The national media is turning up the heat on President Trump less than two weeks from Election Day, labeling him a habitual liar on issues like immigration and taxes.
CNN has been particularly zealous in calling Trump out for what the network says are deliberate lies and falsehoods he “spreads” at his mega-rallies. The network aired a graphic multiple times Tuesday and Wednesday that said, “Trump spreads lies & stokes fears ahead of elections.”
The graphic appeared throughout the day Tuesday, including in the 7 a.m., 8 a.m., 9 a.m., 1 p.m., 2 p.m., and 3 p.m. hours. It was placed on screen the following day in the 6 a.m. hour.
[Also read: Trump blames the press for growing 'anger' in America]
Tell me again how @CNN isn't biased? @CNN went immediately from this........ pic.twitter.com/ZMA7VaamNu
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) October 23, 2018
CNN’s morning program “New Day” on Tuesday ran two segments on Trump’s “lies.”
“And President Trump is waging a fact-free campaign of fear ahead of the midterm elections that are now two weeks from today,” said anchor Alisyn Camerota introducing one of the segments.
“So, the fib is the feature; it's not a bug,” said co-anchor John Berman. “The falsehood, or in some cases, the lie is meant to scare you.”
CNN White House correspondent Abby Phillip said Trump was “hoping to drive Republicans out to the polls by stoking fears and misinformation about migrants.”
On MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” co-host Mika Brzezinski referred to “Trump’s lies about the caravan,” meaning the thousands of Central Americans en route to the U.S.-Mexico border.
Trump has used the caravan at his rallies to illustrate immigration problems and has blamed Democrats for its steady march to the border, where they’re expected to seek asylum.
“One lie after another lie after another lie. But I had a relative yesterday talking about this invasion of migrants coming and I had a college educated friend email me yesterday asking me how are we going to stop America’s borders from being invaded, ‘They’re coming, they’re coming,'” said co-host Joe Scarborough. “The lie’s working.”
Trump has made several claims dubbed as misleading or as lies, including that there are “Middle Easterners” in the migrant caravan; that there is “rioting” in California over so-called sanctuary cities, where law enforcement is instructed not to cooperate with federal authorities on immigration; and that there would be “major tax cuts” for middle-income people introduced before the midterm elections.
When asked to prove such assertions, Trump often challenges the news media to “look at” issues for their own evidence, or he adds more context, like when he said the “tax cut” would actually be only a proposal he would ask Congress to take up after the election.
Some claims by Trump may only be for rhetorical effect, as when he said at one rally that “Democrats want caravans. They like the caravans.”
CNN’s Brian Stelter wrote Monday that the attempt to fact-check the claim “proved … difficult” because Trump “has essentially provided no proof to back up his statement.”
On Tuesday, CNN’s Wolf Blitzer began his show, saying, “Call it what you will: embellishment, mischaracterizations, lies. President Trump’s penchant for storytelling is more evident than ever out on the campaign trail right now with exactly two weeks to go until the critical midterm elections.”
ABC News ran a piece Tuesday by senior producer Justin Fishel that said, “This week is about keeping up with all the false statements and empty promises” made by Trump.
And over the weekend, a New York Times article covered Trump’s hard-line immigration rhetoric using terms and phrases like “without offering any evidence”; “he has falsely blamed”; and “unfounded charges.”