Recent stories on ABC’s World News Tonight have shown conflicting takes on whether global warming has caused the current hurricane season – the first story supporting the theory, the second story (with a different anchor and reporter) dismissing global warming’s role. On World News Tonight Saturday on July 9, anchor Dan Harris relayed that scientists are wondering whether global warming is responsible for the early creation of strong hurricanes in the Atlantic Ocean. While introducing a story by reporter John Berman detailing the predictions of scientists that there will be stronger hurricanes in the future due to global warming, Harris introduced the story by saying, “Scientists have been surprised by the intensity of recent storm systems, and they're wondering whether global warming may be playing a role.” (Berman’s report itself did not specifically address the issue of whether the current hurricanes have been affected by global warming, but instead focused on predictions that future hurricanes will be stronger due to global warming.) Last Friday, six days later, on the July 15 broadcast, reporter Jeffrey Kofman filed a story detailing several converging factors that are causing the recent strong storms, at the end of which he concluded: "Scientists say this is not because of global warming, it is simply a lot of cyclical climate patterns conspiring to create the perfect conditions for a long season of perfect storms."

On Monday night, July 18, Keith Olbermann mocked the NRA’s executive vice president, Wayne LaPierre, because of LaPierre’s criticism of Columbus, Ohio’s recently-passed assault weapons ban. On his Countdown program, Olbermann has a regular segment called the “Worst Person in the World” in which he introduces three nominees for the dishonor – the first nominee labeled as “worse,” the second nominee labeled as “worser,” and the third nominee labeled as “worst.” Olbermann bestowed upon LaPierre the distinction of “worser” as detailed in the below quote from last night’s show: