 4 of the first atmospheric river that hit California and the second atmospheric river, whichtriggereda “bomb cyclone,” found that with one exception, cable news networks — CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC — and national broadcast networks — ABC, CBS, and NBC — failed to link these events to our warming climate.

TV News failed to explain how climate change is making precipitation events, like those that have flooded parts of California, more severe and more frequent

Print and online news sources have contextualized the extreme weather events devastating California:

But TV news largely failed to explain how climate change is fueling these storms.

Of the 60 segments aired by national TV news networks from December 31 through January 4, 2023, only 1 mentioned climate change.

Cable news — CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC — aired a total of 33 combined segments on the California rain. CNN covered the storms the most, with 24 segments, followed by Fox News with 8 and MSNBC with a single segment. CNN was the only network to air a segment linking climate change to the storms impacting California. 

In an exchange between CNN anchor Kate Bolduan and San Francisco Mayor London Breed on the January 4 edition of At This Hour,the two discussed the ongoing impacts of climate change on California, including its historic drought and worsening wildfires, and concluded that preparation for the climate crisis is not a future exercise but an imperative for a crisis that is unfolding now. [cnn vid]

Extreme weather has become a year-round phenomenon not limited to the heat and megastorms that usually peak over a few months of the year. In 2022, wildfires torched Texas, months before peak U.S. wildfire summer season, destructive unseasonable tornadoes caused chaos in New Orleans and across parts of Texas, and an ice shelf the size of Rome collapsed in Antarctica after temperatures reached 70 degrees above normal in March. Even the hurricane that leveled Florida hit later in the season than storms of that magnitude usually do.

These supercharged winter storms should also be presented as an impact of our increasingly warming planet. However, climate coverage is still concentrated around the summer and fall months that have traditionally constituted peak extreme weather season, with events outside of this period often left isolated instead of covered as part of the broader landscape of global climate events. The scope of how climate change impacts weather events is expanding, and TV news coverage needs to expand with it.

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https://www.mediamatters.org/immigration/cnn-following-right-wing-medias-playbook-how-fearmonger-about-immigration

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https://www.alternet.org/2022/11/does-not-need-to-apologize/

no lnx

Watch: Former Trump staffer says Donald 'does not need to apologize' for dining with Holocaust denier

Image via screengrab.

Brandon Gage November 28, 2022

CNN anchor Don Lemon on Monday morning grilled former President Donald Trump's Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Len Khodorkovsky about the attendance of antisemites Kanye West and Nick Fuentes – an outspoken Holocaust denier – at a dinner that Trump hosted on Tuesday, November 22nd at his Palm Beach, Florida Mar-a-Lago estate.

Trump's association with West and Fuentes has triggered widespread outrage and frustration, most notably among Republicans, many of whom believe that Trump has all but sabotaged the party's chances of retaking the presidency in 2024 if Trump wins the GOP nomination.

Yet there are exceptions, such as House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-California), who has not opined on the clandestine company that Trump appears to be keeping. Trump, meanwhile, has refused to acknowledge the bigotry that Fuentes espouses and has denied having any knowledge of Fuentes prior to their meal. Trump also reportedly fears that disavowing white supremacy and antisemitism would alienate his supporters.

READ MORE: 'Entrenched in obstinance': Donald Trump is refusing to condemn Holocaust denier despite allies' pleas

Karen Giorno, an ex-Trump aide and senior advisor who was at the event, told The Washington Post on Friday that Trump "was impressed with Nick and his knowledge of Trump World. Nick knew people and figures and speeches and rallies and what surrounded the Trump culture, particularly when it came to the base."

During Monday's CNN segment, Lemon asked Khodorkovsky to condemn Trump for meeting with West and Fuentes.

It was a struggle.

Khodorkovsky:

As a grandchild of Holocaust survivors, I am concerned with the mainstreaming of antisemitism wherever it comes from. And I, I, I, condemn Kanye's antisemitism and I condemn his psychic's antisemitism.

Lemon:

Do you condemn the former president for meeting with antisemites?

Khodorkovsky:

Sir, sir, alright you know, I would appreciate the opportunity to...

READ MORE: 'Not accidental': GOP governor admonishes Donald Trump for dining with Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes

Lemon:

You said you condemn antisemitism and the mainstreaming of antisemitism. Do you condemn the former president for meeting with antisemites? For entertaining antisemites and antisemitism?

Khodorkovsky:

Let me just explain it to you this way sir. I know the president is not an antisemite. He does not need to apologize to me or anybody else.

Lemon:

I'm not asking if he's an antisemite. I'm asking if you entertain – do you condemn him for entertaining and meeting with antisemites? It's a very simple question.

Khodorkovsky:

Well and I'm trying to give you an answer that I wish he wouldn't have met with them.

Lemon:

It's a yes or a no.

Khodorkovsky:

I didn't realize I was on a witness stand here, Don. look, I'm trying to have a substantive conversation about a real issue like antisemitism and you're trying to make it all about Trump. It's not about Trump.

Lemon:

Well, it is about Trump. Sir, we're talking about the former president meeting with an antisemite. How is this not about Trump?

Khodorkovsky:

Because it's about the antisemitism. It's not about Trump.It's about making sure the issue of antisemitism is confronted in a way, in a substantive way, in which, you know, obviously, I'm sure you're aware there's rising antisemitism in the United States and the world. It certainly is important for us to take it on. It is important for us to call it out.I am calling it out. I am saying he should not have met with Kanye West and his psychic.What I'm also trying to point out, Don, is that it behooves you and CNN and every other press outlet to call it out when you see it, especially when it comes in the halls of Congress, especially when every Democratic presidential hopeful goes and kisses the ring of Al Sharpton.

Lemon:

I think, listen, sir. CNN does that.

Watch below or at this link.

READ MORE: 'Nightmare': Longtime Trump adviser warns Fuentes meeting is 'another reason' people want 'DeSantis to run'

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mma 11 22

ALICE STEWART (COMMENTATOR): This is about political rhetoric that has led to political violence. And that goes on both sides of the aisle. Juliette hinted at the fact that it happens. It does happen on both sides. And I think it's really important for us to remember that. You look at Chuck Schumer in March of this year when there was hints of the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade. He said that that would unleash a whirlwind and he would hate to see what would happen at that point. And who knows what would hit them. Three months later, a man was arrested outside of Justice Kavanaugh's home with a gun, with burglary tools and arrested for trying to assassinate a Supreme Court justice. So it's important to remember this happens on both sides of the aisle.And it's incumbent on Republicans and Democrats to lower the temperature on divisive rhetoric. 

