MSNBC host Lawrence O’Donnell is not happy with the cable news networks, including his own, after they aired former president Donald Trump‘s press conference live on Thursday (August 8) without fact-checking his lies.
On Thursday’s edition of The Last Word, O’Donnell tore into MSNBC and other networks for their coverage, saying they are making the exact same mistakes as during the 2016 presidential race, which saw Trump defeat Hillary Clinton to become United States president.
“It was 2016 all over again today,” O’Donnell said at the top of the show. “Donald Trump spoke at his home in Florida for over an hour and all of the cable news networks, including this one, carried it live just like they all did repeatedly in 2016.”
He continued, “It would be hard to find a sentence in what Donald Trump said today that did not include at least one lie. Some of the networks tried to play catchup with fact-checking after Donald Trump finished speaking, but that, of course, is way too late and utterly useless. No network even attempted to fact-check every lie Donald Trump told.”
O’Donnell went on to say that every network “has the capacity” to “run a live scroll at the side of the screen fact-checking” Trump’s lies. “Not all of them, that would be impossible,” he added, “but many of them as he speaks.”
What frustrated the news anchor even more was that “none of the networks – none of them – carried Kamala Harris’ speech live after the Trump appearance. None of them.”
Blasting his own network MSNBC, O’Donnell stated, “This network brought you the last few minutes of Kamala Harris’ speech live, but was actually doing Olympics coverage when the speech began and kept doing it.”
In order to “correct that mistake,” O’Donnell told viewers “we will be presenting to you in full, and unedited as if live, everything that Kamala Harris said today in her speech in Michigan, which all of the networks knew was coming, they knew what time it was coming, they knew how to cover it live, and they didn’t, after giving Donald Trump more than an hour of live coverage on all of their networks.”
O’Donnell later tweeted a link to his full opening monologue, adding, “What I said tonight was a muted version of what I was actually feeling, even when I threw the script which surprised me too.”
Here’s the whole thing. What I said tonight was a muted version of what I was actually feeling, even when I threw the script which surprised me too. https://t.co/lmypzkHfPh— Lawrence O’Donnell (@Lawrence) August 9, 2024
Viewers appreciated O’Donnell’s honesty and took to social media to thank him for speaking his mind.
“You gave a Master Class tonight on how journalism is supposed to be. If everyone in the MSM (mainstream media) did what you did, trump wouldnt have gotten within 100 miles of the WH the first time,” one fan wrote.
Another added, “You sir are a legend. Thank you for calling out the press for weak when it comes to Donold Trump.”
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“Appreciate the energy, Lawrence. It’s time to stop giving that man ANY benefit of the doubt or leniency. He’s abused the public trust at every turn and does not deserve it. It needs to be called out all day, every day, until he fades into obscurity,” said another.
“Thank you, @Lawrence. I am so grateful for your voice on the air. It’s so very much needed,” wrote one commenter.
Another said, “Bravo, thank you ! We have a press that is failing us, keep up the pressure.”
The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell, Weeknights, 10/9c, MSNBC
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