THE DAILY NEWSLETTER - WEDNESDAY, APRIL 28, 2021

Media Winners & Losers

MEDIA WINNER:
Juan Williams

Fox News host Juan Williams slammed coverage of two news stories that spread around conservative media this week — and received ample airtime on Fox News — which ultimately turned out to be false.

During a segment on allegations that John Kerry discussed Israeli intelligence with Iran, Williams brought up the false reports that received coverage in the “right wing echo-chamber.”

Williams said he was “worried” about covering the Kerry story, suggesting it could end up proving just as false as the others.

Williams said: “Last week we had the hamburger story, ‘Oh, Biden is going to take your hamburger.’ Kamala Harris’ book is being given to immigrants. These stories are false, but the right-wing echo chamber starts going crazy because you can go after a Democrat!”

“Well I guess they learned from the best,” The Five co-host Greg Gutfeld replied, suggesting the right has learned from the left about how to hype false stories.

Gutfeld and Williams clashed even more awkwardly on the subject of crime.

It's often Juan Williams' role to being contrary or the lone critic. The unimpeachable shot in this case, though, really left no rejoinder save snark. That's a clean win.

MEDIA LOSER:
Laura Italiano

The reporter who wrote a false story about books by Vice President Kamala Harris being handed out to children at a migrant shelter resigned on Tuesday, alleging she was forced to write the story and that it was her “breaking point.”

The report falsely claimed that copies of a children’s book by Harris were being given to migrant children at a shelter in Long Beach, California as part of “welcome kits.” It was on the front page of the New York Post on Saturday, and blew up in conservative media.

As we wrote in yesterday's Green Room, that story was deleted after a WaPo fact-check found just one of Harris’s books was donated to the shelter, by a local, as part of a book drive. A heavily revised version of the story was reposted later on Tuesday, along with an editor’s note.

In a series of tweets, Laura Italiano, the author of the report, announced her resignation.

“An announcement: Today I handed in my resignation to my editors at the New York Post,” she wrote. “The Kamala Harris story — an incorrect story I was ordered to write and which I failed to push back hard enough against — was my breaking point.”

How it shakes out, with finger-pointing now underway, remains to be seen. But it has not been a good week for the reporter.

The A-Block

DC Cop Beaten in ‘Savage’ Capitol Attack Condemns ‘Dangerous’ Whitewashing of Riot in Emotional Interview With Don Lemon

DC Metropolitan Police Officer Michael Fanone, who was beaten, Tased, and had his gear torn off his chest by the mob of Trump supporters that stormed the U.S. Capitol on January 6 spoke to CNN’s Don Lemon for a powerful interview on Tuesday night.

An emotional Don Lemon started the interview by saying he had become friends with Fanone since getting to know him in the aftermath of the attack.

Fanone said he has been experiencing “PTSD and emotional trauma” in the months since January 6.

The officer, who said at one point rioters called to shoot him with his own gun, decried the “whitewashing” of the bloody attack by former President Donald Trump and his supporters.

“It’s been very difficult seeing elected officials and other individuals kind of whitewash the events of that day or downplay what happened,” Fanone said.

While he didn’t mention Trump by name, he referenced the former president’s claim that the rioters were “hugging and kissing” police.

Fanone said that characterization “is very different from what I experienced, what my co-workers experienced, on the 6th.”

Lemon asked Fanone to respond to rhetoric casting the rioters as harmless patriots.

“I think it’s dangerous,” Fanone said. “I experienced a group of individuals that were trying to kill me to accomplish their goal.”

Fanone had to pause as he grew emotional, apologizing to Lemon.

“I experienced the most brutal, savage hand to hand combat of my entire life,” he continued. “Let alone my policing career, which spans almost two decades.”

Fanone described himself as apolitical, saying that aside from presidential elections every four years, “the rest of the time I don’t give a f*ck.” Still, he said Trump’s rhetoric was to blame for the attack.

Lemon aired footage of Fanone being dragged into the mob on the steps of the Capitol Building, a moment the officer described as similar to being held down by waves as a kid.

“They just started attacking me from all directions,” Fanone said. “It was overwhelming. I felt like they were trying to kill me.”

This is one of the most powerful interviews on the January 6th insurrection that you'll see. It is an important story, and handled brilliantly by Lemon. A must watch.



In Other News...

Meghan McCain Accuses The View of Ignoring Pro-Conservative Topics in Scorching Rant on Media Bias

Hunter Biden to Lecture Tulane University Students About 'Fake News'

April Ratings: Fox News Returns to Dominance, But All Networks See Steep Declines From Last Year

Fingerless Suspect Gets Fingered: Police Arrest Man Who Allegedly Left Severed Digit at Scene of the Crime

HOWE: CNN’s New Day Claims to be Straight News, But Adopts Dunks-and-Owns Format

Must See Clip

The 'Good' Side of Slavery?

A hearing erupted in laughter the other day when one Republican legislator was compelled to tell another that “There’s no ‘good’ to slavery, though.”

The good, the bad, the ugly... hmm, wait a second.

Think. THEN talk. But first, WATCH.

Links We Like

Price Tag For Biden’s New Spending Now $46,321 Per American Household
- Dan McLaughlin, National Review
Biden to Unveil Sweeping Plan to Congress, GOP Sends Lone Black Senator as Tribute
- Stephen A. Crockett Jr., The Root
Why I'll Keep Running With My Mask On
- Jeva Lange, The Week
Coronavirus Has Crushed India’s Health System. Patients Are On Their Own
- Joanna Slater, Niha Masih and Shams Irfan, Washington Post
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