How the news media discussed domestic terrorism on Capitol Hill

How the news media discussed domestic terrorism on Capitol Hill

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The events on Capitol Hill on Wednesday, January 6, 2021 will be remembered as an act of domestic terrorism against the United States; as a national tragedy; and as a real manifestation of online radicalization. Here are the key questions going on Thursday:

– Is President Trump a danger to the republic? Is he fit to hold office until January 20?

– Is the 25th amendment being called in, as a wide range of opinion leaders insist?

Will the resigning White House staffers, such as Stephanie Grisham and Sarah Matthews, speak in public? If not, why not?

– How many employees of the White House will still resign? Will Trump still have spokesmen left?

– Will the Murdochs do anything to curb the contagious programming on Fox News? What about Newsmax and ON?

– Will the insurgents target other places in DC in the coming days?

Far from Washington, there were skirmishes in several capitals of the state on Wednesday. Does it continue?

– What will this disaster be called in ten years from now? The “Trump riots?”

Let’s now look at how the country’s news media covered this disgraceful day, starting with Thursday’s front pages. The New York Times say, in all capital letters, “TRUMP INCITES MOB.” The Washington Post headline say “Trump mob storms Capitol.” The Wall Street Journal say “MOB STORMS CAPITOL.”

Writing for history

– Peter Baker’s lead role for The New York Times: “So it ends.”
Dan Balz’s lead for the Washington Post: ‘January 6, 2021 will be remembered as one of the darkest days in the history of the United States.’
Kevin Liptak’s lead on CNN: ‘Three years, 11 months and 17 days after President Trump of the Western Front of the American Capitol warned that’ American massacre stops here ‘, the place where he stood was engulfed by his own protesters carnage of their own. ‘
“America is in a ‘reality crisis,'” Charlie Warzel wrote, “in which millions of Americans are actively pursuing the conspiracy and violent, radical ideologies to make sense of a world they do not trust.”
– Jake Tapper from CNN tweeted shortly before midnight: ‘People, it was a dark day. The president and his envoys – and those for whom they lied – continue to test the American experiment and threaten to destroy it. But a lot of pressure back and I am confident will survive and emerge stronger. Thank you for watching and God bless you. ‘

“Lies have consequences”

This is what Senator Ben Sasse said on Wednesday: “Lies have consequences.” Other reality-based members of the Republican Party, such as Adam Kinzinger, also rotted the conspiracy theory in their party. But they remained a minority in the IDP.

Many Democrats were much more powerful in their repudiations of the political and media climate in which it unfolded. Bill Clinton said “the assault was fueled by more than four years of poison politics that deliberately spread misinformation, sowed distrust in our system and put Americans against each other.” Barack Obama called both “a political party and the associated media ecosystem” because they were ‘largely unwilling to tell their followers the truth’ about Biden’s victory, and the soon-to-be majority leader, Chuck Schumer, denounced Trump along with “the captive media that parrots his lies”.

The rioters organized online

Jane Lytvynenko and Molly Hensley-Clancy of BuzzFeed News report that they’ve been planning openly on mainstream social media and the internet pro-Trump internet for weeks. “On forums like TheDonald, a niche site that came into being after Reddit banned the subreddit of the same name, they promised violence against lawmakers, police and journalists if Congress did not reject the outcome of the 2020 election.”
Some of the rioters streamed their crimes live, so there is a lot of video evidence. The FBI is now appealing to the public for information on the riots.

Members of the media attacked

There were several cases on Wednesday where journalists were targeted by rioters. Some news crews traveled with private security – in the capital of the country. In a particularly serious case, a live recording outside the Senate was surrounded by men threatening news crews and damaging TV equipment. The AP confirmed that some of the equipment from the outlet was stolen and destroyed during today’s violent protests in Washington.

