Journalists lost their minds on Monday when White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders battled CNN’s Jim Acosta over fake news.
“A number of outlets have had to retract and change and rewrite and make editor’s note to a number of different stories,” Sanders said of the false stories being peddled by the likes of CNN, Bloomberg, and ABC. “There’s a very big difference between making honest mistakes and purposely misleading the American people.” (RELATED: Sarah Sanders Gets Into It With CNN Over Fake News Question: ‘I’m Not Finished!’)
The media immediately flew into defense mode after the exchange, claiming that the media never intentionally spreads disinformation.
“It makes all of us angry,” CNN anchor Brooke Baldwin anchor seethed. “It makes all of us angry.”
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“Look, we’re human beings, as Jim said earlier, we’re going to make mistakes,” CNN political analyst Brian Karem said. “And we always apologize and correct ourselves.”
CNN did not apologize for for inaccurate reporting about an email that was sent to Donald Trump Jr. with a link to stolen Democratic documents.
“The people in this White House have such disdain for what he do,” Karem whined. “It’s a matter of divide and conquer.”
CNN political analyst April Ryan similarly complained that the White House is a “totally different” place than what it was when past presidents were in office.
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“The contention was there, Sarah was there–she knew exactly what she was going to do,” Ryan declared. “She came in there and she wanted to cut down any back and forth that could make the president look bad…I’ve never seen a room like that and it’s getting worse.”
Meanwhile on MSNBC, anchor Katy Tur said Sanders was “less than pleased” during the briefing and urged Sanders to apologize to reporters for the lies the administration has allegedly told reporters.
“Let’s be clear about something–reporters make mistakes, we’re human…and when the mistake is serious enough sometimes we are suspended or fired,” she complained.
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“Is this just incredibly dangerous and incredibly problematic?” Tur later asked a guest, MSNBC national security contributor Michael Schmidt.
“His narrative isn’t true but it has had some staying power and it has had some impact,” Schmidt responded. “It’s been a good distraction from him because he’s had some news over the past few weeks on the Russia investigation that has not been good.”
Beyond the on-air meltdown over Sanders’ attack on the media, journalists on Twitter further expressed their anger.
.@PressSec-You’re an absolute disgrace & a pathological liar. Following in your father’s footsteps?
— Scott Dworkin (@funder) December 11, 2017
Sarah Sanders is a disgrace to the podium & to the country. She acts like she’s a FoxNews pundit speaking for the president of the US. It’s absolutely pathetic. Her & Trump are the biggest pathological liars on the planet. She should resign in disgrace yesterday. #FireSarah
— Scott Dworkin (@funder) December 11, 2017
Enjoying seeing how @PressSec is struggling answering simple questions at the press briefings. Lying so much and for so long is not easy that’s for sure.
— Noam Galai (@ngalai) December 11, 2017
Sarah Sanders very angry dealing w/ reporters today.
hunch: Trump told her she’s doing an awful job and blamed him for his 32% approval rating.
— Eric Boehlert (@EricBoehlert) December 11, 2017
—@Acosta asks @PressSec to name a report that was put out by media outlet to intentionally mislead American ppl.
Sanders cites botched story from ABC’s @BrianRoss.
But ABC didn’t intentionally put out report with aim of misleading ppl…
— Oliver Darcy (@oliverdarcy) December 11, 2017
Think he is talking about you @PressSec https://t.co/Ql12O6Tsf9
— Adam Parkhomenko (@AdamParkhomenko) December 11, 2017
Here’s @PressSec claiming reporters are putting out info they know to be false. No evidence to back that up. On other hand, @realDonaldTrump has repeatedly made false claims & spread false information, even after getting fact-checked. Unlike media, he doesn’t correct when wrong pic.twitter.com/9AyojDj9HC
— Jeremy Diamond (@JDiamond1) December 11, 2017