Diversion and denial are the 2 key techniques of public family members. In response to the testimony of fired FBI Director James Comey the day before today, the proper wing media determined to cognizance on distractions.
Instead of protecting the president in opposition to allegations that he had obstructed a federal investigation, conservative outlets like Fox News spent most of their time on Thursday discussing peripheral troubles brought up at some stage in the listening to.
Which is a pretty damning choice.
Comey’s hearing, which dragged on for nearly 3 hours Thursday morning, contained some of the maximum adverse — and quotable — allegations yet towards the White House, consisting of a moment when the fired FBI director accused the management of spreading “lies, plain and easy.” The New York Times’s Peter Baker called the testimony “nearly simply the most damning j’accuse second via a senior regulation enforcement professional towards a president in an era.”
But there had been additionally a few thrilling occasions for Trump supporters: whilst Comey claimed that a New York Times story changed into “now not authentic”; whilst he threw Obama-era Attorney General Loretta Lynch under the bus; and most of all, when he showed that the FBI at the time turned into no longer without delay investigating Trump himself — simplest his pals — for collusion with Russia throughout the election.
These moments, although they had been not exactly news, gave the conservative media plenty to talk approximately on Thursday night and Friday morning. As the mainstream press targeted at the central query of Comey’s testimony — whether or not the president had interfered with the FBI’s Russia probe — right-wing shops in large part sidestepped that rely.
Most of the outright denials, as an alternative, have come from the White House itself. On Thursday, Trump attorney Marc Kasowitz issued the management’s respectable reaction, an assertion that basically called Comey a liar, claiming that Trump in no way attempted to extract a loyalty oath or to persuade the Russia investigation.
The typo-ridden Kasowitz letter becomes extensively panned even on Fox News. “I do not suppose it resonated with any folks, even people who wish the president properly,” stated Andrew Napolitano, a Trump ally, on a panel straight away following the listening to. Meghan McCain added that this was similarly proof that Trump needed to “easy house with his crew, especially all people in his communications branch.”
“They have were given to get some adults who know what they’re doing inside the room,” she stated.
But did conservative stores do any higher at defending the president? On Friday morning, Trump seemed to approve of his allies within the right-wing media. “Great reporting by means of @foxandfriends and such a lot of others,” he tweeted. “Thank you!”
Yet at numerous points on Thursday, Fox News pundits briefly conceded that Comey’s testimony did improve extreme allegations against Trump. “You have a very credible and compelling argument that the president of America has now not been truthful with the American people and ordered the director of the FBI to close down and research,” Napolitano said.
