Yes, there’s a huge anti-Trump media bias

Last Friday, I had the opportunity to chat on Q13 FOX about the pulse of President Trump supporters and Republicans in general. The topic of media bias came up and I wanted to explore it more here.

I wasn’t a Trump supporter during the presidential campaign and I ended up writing in a candidate for president. But I’ve grown more sympathetic to Trump based on how unhinged media members have become in their coverage. Some of them express their bias explicitly, others do it subtly. Many do it unnecessarily.

RELATED: Seattle minimum wage study appears insanely biased

When President Trump incorrectly stated that President Obama didn’t call the families of fallen soldiers, rather than do a standard report on the statement being false, the New York Times lied about the statement from Trump.

Trump said: “If you look at President Obama and other presidents, most of them didn’t make calls. A lot of them didn’t make calls. I like to call when it’s appropriate.”

The title of the New York Times piece on the topic? “Trump Falsely Claims Obama Didn’t Contact Families of Fallen Troops.” This is an unnecessary lie informed by the writer’s bias. Trump never claimed Obama didn’t have contact with families. Trump very specifically said some presidents wrote letters. So why are we going from “phone calls” to “contact” when you can just as easily be accurate and still call out the president?

Over the weekend, CNN decided to fact check a tweet by Trump and, true to form, CNN botched it with their bias. It was a fact-check that turned into an op-ed because CNN is incapable of actual journalism anymore.

Just out report: “United Kingdom crime rises 13% annually amid spread of Radical Islamic terror.” Not good, we must keep America safe!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 20, 2017

I can’t fact-check the quote by Trump because it’s unsourced. But the content of the quote is correct. The only way to say it’s false is to bring in a context not presented by the president and that’s what CNN decided to do.

According to James Masters and Richard Allen Greene: “President Donald Trump incorrectly suggested there is a link Friday between rising crime rates in the United Kingdom and the ‘spread of Radical Islamic terror.'”

They contend:

But although Trump was correct in asserting that there had been a 13 percent rise in “victim-based crime” in the UK in the year ending June 2017 compared to the year before, there was no evidence that the rise was linked to “Radical Islamic terror.”

The Office for National Statistics — which compiled the report, “Crime in England and Wales: year ending June 2017” — told CNN it did not draw any link between the rise in “victim-based crime” and “Radical Islamic terror.

Much like Trump, CNN writers ascribe a quote out of context. Trump didn’t use the term “victim-based crime” but CNN claims he did. That allows CNN to change the context of the quote. Trump also didn’t say the Office for National Statistics claimed a link. Trump isn’t even directly saying there’s a link. He’s saying the crime rate rose “amid” the spread of terrorism. And he’s right. How do I know? Ironically, CNN gives us the context.

CNN reports: “the number of attempted murders rose by 59 percent, the report found, with 69 percent of that increase a result of the two terror attacks.”

In other words, the 13 percent rise “amid” the spread of terrorism.

Trump’s statement, overall, is true. So why ascribe words Trump didn’t use? Media bias. The fact check changes tones to attack the president for his weak response to Charlottesville. They write:

Last month, he railed against “loser terrorists” behind the London Tube explosion and suggested that the perpetrator was known to authorities and recruited on the Internet, prompting British Prime Minister Theresa May and a London police spokesperson to publicly rebuke the President.
And in June, soon after news reports surfaced about the London Bridge terror attacks, he seized on the moment to promote the travel ban.

In contrast, the President has been less willing to condemn domestic terrorist incidents in the US, most notably the white supremacist protests in Charlottesville, Virginia, over the summer that left one woman dead.

It’s unnecessary to make things up while fact checking or criticizing the president. Yet members of the media can’t help themselves.

This reads like an editorial, which is what this article became. The writers couldn’t help themselves. They’re informed by a bias. And this bias is backfiring. It’s created sympathizer out of former Never Trumpers and its helped, I’d argue, create the record-breaking small donor contributions to the RNC.

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