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https://www.alternet.org/2022/10/rick-scott-repeatedly-fact-checked/

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an 10 22

no lnx twt vid

'Cesspool of hate': Jake Tapper explores Gab's digital netherworld of 'hideously racist' posts and 'Nazism'

David Badash and The New Civil Rights Movement October 18, 2022

CNN’s Jake Tapper says the far-right social media platform Gab, run by an antisemitic Christian nationalist, has “hideously racist” posts and embedded “Nazism” as part of its “popular” offerings – and says after he reported his findings founder Andrew Torba called him the “son of the Devil” and claimed the site hosts “pro-life” and “Christian content.”

Tapper on Monday took a walk into the world of far-right social media platforms, after Kanye West announced his intention to buy the flailing site Parler, and glanced at Facebook and Twitter as well, but says the so-called “free speech” sites on the far-right are filled with hate – and that “the hate is the whole point.”

Tapper says of the far-right sites he looked at, Gab has “the fewest rules” and “the lowest standards” when it comes to content moderation.

READ MORE: ‘Yes’: GOP Nominee Mastriano Supports Charging Women With Murder if They Have an Abortion After a 6 Week Ban (Audio)

“I signed up for Gab this morning. I clicked on ‘Explore,’ which took me to ‘popular posts across Gab.’ I came in with an open mind and immediately Gab hit me with this post: ‘We are in a wartime but it’s a quiet war perpetrated by the Jew,’ with a picture of Adolf Hitler,” Tapper told CNN viewers.

“And there was plenty more where that came from. The ‘N-word is super big on Gab. It is a cesspool of hate,” Tapper observed.

And while Gab “takes precautions,” it “doesn’t seem to care about hate speech.”

“The more speech I saw on Gab this afternoon, was more speech extolling Nazis and more speech engaging in Holocaust denial, and more speech sharing more hideously racist posts than I’ve ever seen in one place in my life,” Tapper said. “I saw less of it but still too much of it on Parler today.”

“It’s high time we recognize that the hate on many of these far-right sites is not just an unfortunate result of belief in free speech. The Hate is the whole point.”

READ MORE: Watch: Torba Warns GOP to Not ‘Disavow or Condemn Us’ Because ‘Christian Nationalists Are the Republican Party’

The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) calls Gab a “haven for hate and disinformation,” and “an online hub for extremist and conspiratorial content.”

“Gab quickly became known as a platform used by conspiracy theorists, white nationalists, neo-Nazis, members of militias and influential figures among the alt-right,” the ADL adds. “Over the last two years, Torba has worked to insert Gab, himself and Christian nationalism into mainstream society and politics, primarily through relationships with elected officials and candidates.”

Gab founder and CEO Andrew Torba has promoted the white genocide or “Great Replacement” conspiracy theory and has been called an advisor to Republican state senator Doug Mastriano, a far-right 2020 election-denying Christian nationalist running for governor of Pennsylvania, where Gab is based. (While never condemning Torba, Mastriano denies the relationship, but there are receipts of Gab doing “consulting” work for Mastriano, who has also told Torba, “Thank God for what you have done.”)

Tuesday morning Tapper took to Twitter to share that Torba attacked him after his Monday report aired on CNN.

Tapper shared the video of the posts he saw on Gab, which includes the antisemitic one he quoted on-air that had the photo of Adolf Hitler.

“Gab’s antisemitic founder is attacking me with the accusation he makes about folks who report factually about his site, that I’m the son of the devil. Totally normal stuff,” Tapper tweeted.

He also posted screenshots of Torba’s posts on Gab.

[READ MORE: Mastriano’s Consultant Just Posted Video Declaring ‘We Have Multiple Candidates…Who Are Christian Nationalists’

“Jake Tapper reported on CNN tonight that Gab’s Explore page was filled with Hitler memes and n word posts,” Torba wrote on Gab.

“Reality,” he claimed, “pro-life content, Christian content, content from multiple members of Congress, wholesome animal videos, etc.”

But he didn’t stop there.

“Jake Tapper = John 8:44,” Torba added.

For those unfamiliar with every Bible verse, one version of John 8:44 reads: “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it.”

Watch Tapper’s CNN report below, see his tweets above, or at this link.

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an raw tom b 10 22

In an unsurprisingly contentious interview with Arizona Republican Kari Lake, who is vying to become her state's next governor, CNN "State of the Union" host Dana Bash was forced to cut her guest off as she ranted about 2020 election fraud -- and then pressed her to present any evidence she has.

With Lake not in the CNN studio and responding remotely, where she was shot in soft-focus, the conversation started off pleasantly until the Arizona election denier started making accusations that led the CNN host to pull her up short and fact-check her multiple times.

"I want to move on to another really important issue, particularly when it comes to your critical swing state of Arizona," Bash prompted after a discussion about immigration. "That is what happened in 2020. You called the 2020 election 'corrupt, stolen, rotten and rigged.' There is no evidence of any of that presented in a court of law or anywhere else, that any of those things are true. So why do you keep saying that?"

"Well, there's plenty of evidence," Lake countered. "We had 740,000 ballots with no chain of custody. those ballots shouldn't have been counted."

"Where is the evidence of that?" Bash cut in.

"Dana, there's plenty of evidence," the GOP candidate parried. "I'm happy to send it to your team. The problem is the media won't cover it."

"We've covered this extensively and what you just said has been debunked," the CNN host interrupted.

"Only one side of it, Dana," Lake shot back. "The real issue, Dana, is people don't trust our elections -- they haven't since 2000. I'm a reporter, been sitting on your side of the desk for a long time. Since 2000, we have Americans who don't trust our elections. In 2000, in 2004 they didn't trust the elections."