Post journalist arrested

“Two Washington Post video journalists,” Zoeann Murphy and Whitney Leaming, “tweeted Wednesday night that they were arrested during the riots at the U.S. Capitol,” Lindsey Ellefson, TheWrap, wrote. The evening clock at 18:00 in DC released members of the media, as every police officer should know. “Our journalists were just doing their job and should never have been arrested in the first place. However, we are glad that the police released them quickly,” a Mail Spokesman said.

Notes on cable and broadcast coverage

“The chaos erupted at an hour when most television networks focused primarily on the congressional process,” Jeremy Barr and Paul Farhi, The Post, wrote in a summary of the day’s report. “It took time for many reporters and producers to realize what was going on and shift their coverage as congressional correspondents turned into war correspondents and called in reports while hiding from coverage.” At the time, anchors and commentators “quickly proclaimed the rioters’ behavior in harsh, direct language – even on Fox News.”

As the minutes and hours passed, many news agents stopped saying ‘protesters’ and started saying ‘rioters’ and ‘mob’.

– CNN “has sent internal guidance that staff may refer to the Capitol Hill riot today as ‘domestic terrorism’,” Max Tani report.

Former NBC News CEO Mark Lukasiewicz, who has been quite critical of his former network and other broadcasters in recent months, has expressed respect and admiration for the work they have done and the risks they are taking today. Journalism has never been so essential. ‘

ABC and NBC have scrapped their entire series of broadcasts for the news coverage. CBS initially aired sitcoms at 8pm Eastern, but resumed a special report from CBS News.

The sober coverage up and down the knob makes Fox’s first talk show even more strange.

The judge’s new story: Antifa, Antifa, Antifa

If you thought the invasion of the Capitol on Wednesday would break the fever, think again. ‘The rioters were Antifa’ becomes a standard point of conversation on the far right. Many commentators, from Sarah Palin to Candace Owens, from Laura Ingraham to Lin Wood, have driven the idea that left-wing radicals were responsible for some of the violence that played out on Wednesday. Ken Paxton, Texas AG, even tweeted, “These are not Trump supporters.” But as Ben Collins noted, there were actually recognizable Trump supporters in the Capitol building. The accusation of leftists is just a cynical way of apologizing for what happened and changing the conversation.

What Fox and Newsmax viewers heard

Along with all the Antifuse excuses, here’s an example of what was heard on pro-Trump TV via Oliver Darcy. Everyone condemned the violence, but then …

Greg Kelly of Newsmax attacked the media for his coverage, arguing that journalists were condescending towards Trump supporters. Kelly also interviewed Rudy Giuliani who expressed disappointment over Mike Pence.

On Fox, Tucker Carlson apparently acquitted his audience of what happened: “It’s not your fault, it’s their fault,” he said, continuing the “us-against-them” theme of his show.

Carlson also claimed that the events on Wednesday would be used to tackle ‘civil liberties’.

At the same time on Newsmax, Grant Stinchfield also condemned the media for not buying conspiracy theories from voter fraud.

Sean Hannity continued to lie about the election, obsessed with voter fraud and focused on the fact that the Capitol complex needs more security. His guests complained about left-wing mobsters saying Republicans are held to double standards.

Laura Ingraham, who mocked those who said the Black Lives Matter uprisings were mostly peaceful, kept pointing out that most people in DC were peaceful, but ‘because of a small contingent of lungs, these patriots were unfairly maligned. . “

Notes and quotes

– Stephen Colbert started live on CBS on Wednesday night and started his show by asking, “Hey, Republicans who supported this president … have you had enough?”

– Daniel D’Addario of Variety: ‘Although Trump’s use of social media was announced, he was and remains a being of television, and – today – television has surpassed him and placed him on the counterpoint of violent and disturbing images that the American people could judge for themselves in Trump’s own words. ‘
New York Times TV critic James Poniewozik: While the riot unfolded, “everyone knew he was watching. They would have known even if he had not announced it. Donald Trump was an obsessive spectator of his own TV show. cover presidency, for hours a day. Of course he would be nailed for the next act. “

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