CNN anchor Jake Tapper took no kindess on Friday to President Donald Trump’s announcement that he was “banning” CNN, MS NOW and Politico “from the White House, … effective immediately.”
There was no indication the Trump administration had taken steps to follow through on the ban. CNN reporters were not escorted from their White House workspace near the briefing room later on Friday, nor was the CNN team traveling Friday with Vice President JD Vance removed from the reporters’ pool.
But Tapper had no mercy for what he called Trump’s “unconstitutional” ban.
“He wants the news to bend,” said Tapper. “… Let's remember that earlier he defined ‘fake news’ as purposely negative stories. That's ‘fake news’ to him. He wasn't talking about stories that are inaccurate. He started talking about stories that are not positive.”
Tapper made note to report Trump said “more [was] to come,” and he talked about the Washington Post and the New York times, both of which he repeatedly called “fake news.” Tapper did not hesitate to bring up examples of certain newspaper owners kowtowing to Trump through settlement payments or some other means yet still suffering the president’s enmity.
“I think it's interesting, just as an object lesson,” said Tapper. “Jeff Bezos took over the Washington Post. Jeff Bezos made changes to the Washington Post, we believe — although it's never been established as clear fact — to curry more favor with the president. It doesn't matter how much you kowtow to the president, whether you're ABC writing the check for $16 million or CBS (Paramount) writing the check for $16 million or Jeff Bezos doing it. Unless you are 100 percent positive (about Trump) you know the bill is going to come due.”
Tapper made no mention, however, of Trump’s media manipulation plan for MAGA elements to purchase CNN’s parent company and twist it into a MAGA-styled version similar to the recent conversion of Paramount. Trump, himself, made clear his plan while speaking to Tapper in an earlier interview while discussing the death of Sen. Lindsey Graham.
“Sure,” responded Trump in answer to Tapper’s invite for additional call-in interviews. “We're trying to have CNN go on a normal path.”
“I’m on the normal path right here, sir,” Tapper replied.
“Good,” said Trump. “You are.”
Political analyst Dan Pfeiffer commented on the exchange, saying “Trump says ‘WE are trying to get CNN to go down a normal path.’ He is admitting on live television that the FCC’s approval of Paramount Skydance’s acquisition was part of a corrupt plan to make CNN more MAGA-friendly.”
As Pfeiffer explained: “David Ellison, the pro-Trump billionaire who owns Paramount, reportedly made promises to Trump to change CNN’s news coverage and on-air lineup. And this is exactly what Ellison did when he acquired CBS News.”
On Friday, Tapper cited the Obama White House saying Fox News was not a legitimate news organization, and they tried to get them excluded from a pool interview, but “all the networks said, ‘no, you can't do that. It doesn't matter if you don't like what they report.’”
“It'll be interesting to see if Fox repeats that same kind of affirmation,” Tapper said.
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