Watch below or at this link:

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https://www.alternet.org/2022/09/trump-accused-of-extortion-over-attempt-to-force-cnn-sale-to-rupert-murdoch-new-book-2658253590/

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no lnx vid twt

https://www.mediamatters.org/cnn/cnns-air-talent-get-message

CNN’s on-air talent get the message

WRITTEN BY MATT GERTZ

PUBLISHED 09/07/22

When Chris Licht took over as CNN chairman earlier this year, the network’s staffers had difficulty discerning his vision for the network. Licht signaled broad shifts, including what The New York Times described as a move toward “dialing back partisanship on the air.” But while ominous signals abounded as to what precisely that meant for the network’s employees – John Malone, a board member of CNN’s new parent company, had suggested in 2021 that CNN should look to Fox News as a model – Licht provided few specifics. There was enough confusion among the network’s rank-and-file that CNN host Erin Burnett, moderating Licht’s first staff town hall in May, channeled her colleagues’ anxiety to ask, “Will there be avenues for us to understand your thinking?”

Licht has provided one such avenue over the past several weeks: He has spoken through the firings of on-air talent perceived as providing insufficient deference to the right. Reliable Sources host Brian Stelter, a harsh critic of Fox and former President Donald Trump’s treatment of the mainstream media, lost his job last month. Veteran White House correspondent John Harwood, who had denounced Trump’s attacks on democracy, was shown the door on Friday. In each case, media reporters stressed that the firings were part of what the Washington Post termed Licht’s “strategy shift,” with the chairman purging journalists that were perceived as critics of Trump and his allies “to present a new, more ideologically neutral CNN.”

The message Licht’s firings send to CNN journalists is crystal clear: Too much criticism of the right, which remains united behind Trump and champions the election denial that triggered the January 6 insurrection, may cost you your job. And to inoculate themselves against that critique, some at the network are seemingly going out of their way to channel right-wing attacks against President Joe Biden.

Take Brianna Keilar, co-anchor of CNN’s New Day morning show. After a series of reports that her job was on the line due to her past coverage of Trump and Fox, Keilar grabbed headlines for her multi-day fixation on the optics of Biden standing in front of two U.S. Marines while delivering his Thursday speech on his predecessor’s threat to democracy.

Keilar, a CNN veteran who worked her way up from general assignment reporter to her current position, had denounced Fox misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines and January 6, among other topics. Such reporting might have earned plaudits under Jeff Zucker’s CNN regime, but it is an apparent black mark for Licht, who reportedly seeks a doomed “truce” with the right-wing propaganda network.

Reporting on the cancellation of Stelter’s show on August 18, the Associated Press included this inauspicious paragraph: “Licht has made it known internally that he’s not interested in conflict between CNN and Fox News on the network. The CNN ‘New Day’ anchor Brianna Keilar had also attracted attention for detailed critical pieces on Fox, but they have stopped since Licht took over.”

The next day, Hollywood Reporter recalled that Licht had promised advertisers in May that he would “reimagine” CNN’s morning show.“Whether that reimagining includes New Day anchors John Berman and Brianna Keilar is unclear for now, but few inside CNN expect them to remain on that show long-term,” according to that report.

Then on August 31, Puck’s Dylan Byers named Keilar as one of the CNN journalists “who built their personal brands by going to war with Trump” and are now on the chopping block. Byers, who initially broke the news of Licht’s selection as CNN chairman, cited his “well-placed sources.”

Things looked bleak for Keilar. But the next night, while Biden was speaking at Independence Hall about how “Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our Republic,” Keilar tweeted, “Whatever you think of this speech the military is supposed to be apolitical. Positioning Marines in uniform behind President Biden for a political speech flies in the face of that. It’s wrong when Democrats do it. It’s wrong when Republicans do it."

Keilar’s tweet drew immediate criticism from Democrats. But under the Licht paradigm at CNN, that is to her credit. She followed up her tweet the next morning with an on-air segment, then authored a lengthy analysis piece for CNN’s website headlined, “Biden’s use of Marines during Philadelphia speech adds to debate over politicization of the military.”

The CNN anchor’s repeated criticisms of Biden are drawing positive coverage from right-wing outlets, generating purportedly counterintuitive headlines like Democrats melt down after CNN hosts criticize Biden speech (New York Post), CNN Anchor Brianna Keilar Criticizes Biden For Marines In Philadelphia Speech. White House Responds (Daily Caller), and Liberals fume at CNN reporters who mildly criticized military presence at Biden speech: 'This is embarrassing' (FoxNews.com).

Others at CNN, perhaps seeking to avoid an unplanned job search, pushed similarly strained complaints, from Twitter to the White House briefing room to the network’s airwaves.

Nor is the trend limited to discussions of Biden’s speech. Also over the weekend, CNN correspondent Sara Sidner drew some attention from the right by tweeting that there are “serious questions that should be asked about” Biden’s adult son Hunter.

Whether Keilar and her colleagues are making cynical calculations to appeal to the new regime or have just internalized the right-wing spins on events of the past few months, the result is the same: CNN airing commentary that seems to be aimed at bolstering the network’s bona fides with Republicans.

Licht’s goal may be to make CNN more “neutral” and less “partisan.” But it is very difficult for CNN’s reporters worried about losing their jobs to project a nonpartisan mien, particularly given the naked radicalism of the right and the inclination of its propagandists to smear any reporter that doesn’t hew to its own standards. It’s easier, however, for them to simply provide some false balance by leaning into the talking points Republicans use to attack Democrats; fill their panels with conservatives willing to defend the worst excesses of the Trumpian right; and maybe offer some breathless reporting of the speeches of Trump or his successor.

Licht’s strategy thus has CNN pivoting right back to the brand of programming that paved Trump’s path to the White House back in 2016. There’s one major difference: This time, the network’s leaders know the stakes – and they are busy casting off anyone who might be willing to tell their viewers what those stakes are.

Related

CNN’s coverage of unions over the Labor Day weekend was woefully inadequate

09/09/22

New CNN chief’s first major hire is retired cop who recently lied about the NYPD spying on Muslims after 9/11

09/06/22

On his last day at CNN, John Harwood called out mainstream media’s false equivalency problem

09/02/22

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https://www.mediamatters.org/cnn/new-cnn-chiefs-first-major-hire-retired-cop-who-recently-lied-about-nypd-spying-muslims-after

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new ceo trying to attract gop -->

https://www.alternet.org/2022/09/are-you-kidding-me-reporters/

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9 22

Veteran CNN White House Correspondent John Harwood abruptly resigned from the network on Friday shortly after he unloaded on critics of President Joe Biden's primetime Thursday night speech in which Biden warned the American people of the existential and imminent dangers that former President Donald Trump and his Make America Great Again movement pose to the United States.

