Fox News host Shep Smith defends CNN after Donald Trump bans it from White House briefing
Donald Trump’s persecution of the media has now gone so far that one cable news network has taken to the airwaves to defend the integrity of its most hated rival. After the White House banned CNN and a number of other news outlets from a press briefing today simply because Trump doesn’t like them, Fox News host Shep Smith did an entire on-air segment defending CNN and criticizing Trump over the matter.
Shep Smith has previously used his Fox News on-air slot to defend CNN reporter Jim Acosta after Donald Trump shouted him down for trying ask a question during Trump’s first ever White House briefing. But after Trump made the historically unprecedented move today of banning CNN, the New York Times, Politico, The Huffington Post, BuzzFeed, and the Los Angeles Times from today’s briefing, Smith took more direct aim.
The Fox News host spelled out the editorial practices by which CNN had used in reporting its story about White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus pressuring the FBI over the Trump-Russia scandal, and he pointed out that they’re the same editorial standards which other major news outlets use in their reporting. As for Donald Trump’s ongoing insistence that CNN is “fake news,” Smith pushed back by asserting that “CNN’s reporting was not fake news.”
Considering how little love Fox News and CNN have historically had for each other, and how directly they compete for viewers and ratings, it’s nothing short of remarkable to hear a prominent Fox News host doing an on-air segment devoted to defending CNN. But in the Trump era, that’s where we’re now at. Watch Fox News host Shep Smith defend CNN live on-air:
