While cutting off Trump’s fraud speech was the right thing to do, there is still a case for balanced journalism
Where were you when a US president stood up and claimed his own country’s election was corrupt – and media organisations simply cut him off because he had no evidence for any of his mad, rambling allegations? After so many years of Donald Trump spreading misinformation and manipulating the media, it felt like a historic turning point and a huge relief.
MSNBC halted its livestream, with host Brian Williams saying Trump’s Thursday night speech was “not rooted in reality and … dangerous”; USA Today did the same and removed the video from its platforms saying, “Our job is to spread the truth – not unfounded conspiracies.” CNN, which stayed with the White House speech until the end, called it “sad, pathetic and dangerous”. Its anchor Anderson Cooper then described Trump as “an obese turtle on his back flailing in the hot sun realising his time is over” – a line that lit up my social media timeline and WhatsApp groups as “the TV moment of the election”.