Democrats "are standing by the message that President Biden offered. Of course it was a political speech. We're in a midterm reelection year. The issues that he's talking about are inherently political," Harwood said on the air while standing outside of the White House.

"But I think it's also important to say that the core point he made in that political speech about a threat to democracy is true," he continued. "Now that is something that is not easy for us as journalists to say. We’re brought up to believe there’s two different political parties with different points of view and we don’t take sides in honest disagreements between them. But that’s not what we are talking about. These are honest disagreements."

READ MORE: Watch: Donald Trump promises 'full presidential pardons' with 'apologies' to January 6th defendants

Harwood then threw down the gauntlet on Trump's right-wing cheerleaders:

The Republican party right now is led by a dishonest demagogue. Many, many Republicans are rallying behind his lies about the 2020 election and other things as well. And a significant portion, or a sufficient portion of the constituency that they're leading attacked the Capitol on January 6th. Violently.

By offering pardons or suggesting pardons for those people who violently attacked the Capitol, which you've been pointing out numerous times this morning, Donald Trump made Joe Biden's point for him.

Less than two hours later, precisely at noon, Harwood tweeted that he is leaving CNN:

Personal news: today's my last day at CNN proud of the work thanks to my colleagues i've been lucky to serve the best in American media - St. Petersburg Times, WSJ, NYT, the NBC family, CNN look forward to figuring out what's next.

Watch below or at this link.

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https://www.alternet.org/2022/08/sean-hannity-2657922552/

On Thursday, August 18, CNN announced that it had canceled the Sunday-morning show “Reliable Sources” and that host Brian Stelter would be leaving the network. Reportedly, CNN’s new CEO and chairman, Chris Licht — who has said that he wants more “straight news reporting” and less commentary at CNN — disliked “Reliable Sources” and viewed Stelter, who spent a lot of time debunking Fox News hosts, as overly opinionated.

Liberal economist Robert Reich, in an op-ed published by The Guardian GUK on August 24, is highly critical of CNN’s decision to cancel “Reliable Sources” — and he views it as a glaring example of CNN changing for the worse. Reich, who served as secretary of labor in the Clinton Administration and teaches at the University of California, Berkeley, essentially argues that if “Reliable Sources” had been canceled because it had terrible ratings, that would be one thing. But he implies that Stelter was fired for political reasons and a misguided effort to offer “balanced journalism” at a time when extremists who are threatening U.S. democracy have no interest in balance.

“For several years,” Reich observes, “Brian Stelter’s Sunday show on CNN, ‘Reliable Sources,’ has been a reliable source of intelligent criticism of Fox News, right-wing media in general, Trumpism, and the increasingly authoritarian lurch of the Republican Party. Last week, CNN abruptly canceled the show and effectively fired Stelter and his staff. Why? The show was commercially successful. Its ratings have suffered somewhat lately, but it was doing better than several of CNN’s prime-time shows.”

READ MORE: CNN is seeking a 'cease-fire with Fox News' under its new president: report

Reich adds that “there appears to be more to” the cancelation of “Reliable Sources” than Licht’s view of Stelter’s “opinionated style.”

“Licht has told CNN staff they should stop referring to Donald Trump’s ‘Big Lie’ because the phrase sounds like a Democratic Party talking point,” Reich notes. “Licht also wants more ‘straight news reporting,’ along with more conservative guests. What’s motivating Licht? Follow the money. CNN’s new corporate overseer is Warner Brothers Discovery Inc., which now owns what used to be Time Warner, including CNN. The CEO of Warner Brothers Discovery is David Zaslav. Zaslav has been prodding Licht to reposition CNN to the center, and be a network preferred by ‘everybody.… Republicans, Democrats.’ But CNN is never going to be the network preferred by Republicans. Fox News has that sewn up.”

Reich continues, “As Republicans move further rightward into the netherworld of authoritarianism, there’s even less possibility that CNN’s news coverage will be able to satisfy them. Nor should CNN even try. If we’ve learned anything from Trump and his lapdogs at Fox News, it’s that facts, data and logic are no longer relevant to the Republican base. Even ‘straight news reporting’ depends on what stories are featured, which facts are highlighted and the context surrounding the news. This necessitates judgment and values.”

Liberal Washington Post opinion columnist Greg Sargent has stressed that when mainstream news outlets are reporting on someone as far to the right as Doug Mastriano, the GOP gubernatorial nominee in Pennsylvania, they shouldn’t normalize extremism in the name of “balance.” And Reich, similarly, argues that “straight news reporting” becomes problematic if it downplays attacks on democracy.

READ MORE:CNN cuts off Republican strategist for blaming 'both sides' for January 6th

“The anti-democracy movement in America, as elsewhere, is among the biggest issues confronting us today,” Reich warns. “Is reporting on it considered ‘straight news’ or ‘opinion?’ Wouldn’t failing to report on it in a way that sounded alarms be a gross dereliction of duty? Besides, how is it possible to report on (former President Donald) Trump or Rudy Giuliani or any number of today’s Republican leaders and not speak of the Big Lie, or say they’ve broken norms, if not laws? So, what’s motivating Zaslav? Keep following the money.”

Reich adds, “The leading shareholder in Warner Brothers Discovery is John Malone, a multibillionaire cable magnate. Malone was a chief architect in the merger of Discovery and CNN. Malone describes himself as a ‘libertarian,’ although he travels in right-wing Republican circles. In 2005, he held 32 percent of the shares of Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation. He is on the board of directors of the Cato Institute. In 2017, he donated $250,000 to Trump’s inauguration. Malone has said he wants CNN to be more like Fox News because, in his view, Fox News has ‘actual journalism.’ Malone also wants the ‘news’ portion of CNN to be ‘more centrist.’”

On the final broadcast of “Reliable Sources,” Stelter stressed that it’s “not partisan” to defend “democracy” or “stand up to demagogues” and that “we must make sure we don’t give platforms to those who are lying to our faces” — and Reich applauds that statement.

“Sadly, there are still many in America — and not just billionaires like Malone — who believe that holding Trump accountable for what he has done, and continues to do, to this country is a form of partisanship, and that such partisanship has no place in so-called ‘balanced journalism,’” Reich writes. “This view is itself dangerous.”

