President Trump on Tuesday dismissed as “fake news” reports that his daughter and senior adviser Ivanka Trump may have violated federal law by using a personal email account to conduct government business.
In his first comments on the story, President Trump rejected parallels to his 2016 Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton‘s private email setup because he said his daughter’s emails did not contain classified information and she did not use an extensive home server.
“She wasn’t doing anything to hide her emails,” Trump said of his daughter while speaking to reporters at the White House.
The following article by Grace Bennett was posted on the Media Matters website October 1, 2017:
ABC’s This Week, CBS’ Face the Nation, CNN’s State of the Union, Fox’s Fox News Sunday, and NBC’s Meet the Press all failed to mention Jared Kushner and other Trump officials used private email accounts
The October 1 editions of all the Sunday political talk shows failed to discuss the news that several White House officials in the Trump administration used private email accounts to conduct official government business, making themselves vulnerable to espionage from foreign entities.
On September 25, TheNew York Timesreported that at least six White House advisors, including Steve Bannon and Reince Priebus, had used personal email accounts to conduct official government business. The Times’ story followed a Politicoreport that Jared Kushner, a senior advisor and President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, had used a private email account to conduct correspondence related to White House matters. Even though the story that White House advisors used personal email accounts for official business was reported several days ago, ABC’s This Week, CBS’ Face the Nation, CNN’s State of the Union, Fox Broadcasting Co.’s Fox News Sunday, and NBC’s Meet the Press all failed to discuss it during their Sunday morning broadcasts.
As the Timesnotes, “Officials are supposed to use government emails for their official duties so their conversations are available to the public and those conducting oversight.” According toPolitico, the National Security Agency (NSA) had “warned senior White House officials in classified briefings” against the “improper use of personal cellphones and email,” as it “could make them vulnerable to espionage” by foreign entities. By failing to discuss the news of the officials’ use of private accounts, Sunday political talk shows ignored a significant story and failed to inform their audiences of yet another example of the lack of transparency that has been an endemic in the Trump administration. The Sunday shows’ failure to report on officials’ use of personal email accounts is particularly shocking given the media’s obsessivefocus on Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server during her time as Secretary of State throughout the 2016 election.
Methodology:Media Matters searched SnapStream for mentions of “emails,” “private email server,” “personal email,” and “private server” on the October 1 editions of ABC’s This Week, CBS’ Face the Nation, CNN’s State of the Union, Fox Broadcasting Co.’s Fox News Sunday, and NBC’s Meet the Press.
