Tag: Trump attack on media

In Economic Warning Signals, Trump Sees Signs of a Conspiracy

New York Times logoPresident Trump, confronting perhaps the most ominous economic signs of his time in office, has unleashed what is by now a familiar response: lashing out at what he believes is a conspiracy of forces arrayed against him.

He has insisted that his own handpicked Federal Reserve chair, Jerome H. Powell, is intentionally acting against him. He has said other countries, including allies, are working to hurt American economic interests. And he has accused the news media of trying to create a recession.

“The Fake News Media is doing everything they can to crash the economy because they think that will be bad for me and my re-election,” Mr. Trump tweeted last week. “The problem they have is that the economy is way too strong and we will soon be winning big on Trade, and everyone knows that, including China!”

View the complete August 18 article by Maggie Haberman on The New York Times website here.

Trump criticizes media amid growing criticism of his handling of Putin

The following article by Brett Samuels was posted on the Hill website July 17, 2018:

Faced with growing bipartisan criticism of his performance at a summit with Russian leader Vladimir Putin, President Trump on Tuesday blamed the media for unfair coverage of the meeting.

In a series of tweets, Trump blasted the media and touted the economy in response to a day of negative coverage about the summit, where the U.S. president appeared to take Putin’s word that Russia didn’t interfere in the 2016 election over the findings of his own intelligence agencies.

“While I had a great meeting with NATO, raising vast amounts of money, I had an even better meeting with Vladimir Putin of Russia,” Trump tweeted.

“Sadly, it is not being reported that way – the Fake News is going Crazy!” he added.

View the complete article on the Hill website here.

‘Fake News,’ Trump’s Obsession, Is Now a Cudgel for Strongmen

The following article by Steven Erlanger was posted on the New York Times website December 12, 2017:

President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, center, answers questions at the Gostiny Dvor studio during the annual “Direct Line with Vladimir Putin broadcast live” by Russian TV channels and radio stations in Moscow in June. Credit Mikhail Klimentiev/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

BRUSSELS — President Trump routinely invokes the phrase “fake news” as a rhetorical tool to undermine opponents, rally his political base and try to discredit a mainstream American media that is aggressively investigating his presidency.

But he isn’t the only leader enamored with the phrase. Following Mr. Trump’s example, many of the world’s autocrats and dictators are taking a shine to it, too.

When Amnesty International released a report about prison deaths in Syria, the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, retorted that “we are living in a fake-news era.” President Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela, who is steadily rolling back democracy in his country, blamed the global media for “lots of false versions, lots of lies,” saying “this is what we call ‘fake news’ today.” Continue reading “‘Fake News,’ Trump’s Obsession, Is Now a Cudgel for Strongmen”

James B. Comey tweeted about freedom of the press — minutes after Trump attacked CNN

The following article by Justine Phillips was posted on the Washington Post website November 26, 2017:

President Trump and former FBI director James B. Comey. (Evan Vucci, left, and Susan Walsh/AP)

Former FBI director James B. Comey’s latest tweet was a defense of the press — a quote from Thomas Jefferson’s Jan. 28, 1786, letter from Paris to physician James Currie.

“Our liberty depends on the freedom of the press, and that cannot be limited without being lost,” Comey tweeted Saturday evening along with a picture of the Capitol.

Lifting a quote from a 200-year-old letter that Jefferson had written to the doctor who treated Lucy Elizabeth Jefferson, his daughter, and tweeting it may seem random and innocuous on the surface, but its timing suggests otherwise. Continue reading “James B. Comey tweeted about freedom of the press — minutes after Trump attacked CNN”