READ MORE:Steve Bannon lawyer squirms as CNN host backs him into corner over damning leaked recording of his client

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ukraine war may well be inflection pt between getting off FF and 2x down?!

https://www.alternet.org/2022/03/gop-lawmaker-fact-checked-by-cnn-s-dana-bash-after-blaming-biden-for-oil-companies-not-drilling/

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As well as being endorsed by Wood, Diaz was also endorsed by disgraced former national security advisor Michael Flynn,who, along with Wood, is one of the most listened-to figures in QAnon world.

Flynn’s brother, Joseph Flynn,who iscurrently suing CNN for portraying him as a QAnon supporter after he appeared in a video typing the QAnon oath, also congratulated Diaz on her victory.

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National TV networks mention climate change in 32% of segments on global extreme heat

07/19/22

Punishing extreme heat is affecting countries all across the globe this week. Extreme “red” heat warnings were issued in the United Kingdom for the first time, and Wales recorded its highest-ever temperature. At least 1,100 people have died in Spain and Portugal due to the extreme heat, which has fueled wildfires there and in parts of France. The Midwestern U.S. and Central Asia are suffering from extreme heat as well.

The European heat is truly exceptional, and its connections to the climate crisis are unquestionable. As climate reporter Andrew Freedman recently noted on Twitter, “the word ‘unprecedented’ is as overused as the phrase ‘the new normal,’ but the extreme heat event underway in Europe truly is historic. And it would not be as hot without human-caused global warming.”

Despite the clear links between climate change and extreme heat, corporate broadcast and cable TV news programs failed to consistently connect climate change to these global extreme heat events. Out of 62 combined segments and weather reports discussing the historic heat waves on ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, and MSNBC, from July 16-18, only 20 (32%) mentioned climate change. The vast majority of extreme heat segments mentioning climate (16) were related to the European heat wave.

News shows on ABC, CBS, and NBC ran a combined 27 global heat segments – 37% of them mentioned climate change

From July 16-18, corporate broadcast networks ABC, CBS, and NBC aired 10 mentions of climate change related to extreme heat, and 7 of those mentions were in the context of reporting on the European heat wave.

Climate change was mentioned in 5 of ABC’s 12 extreme heat segments (42%). Four of those segments were in the context of European heat, and 1 in the context of U.S. heat. The latter mention was by meteorologist Ginger Zee on the July 18 edition of World News Tonight and represented the only climate mention in a weather report on corporate broadcast news.

Meanwhile, NBC aired 9 segments covering the extreme heat, with 3 of them (33%) mentioning climate change – 2 in the context of U.S. heat, and 1 in the context of European heat. CBS aired 6 extreme heat segments, with 2 (33%) mentioning climate change – both came in the context of European heat.

The July 18 edition of CBS Mornings included a good example of how extreme weather coverage can benefit from interviews with experts in the field who can credibly communicate the science and urgency of action to viewers. CBS correspondent Roxana Saberi interviewed Kirsty McCabe of the U.K.’s Royal Meteorological Society, who stated that “climate change has everything to do with the extreme weather that we're seeing at the moment – and it's human-induced climate change, it’s not a natural variation.” She later stated that “if we don't do something now and take drastic action, we will continue to see these things happening.

[vid?  the July 18, 2022, edition of CBS Mornings

broken down by region, the corporate broadcast networks aired 11 news segments on the European heat, 10 segments on U.S. heat, and 6 that combined both European and U.S. heat.

In June, these same networks mentioned climate in just 9% of combined segments on various extreme weather events happening around the globe. Last week, they mentioned climate in a combined 38% of segments on the Washburn Fire, which threatened Yosemite National Park and its iconic sequoias.

Cable TV networks CNN and MSNBC ran a combined 31 segments on global extreme heat – 10 of them, or 32%, mentioned climate change

MSNBC aired 10 segments on extreme heat, and 7 of them (70%) mentioned climate change – making them the best-performing network reviewed in this time period. Four mentions came in segments about European heat, 2 on both European and U.S. heat, and 1 specific to extreme heat in Texas. MSNBC also featured the only mention by cable news of climate change in a weather report, which occurred while reporting on the European heat wave on the July 18 edition ofKaty Tur Reports. 

CNN ran 21 such segments, and only 3 (14%) mentioned climate change. All 3 came in the context of covering European heat. While lacking in climate mentions during its extreme heat coverage, the network featured one segment that did a particularly good job of putting these events within the context of the climate crisis and articulating the high stakes of climate inaction. During the 5 a.m. hour of the July 16 edition of CNN Newsroom,the reporter stated that “the extreme heat and drought fuelling what scientists say is a sign of the effects of climate change,” before going to climate scientist Michael Mann to explain further.Later in the segment, the reporter stated, “As the mercury climbs, scientists again warning [that] without addressing the climate crisis, weather events like this will grow more common and more extreme."

[vid]

broken down by region, these networks aired 19 segments on the European heat, 10 segments that combined both European and U.S. heat, 5 segments on U.S. heat (two of which were specific to Texas), and one segment on the heat wave currently affecting Asia.

In June, these networks mentioned climate in a combined 21% of segments on various extreme weather events. Last week, they mentioned climate in 37% of segments on the Washburn Fire.

Notably, Fox News ran 4 weather reports on extreme heat, and none of them mentioned climate change. Two were specific to U.S. heat, and 2 combined both U.S. and European heat. We did not include Fox’s numbers in the full dataset due to the network's long history of downplaying the severity of climate change.

The heat will only worsen this week (especially in parts of Europe), so these networks have an opportunity to better incorporate climate change in their reporting

Temperatures are expected to remain very high in the U.K. and France through July 19. Numerous record-high temperatures may be set in the Midwestern U.S. as well on this date, giving these networks an opportunity to accurately report on climate change in their extreme heat reporting throughout the rest of the week.

Methodology...

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wow d'souza hillary's am shite  stank?

https://www.thedailybeast.com/jonah-goldberg-who-quit-fox-news-over-tucker-carlson-joins-cnn

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an 1 22  https://www.alternet.org/2022/01/gretchen-carlson/

no lnx vid

Watch: Former Fox News anchor explains how network's viewers have been brainwashed into believing conspiracy theories

Meaghan Ellis January 28, 2022

Former Fox News anchor Gretchen Carlson offered a damning assessment of the network as she explained just how bad its spread of conspiracy theories and misinformation has become.

