RUSH: There’s another controversy that happened yesterday, and that is the White House told a CNN infobabe, Kaitlan Collins, that she was disinvited from a Rose Garden event, the reporter claiming it was because the White House didn’t appreciate the inappropriate questions that she asked.
The White House decision came after Kaitlan Collins of CNN called out several questions of President Trump following an Oval Office photo-op with President Trump and the European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker. As the photo-op was coming to a close and the press was being escorted out, some of the reporters, including Kaitlan Collins, began screaming questions at Trump. They sounded like braying jackasses. The look on Juncker’s face as this took place was priceless.
And, by the way, these situations, these Oval Office photo-ops, they are traditionally no questions. I actually think, folks, I think CNN and all of the rest of them, I think they’ve actually wanted to get a White House reporter kicked off the detail. I think they’ve been angling for it. I think it’s a great story for ’em. I think they’ve been trying to get kicked out. I think Jim Acosta has been trying to get kicked out. I think they’ve been trying to behave in such a way as to get kicked out so that they would have that story and be able to run with that story.
And they do. They now have it. Kaitlan Collins was called into the meeting with Bill Shine, now the director of the comms shop, where she was told, “Sorry, you’re being disinvited.” Now, the White House said we didn’t disinvite CNN. We disinvited her. We said anybody else that you want. Well, this led to a statement of solidarity being issued by Fox News. Fox News issued a statement of solidarity with CNN, and with reporters in general, condemning this action by the White House communications office. That happens to be audio sound bite number 15.
This is Ellison Barber, and it was last night on Fox News @ Night with Shannon Bream. Also Bret Baier issued a statement of solidarity with CNN claiming Fox stood with CNN on this, didn’t approve of the White House action. This is correspondent Ellison Barber reporting about banning Kaitlan Collins and CNN and all that. Here’s that.
BARBER: As per Fox News, we stand with Kaitlan Collins and CNN on this. In a statement Fox News president Jay Wallace said, quote, “We stand in strong solidarity with CNN for the right to full access for our journalist as part of a free and unfettered press.”
RUSH: Okay, fine and dandy. I can imagine a number of you are a little mad at Fox for running so fast here to join CNN and so forth. You understand it, don’t you, or do you not understand it? (interruption) You understand why Fox was so quick to do this? You…? (interruption) You…? (interruption) You…? (interruption) Well, what’s the theory, then? Tell me what do you think.(interruption) Mmm-hmm. Mmm-hmm. Mmm-hmm. (interruption) All right. Okay. As a professional courtesy, the theory is that they have to do this, that Fox is already embarrassed that they’re the president’s network.
They’re already embarrassed that Fox is the president’s favorite network, and if they don’t stand up in solidarity with this banned CNN infobabe, this is gonna really look bad. Maybe so. I’ll just tell you this. Even though Fox thinks they’ve done the right thing, and even though they’ve issued this statement of joint solidarity, it isn’t gonna change the way CNN reports on Fox an iota. It isn’t gonna change a thing about the way the rest of the Drive-Bys report on, look at, and discuss Fox! Now, I don’t know if the intention was to change that, but it isn’t going to.
But, ladies and gentlemen, there is another side to this story. I want to go back to the archive, to the Grooveyard of Forgotten Sound Bites. This was June 15, 2012, just a little over six years ago. It was in the Rose Garden, interestingly enough. President Barack Hussein O, The One, was president, and this was a no-questions-asked availability. Obama was speaking about the Department of Homeland Security’s announcement that it would stop deporting illegal immigrants who come to the country at a young age. Everybody in the press pool was told, “No questions, no questions, no questions.” But that didn’t stop Neil Munro of the Daily Caller, who shouted a question to Obama.
Here it is…
OBAMA: This is a temporary stopgap measure that lets us focus our resources wisely while giving a degree of relief and hope to talented, driven, patriotic young people. It is the —
MUNRO: (interrupting)
OBAMA: (angrily) It is the right thing t’do!
MUNRO: Is it the right thing to do for American workers?
OBAMA: (angrily) Excuse me, sir. It’s not time for questions, sir. (stammering)
MUNRO: Are you going to take questions?
OBAMA: Not while I’m speakin’!
RUSH: So Neil Munro is out there shouting a question, “Is it the right thing to do?” Neil Munro (paraphrased exchange), “Favor foreigners over American workers? Is that what you’re doing? You’re favoring foreigners?” “Excuse me, sir, it’s not time for questions,” and then Munro shouts something else. He says, “Are you gonna take questions?” Obama says, “Not while I’m speaking!” So what do you think happened? Do you remember what happened?
The press corps itself chased this guy all the way to the Washington Monument. They ran him out of the event. They told him that he was an embarrassment to the press corps. They made a move to never let him back into the White House correspondence pool here covering the action at the White House. They literally chased the guy out of the Rose Garden, and here is a montage we put together of journalists talking about how rude the behavior was on the part of Neil Munro, and we start with Julian Epstein.
JULIAN EPSTEIN: (outdoor noise) Would the right wing be doing this if we had a white president there?
DON LEMON: They don’t treat him with the same respect that they would treat a white man in that position.
MICHAEL ERIC DYSON: Does it have anything to do with the fact that this is the nation’s first black president and the level of disrespect is alarming and stunning?
JOE WILLIAMS: It’s very, very difficult to place race outside of this context.
DEAN OBEIDALLAH: This is a campaign to delegitimize the presidency — and, to me, I think race is a component.
ELIJAH CUMMINGS: The same thing is happening with our attorney general. These are two men who are doing outstanding jobs. Uh, but there are folks who just don’t like it.
RUSH: So, you see, this kind of rude behavior on the part of the journalist Neil Munro? No, no, no! That’s not part of the God-given constitutional right of the First Amendment and the free press and all that. No, no, no. Instead, this was racism! This was a reporter refusing to respect the no-questions rule because he’s white and Obama’s black. But I’m not kidding, folks. The press, when Munro asked this question, they blew up at the guy — and some of them did chase him out of the Rose Garden. He literally had to run away. Now, you compare that with yesterday.
So here’s another one of these times where it’s traditionally no questions, it’s in the Oval Orifice, and this CNN infobabe, “Uh, Mr. President! Mr. President! Are you still gonna separate families or you don’t care about that anymore?” Something like that. They applaud her, and they want to give her a new honor or a new award or some such thing. Replace Trump’s defaced star in the Hollywood Walk of Fame with one for her. (interruption) No. This is not even hypocrisy. This is just…
Well, I mean, it is hypocrisy, but it’s more than that. So a whenever a reporter violated (unintelligible) and interrupted Obama it was racism. But when Kaitlan Connor, Kaitlan whatever her name is… When she interrupted Trump, why, that was valorous. That’s what journalists are supposed to do. Journalists aren’t supposed to recognize these no-questions rules. Journalists are supposed to ask any time they can. They’re supposed to hold power accountable to the truth, and that’s all she was doing.
So they’re not consistent with this.