Skyrocketing Violence in Rahm Emanuel's Chicago Spins Out of Control, ABC, NBC Ignore

In Rahm Emanuel's Chicago, 13 people were shot in a violence-soaked 30 minute period, Thursday night. But ABC and NBC completely skipped the story on Friday's morning shows. The silence was particularly stark on Good Morning America. George Stephanopoulos is a close friend of Mayor Emanuel, the former chief of staff to Barack Obama. (Emanuel and Stephanopoulos worked together in the Clinton White House.)

Stephanopoulos interviewed Emanuel on the July 15 edition of This Week, but avoided discussing the uncomfortable fact of the city's skyrocketing murder rate. The AP reported on Friday: "Police say 13 people were shot and wounded in a 30-minute spate of violence in Chicago, including eight gunned down on a single street." 

Stephanopoulos has had no problem boosting his Democratic friend. On June 1, 2011, he seriously speculated about the mayor of the violence-plagued city running for president: "But, you know, if you do a good job here, a lot of Democrats are going to be talking about you to run for President in 2016."

CBS Evening News anchor Scott Pelley on Thursday did report on the general problem of crime in the city: "Gun violence is now an epidemic in Chicago. Just last night, there were eight shootings, two of them deadly, which brings the total this year to 351 shooting deaths, up 30 percent from last year."

Reporter Armen Keteyian revealed just how bad it is, asserting that drugs "are turning parts of this midwest city into a Mexican border town."

NBC's Nightly News on Thursday and Today on Friday also skipped Chicago's breathtaking violence.

Emanuel will be speaking at next month's Democratic National Convention. It seems likely that journalists such as Stephanopoulos will helpfully ignore the astonishing number of murders in the city he's leading.