During an appearance on the CNN segment, "Democracy in Peril," Carlson discussed many aspects of Fox News' critical role in the spread of misinformation and falsehoods. Since former President Donald Trump took office, conspiracy theories have been on the rise and Fox News has become a driving force for it.

Conservative primetime news anchor Tucker Carlson has been at the center of misinformation and the power of his opinion has begun to influence Republican members of Congress.

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“This is the result of fake news,” Carlson said. “You know, we're seeing not only the fallout from fake news during the Trump era, but what happened with the insurrection on January 6th. Now it's moving into other areas. Not just news, now it’s hitting science with vaccines, and now it’s into Cold War politics.”

Carlson also touched on another significant topic as she shed light on the actions of herformer Fox News colleagues, Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham. While they reportedly sent pleas to the White House for the violence to stop on Jan. 6, they still put up a united front on-air and circulated a completely different narrative about the series of events that unfolded.

“I think the bigger story coming out of that is how disingenuous it was to be sending those texts of warning while then going on the air to the American people and doing a complete injustice and disservice by saying something completely opposite,” Carlson said, “and ginning up this whole reaction that it was just fine and patriotic for people to be there on January 6th.”

She went on to express concern about the journalistic state of her former network since the rise of Trump. Carlson also noted how conspiracy theories have become a fallacious replacement for opinion.

“Slowly but surely, this has morphed into eradicating any other point of view since the Trump era that is not just opinion,” Carlson said. “It's gone from an opinion, which was fine, to completely devolving into non-fact-based conspiracy theories and outright dangerous rhetoric, in my mind, and I think it’s a complete disservice to our country.”

Noting the dangers of biased journalism, Carlson explained how dangerous it is to only get information from one news source. She also stressed how imperative it is for Republican leaders and lawmakers to use their platforms to offer clarity regarding some of the dangerous false narratives perpetuated by Fox News.

“For the safety of the Republican Party and for our democracy, I wish more would, because this is not going to end well, in my mind,” Carlson said. “It's really hard to change people's opinions because they're only watching what they want to hear, you know? And that's the other problem that we have in society with the media right now, is that we're so siloed into only watching what we agree with. And so every day that thought process just gets reinforced time after time.”

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Carlson also conceded that conservative media has changed considerably over the last five years as there is no longer a clear line between opinion and conspiracy theory. “Conservative television news is certainly not the conservative news that was out there even just five years ago,” Carlson said, later adding, “There’s a big difference between having a conservative opinion and having one that supports conspiracy theories.”

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an me 621

Conservatives are still pushing wildly bizarre claims about the insurrection on the U.S. Capitol in an effort to avoid accountability for the deadly encounter. On Friday, June 18, CNN offered a quick rundown of the latest myths about the Capitol riots as hosts Brianna Keilar and John Berman debunked all of the theories.

While rolling footage of the most harrowing moments that captured the mob attacking U.S. Capitol police officers, Berman noted that "some Republicans and some deranged entertainers keep developing new and provably false ways to say the insurrection did not happen," according to HuffPost.

From the claims suggesting the insurrection was actually nothing more than a normal tourist visit to the U.S. Capitol to Fox News' Tucker Carlson's latest conspiracy theory suggesting members of the (FBI) were co-conspirators in the Capitol insurrection, the myths just continue to grow....

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https://www.alternet.org/2021/06/cnn-tear-gas-trump/

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donnie ~ quanon coup flynn end times

Donie O'Sullivan is a reporter for CNN. His beat appears to be American conspiracy theories. He was on Anderson Cooper's show last night with reporting on a QAnon conference last weekend during which former Donald Trump adviser and pardoned traitor Michael Flynn said a Myanmar-style military coup "should happen" in America.

That some people in this country long for purifying violence to "reinstate" Donald Trump to his "rightful place" is not what got my attention, though. What did was Donie O'Sullivan's editorial remark at the end of his report. This is what he said:

I spend a lot of time reading these pro-Trump forums, reading these QAnon forums online, and speaking to Trump supporters, and I will say of all the conspiracy theories we hear, this talk from Americans about a coup, cheering a coup, and hoping for a coup, in the United States is one of the most chilling things I hear.

Before I go on, I should say O'Sullivan appears to be an immigrant. (I think he's Irish, given his accent.) As such, I don't expect him to be as attuned to American political culture as I'd expect a native-born American to be. Indeed, as a non-native, I'd expect him to be more attuned to the American civic religion than native-born Americans generally are, because fealty to the civic religion is so often demanded of immigrants....

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https://www.alternet.org/2021/05/fox-news-2653092281/?rs=182

no graf

Fox News possesses an “outsized influence" on the American public, especially among religious viewers.

That was the conclusion of the nonprofit Public Religion Research Institute in a report released just after the 2020 presidential election. It noted that 15% of Americans cited Fox News as the most trusted source – around the same as NBC, ABC and CBS combined, and four percentage points above rival network CNN. The survey of more than 2,500 American adults also suggested that Fox News viewers trend religious, especially among Republicans watching the show. Just 5% of Republican viewers of the channel identified as being “religiously unaffiliated" – compared to 15% of Republicans who do not watch Fox News and 25% of the wider American public.

To further explore the relationship between different faiths and the TV news they associate with as part of my research on religion data, I analyzed the result of another survey, the Cooperative Election Survey.

The annual survey, which was fielded just before the November 2020 election, with the results released in March, polled a total of 61,000 Americans over a number of topics. One question was on their news consumption habits. It asked what television news networks respondents had watched in the prior 24 hours.

Percentage of respondents who saw TV news in past 24 hours

Ryan Burge/CES

Some very interesting patterns emerged across religious traditions – and the nonreligious – and the type of media being consumed. For instance, of the the big three legacy news operations – ABC, CBS and NBC – there was no strong base of viewership in any tradition.

In most cases, about a third of people from each religious tradition said that they watched one of those legacy networks in the last 24 hours. PBS scored very low among every tradition. In most cases fewer than 15% of respondents reported watching PBS in the time frame.

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however, the numbers for the three major cable news networks – CNN, Fox News and MSNBC – were much higher across the board. In eight of the 16 religious and nonreligious traditions categorized in the poll, CNN viewership was at least 50% of the sample. This was led by 71% of Hindus who watched CNN and 63% of Muslims.

