Saturday may have been the first day in Donald Trump's presidency when members of the leftist press which so despises him looked forward to going into work.
You see, people from those nations affected by Trump's travel ban were in transit to the U.S., and certain conflict awaited. The media surely must have thought they had a strong candidate for designated victim in Iraqi Hameed Khalid Darweesh, especially since his ability to escape temporary detention at JFK Airport in New York City was the result of an ACLU action. Boy, were they wrong. Naturally, William Mathis at the Associated Press failed to accurately report what happened. This is 2017, AP. It's on video.
Mathis described a meeting between Darweesh and reporters thusly (bolds are mine throughout this post):
The detainees in New York included two Iraqis who had previously been given permission to come to the U.S. because of their ties to the U.S. military.
One of them, Hameed Khalid Darweesh, who had worked as an interpreter for the U.S. Army after it invaded Iraq in 2003, emerged from custody to cheers from the crowd in the mid-afternoon.
He pronounced the U.S. "the land of freedom" home to "the greatest people in the world" upon his release, but also expressed dismay about having been initially held.
Now let's go to the tape from CNN, and see if the "dismay" Mathis described was really present, and if the AP reporter might have chosen to ignore anything else significant:
Transcript (Darweesh's English is broken and not easily understood, but overall, it's clear enough; the "reporters" identified below are different people):
HAMEED KHALID DARWEESH: First of all, I want to thank the people that take care of me and support me.They leave their family, their business, and come to support me. This is a humanity. This is the soul of America. And this is what pushed me to move, to leave my country and come here.
And I’m very, very thankful to all of the people who have come to support me. Thank you very much. And always when we are (not clear) now, we know America is the land of freedom. The land of freedom, the land of the rights. So this is what brought me too came here and I’m very thankful, and I’m very happy.
Really, I forget (not clear) ... what happened to me, for (not clear) ... those people.
REPORTER: You’re free now.
REPORTER: Hameed, what do you think of America?
DARWEESH: America is the greatest nation, the greatest people of the world.
(A few people start cheering)
REPORTER: What do you think about Donald Trump? (Question gets repeated by a different reporter.)
DARWEESH: I like him, but I don't know, this is a policy. He’s the president, I’m a normal person.
But I have a special immigration Visa in my passport, me and my family, because I work with the U.S. Government, I support the U.S. Government on the other side of the world. But when I came here, they say "no" and they treat me as I break the rules or do something wrong. That surprised me. Really I surprised.
REPORTER: How does that make you feel?
DARWEESH: I’m happy because I have you, you Americans.
Well, imagine that:
- There was absolutely nothing which could conceivably be construed as "dismay" — which is (take your pick) "sudden or complete loss of courage, utter disheartenment"; "sudden disillusionment"; or agitation of mind; perturbation; alarm" — in Darweesh's statements, or his demeanor. "Surprise" is not "dismay." The AP's Mathis made up at story of "dismay" so that Darweesh could be at least partially portrayed as a victim.
- Darweesh said he likes Donald Trump. According to Mathis and AP, that wasn't newsworthy.
- Some people cheered when Darweesh said that "America is the greatest nation, the greatest people of the world." Though they reported the initial cheers upon Darweesh's release, Mathis and AP deemed the patriotic cheers not newsworthy.
It would appear that even the AP's beat reporters outside of Washington are nursing a temper tantrum over the wire service's loss of its formerly automatic selection to ask the first question at White House press conferences. Readers who review two NewsBusters posts from earlier this week, the first relating to the wire service's coverage of Trump's first two business days in office, and the second covering AP's pathetic attempt to smear LifeZette, which was selected for Tuesday first press conference question, demonstrate just how childish and petty these people have become. The rule, for now, appears to be that nothing positive about Donald Trump can appear in an AP dispatch.
The press will surely find a few very loud and outraged people affected by Trump's selective travel ban, but Mrs. Darweesh's interview will at least serve as a partial antidote to the wailing and gnashing of teeth which are sure to come.
Exit question: Why wasn't there similar media outrage when outgoing President Barack Obama immediately ended of the "wet foot, dry foot" policy which gave legal status to Cubans who manage to reach the U.S., stranding hundreds, if not more, in Mexico — especially given that those who are being forced to return to Cuba who were previously seen as dissidents by the Communist Castro regime run a significant risk of imprisonment?
Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.
