Fox News Is Losing Its Mind Trying to Justify Trump's Shameful Response to Charlottesville

By Rafi Schwartz  |  August 14, 2017 | 2:14pm
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Monday morning’s Fox & Friends offered a fascinating look at the Cirque de Soleil–level contortions the show’s hosts have twisted themselves into in order to justify President Trump’s utter failure to condemn the white nationalists responsible for this weekend’s violence in Charlottesville, VA.

“There’s a lot to wake up to,” host Abby Huntsman began, before she and co-hosts Steve Doocy and Pete Hegseth did everything in their power to frame the White House’s disinclination to speak out against actual Nazis as totally normal.

First up: A brief report on protesters arrested in Seattle as they marched against a rally organized by hard right wing Trump supporters. At whose feet did Fox & Friends lay the blame for the violence? Take a wild guess.

With the broader frame of “right-wing protesters: good, counter-protesters: bad” nicely established, the hosts moved on to praising Mike Pence’s condemnation of neo-Nazis, while completely ignoring the actual president’s “both sides” appeasement.

And then things got weird.

After rightfully describing accused Charlottesville murderer James Fields as having a “hate-filled past” (because, even Fox & Friends doesn’t want to carry water for an actual Nazi—at least, not directly) Huntsman turned her ire to…Barack Obama, who in 2016 urged caution when connecting Dallas police shooter Micah Johnson, who was black, with the Black Lives Matter movement.

“The grace given to him, of course, is never given to president Trump in this,” Hegseth whined, ignoring the fact that the Charlottesville race riot was carried out, to a large degree, in Trump’s name.

Also, they splashed this timely chyron across the bottom of the screen.

I’m sure dedicated Fox & Friends watcher Donald Trump loved every second of it.

Update, 1:09 PM:

After more than two days of equivocating statements from the president—and a bipartisan wave of condemnation thereof—Donald Trump on Monday finally spoke out against the “evil” of racism in a brief, highly scripted statement to the press.

Fox News was reportedly delighted.

 
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