The least likely group to watch CNN was clearly white evangelicals, at just 23%. In comparison, MSNBC scored lower nearly across the board. In fact, in none of the 16 classification groups was viewership of MSNBC greater than it was for CNN.

Fox News viewership was higher than that of MSNBC, but was not as widely dispersed as it is for CNN. It's no surprise, given its reputation as a conservative news outlet, that 61% of white evangelicals say that they watch Fox News – in the last election, around 80% of white evangelicals voted for Republican candidate Donald Trump. The other three traditions where viewership was at least 50% are white Catholics, Mormons and members of the Eastern Orthodox Church. It should come as no surprise, as those are three groups that consistently vote for the Republican Party. Just 14% of atheists watched Fox, which is just about in line with the share of white evangelicals who watch MSNBC.

Fracturing right-wing media

But with the fracturing of conservative media sources seeing more competitors vying for viewers among the right, Fox News could see a drop in viewership from the religious right.

In the wake of the 2020 presidential election, Fox News viewership plunged as many Trump supporters believed that the network was not being loyal to their standard-bearer of the GOP.

Given the vast number of news options that people of faith have and the increase in political polarization in the United States, the pressure for networks to deliver the news that people want to hear will only increase as time passes.

Ryan Burge, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Eastern Illinois University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

FROM YOUR SITE ARTICLES

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fired nat am no culture to spk of vs AP palestine?

https://www.alternet.org/2021/05/rick-santorum/

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https://www.alternet.org/2021/05/dark-money-2653023239/

All over the United States — from Georgia to Arizona to Iowa to Texas — Republicans in state legislatures have been pushing voter suppression bills that are designed to make it harder to vote. And CNN has obtained a copy of a leaked video showing the role that "dark money" in the form of Heritage Action for America (the Heritage Foundation's sister organization) has played in crafting these bills, some of which have already been signed into law by Republican governors who include Georgia's Brian Kemp and Florida's Ron DeSantis.

In the leaked video aired by CNN and previously reported by Mother Jones, Heritage Action Executive Director Jessica Anderson can be seen bragging about the group's influence on those bills. Anderson, in the video, declares, "We're working with these state legislatures to make sure they have all of the information they need to draft the bills. In some cases, we actually draft them for them. Or, we have a sentinel, on our behalf, give them the model legislation so it has that grass roots, you known, from the bottom up, type of vibe."

CNN host Chris Cuomo, before airing the video, explained, "We're going to show just how ugly the game has gotten when it comes to the effort to suppress the vote." And he went on to explain why Anderson's use of the word "sentinel" is important.

Cuomo, the brother of Democratic New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, told viewers, "I want you to remember the word sentinel and the phrase, 'You know, they pass it along so it has that grass roots vibe.' This is the game…. Money matters."

The CNN host noted how deceptive Heritage Action's claims are. Heritage, in a statement to CNN, claimed that its intention is to make voting more transparent; Cuomo disagrees.

Cuomo said of Heritage, "You want to cheat. You want to limit how many people can vote — for minority groups and big urban areas, and those local officials you want cut out of the process. That's what you want because that is the far-right sale of White fright. These suppression advocates organize and then weaponize, many selling White fright and false notions that the election was stolen by big groups.

Mother Jones has published video of Anderson bragging about Heritage Action's voter suppression efforts. Watch the video below:

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mirror of smartmatic kraken suits?

Flynn's family members file $75M lawsuit against CNN over QAnon video

321 an

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jorno pushed over stone railing? CNN sucks then trashed  AP gear, we bum rushed it was beautiful, noose made from cable]

https://www.alternet.org/2021/01/capitol/

many pix lnx twt vid?

'Murder the media': Photographers release terrifying video of the mob attack outside the Capitol gates

‘This is horrifying’: Videos show injured officers being evacuated after clashes with Trump supporters

Aysha Qamar and Daily Kos January 09, 2021

As violent Trump supporters terrorized the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday, members of Congress were not the only people they were looking to intimidate. These terrorists also targeted journalists and press under Donald Trump's message of declaring the news and media an "enemy of the people."

"Murder the media," was written on a door of the Capitol while terrorists took over and attacked a group of reporters. In one incident John Minchillo, a photographer of the Associated Press, was attacked by a mob of Trump supporters outside the Capitol building. The violent incident was captured on video and shared by another photographer on Twitter. Local photographers and reporters were present at the break of the horrific violence that took place Wednesday. Footage shared on social media depicts the consequences of words bigots like Trump use to incite violence on communities and spaces.

"Please use this moment to reflect on the importance of journalism as a conduit between us. We tell stories. That's our mission. We have the privilege to shepherd moments over time and space. Please subscribe to your hard working local papers, support their vocation," Minchillo replied to the video of his attack being shared on Twitter.

(WARNING: This story contains violent video, photos, and language that may not be suitable for all readers.)

In a thread of photos posted on Twitter, BuzzFeed News reporter Paul McLeod captured photos of equipment left behind by the Associated press after crowds attacked reporters. According to McLeod, one man yelled "We are the news now, as a crowd damaged the equipment. McLeod also reported that a noose was fashioned from a camera cord and hung from a tree.

The Associated Press confirmed that its equipment had been stolen and destroyed and noted that none of its staff members had been injured.

In another video posted on Twitter, the terrorists again attempted to target individuals they thought were from CNN. While it is unclear whether the journalist was from CNN, the fact that these journalists were assaulted is not okay.

But the violent Trump allies were not the only ones after journalists on Wednesday.Reporters for The Washington Post were shortly detained by police while reporting on Tuesday night, following a pattern of law enforcement officials arresting reporters for doing their work throughout this year.

The reporters arrested were identified as Zoeann Murphy and Whitney Leaming. The two shared on Twitter that they were safe after quickly being released. "I have heard from so many journalist friends/colleagues who were at or around the Capitol today that they are 'fine'. This is a lie," Leaming tweeted. "They are not fine but they push aside their physical safety and mental health to focus on the story at hand [because] one of the most important rules of journalism is that the story is not about you. Just please remember that and maybe not threaten their life, I beg you."

According to The New York Times, media officials were threatened and surrounded for hours, those inside the Capitol building were forced to find shelter in secure locations to avoid assault. A reporter with The Los Angeles Times recalled her experience hiding in the House gallery during an armed standoff.

