Media boost security as Trump ramps up ‘enemy’ rhetoric

The following article by Jason Schwartz was posted on the Politico website August 9, 2018:

TV networks are employing security guards at the president’s high-octane rallies.

Videos from President Trump’s Make America Great Again Rally in Florida on July 31 captured Trump supporters yelling and chanting at journalists and trying to disrupt a live shot by CNN’s Jim Acosta. Credit: Joe Raedlekk, Getty Images

Notebooks, mics, cameras, hairspray — those are all things TV reporters are used to having with them at political rallies. Now, in the age of President Donald Trump, they’ve added another: security guards.

The networks are employing them, according to reporters, at Trump’s high-octane political rallies, where the media often serves as the No. 1 rhetorical punching bag.

Last weekend, NBC News White House correspondent Geoff Bennett posted a picture on Instagram of himself with a member of the NBC security detail at Trump’s Ohio rally, commenting, “We need security guards when covering rallies hosted by the President of the United States. Let that sink in.” Meanwhile, ABC News reporter Tara Palmeri tweeted and wrote about covering the Ohio rally, “for the first time with a bodyguard.”

View the complete article here.