Sarah D. Wire of The Los Angeles Times wrote:

I heard a ruckus behind me and turned and saw a dozen reporters being ushered into the gallery from press offices. Then police shut and locked the doors. Police interrupted the proceedings to announce that tear gas had been deployed in the rotunda.

A staff member handed me an evacuation hood, a cumbersome plastic bag that filters out tear gas and chemicals. She told me to pass it and others down the row until everyone had one. Reporters were not the only ones in the gallery. Staff members were monitoring the proceedings. More than a dozen lawmakers had also taken seats in the public galleries overlooking the House floor. Now we were locked in the room together.

The rioters driven by Trump's hate clearly had no fear of police involvement. CBS News reporter Chip Reid, who has worn protective gear he last wore while covering conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, noted thata rioter told him law enforcement officials would not protect journalists. "There were no police around us—we were on our own," Reid said. "We high-tailed it out of there."

Of course, Trump later addressed the crowd in a video statement Wednesday but continued on his claims that the election has been "stolen." The video removed by many social media outlets including Facebook and Twitter is predicted to incite further violence. As Trump continues to target anyone who calls out his lies, his zombies continue to ready for battle.

"Rioters at the Capitol called for violence against members of the news media, destroyed news equipment and verbally harassed journalists as the 'enemy of the people's—actions that not only pose a dire threat to those working tirelessly to bring information to our communities, but also to the press freedom that is a bedrock value of our nation," Bruce Brown, the executive director of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, said in a statement.

"These actions are the direct result of years of this language stoking fear and hate for one of our most vital institutions. Our free press is crucial to democracy, and indeed, one of the pillars that will help keep it standing beyond this moment."

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https://www.alternet.org/2020/09/this-is-how-you-normalize-a-madman-scholars-and-press-watchdogs-urge-corporate-media-to-treat-trump-like-the-authoritarian-threat-he-is/

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This is how you normalize a madman': Scholars and press watchdogs urge corporate media to treat Trump like the authoritarian threat he is

Lisa Newcomb and Common Dreams September 25, 2020

Major news outlets failed the American people, critics say, when they chose to bury coverage of President Donald Trump's Wednesday comment that he would not commit to a peaceful transition of power—a statement watchdogs say demanded above-the-fold, front-page headlines that simply did not materialize.

"Newsroom leaders made a considered, intentional decision not to panic after Trump was elected," Dan Froomkin, editor of PressWatchers.org, wrote in a scathing rebuke of corporate media's apparent nonchalant attitude towards the president's rhetoric. "This was an epic, obvious mistake, and everything that has happened since was in some sense entirely predictable."

Froomkin continued, "They should have gone on a war footing—and by that I don't mean a partisan war against Trump, I mean a journalistic war against lies, ignorance, and intolerance."

Critics weighed in on the relative non-importance corporate news outlets assigned—in print and online—to Trump's latest suggestion that he may not cede the office of the presidency should he lose in November:

Some observers balked when Peter Baker, chief White House correspondent for the New York Times, attempted to explain away the Times' decision to bury the news by citing print publication deadlines. One pointed to the late-evening news of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's death last week, which was an above-the-fold feature in the next day's Times print edition.

Broadcast media also drew rebukes for its lack of emphasis on Trump's veiled threat at the democratic process.

"Wednesday's network evening newscasts on ABC, CBS, and NBC were no better," Eric Boehlert, founder and editor of PressRun wrote. "Not only did none of them lead with Trump's stunning proclamation, none of the broadcasts even reported on Trump's comments. This is how you normalize a madman. (CNN and MSNBC did a much better job covering the transfer-of-power story.)"

At PressWatchers.org, Froomkin explained how the dynamics in corporate newsrooms have led to complacency among journalists tasked with reporting on Trump's presidency:

One overarching problem is that our major newsrooms have simply gotten so corporate and even-keeled that our top editors value unflappability as a signal virtue. (OK, I admit I take this one a little personally, being a flappable person. A top Washington Post editor once called me "hysterical.") Flappable people don't rise through the ranks. Corporate people do.

Journalism to me is about crusading for the truth. But the notion that a serious, major news organization would pursue a crusade on behalf of its community is considered hippy shit by the people in charge these days. So is consistently standing up to a lawless con man. They've gotten used to printing lies. They barely squawk when Trump calls them the "enemy of the people." They have their algorithms, and they won't give them up no matter what. They just continue to "do the work."

So yeah, their news souls are dead. There, I said it.

Lawmakers and progressive advocates called out the dangerous threat to democracy uttered by the commander-in-chief—and the corporate media for treating it like any other day in Trump's scandal-laden presidency.

"Great (not) to watch journalists reporting Trump's latest direct attacks on the republic as if it's all just a regular press conference," longtime journalist Dan Gillmortweeted Wednesday. "Historians will see Big Journalism's business as usual in this emergency as one of the proximate causes of the American republic's death."

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) gave a speech Thursday denouncing Trump's declared refusal to commit to a peaceful transition of power, saying: "This is not just an election between Donald Trump and Joe Biden. This is an election between Donald Trump and democracy—and democracy must win."

Sanders also outlined steps necessary to prepare the American public and lawmakers for chaos of election night and beyond, calling on the news media specifically to "prepare the American people to understand there is no longer a single election day and that it is very possible that we may not know the results on November 3."

Froomkin pointed out that corporate media's opinion pages are more accurately depicting the real danger of Trump's recent rhetoric than front-page headlines.

"But as usual, to capture the real drama of what's going on, you have to go to the opinion writers—and the editorial cartoonists," he wrote, sharing a link to an op-ed by Washington Post columnist Greg Sargent.

"What really matters here is that Trump is making an actual declaration of intent," Sargent wrote, "not just to refuse to respect the outcome, but rather to try to cancel and override it, if he is able to get away with it."

Boehlert issued a more dire warning:

Trump isn't running for re-election in the sense he's hoping to accumulate more voter support than Biden. (His campaign keeps taking down ads in swing states.)Trump's running to maintain power. He's signaling that he'll refuse to give it up and will not accept his defeat as being legitimate. He's trying to steal an election. In reality, he doesn't care what the results are—he has no intention of abiding by the nation's will, and thinks he can count on the corrupt support of the GOP, the Department of Justice, and the United States Supreme Court to win his lawless battle in the days and weeks after the election.

"Our democracy is at stake," Boehlert concluded. "Trump is trying to steal an election, and the press should say so, every day until Election Day."

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