If an insurrection happened and no one reported on it, did it really happen? Can the perpetrators of violence escape accountability if it escaped the notice of the corporate media? These questions were put to the test as the corporate media conducted a virtual blackout of Saturday night’s violent protests outside the White House.
Here’s a succinct recap as seen on Sunday’s edition of The Big Weekend Show on Fox News:
GUY BENSON: Our colleague Lucas Tomlinson live at the White House tonight where President Biden is managing several crises here at home and abroad. Lucas.
LUCAS TOMLINSON: And Guy, one of those crises was right here at the White House, outside the gates. It got a little noisy here last night as thousands of anti-Israel protesters showed up yelling “F- Joe Biden” and “long live the intifada”. Let's just take a listen here at what it looked like. The Park Service scrambled Eagle, its helicopter, to monitor the protest high above the White House. The Secret Service donned riot gear and ordered the evacuation of reporters from the North Lawn and any White House staff working while the president was at Camp David. They also spray-painted “Genocide Joe” on the statue of General Rochambeau, who led French forces against the British during the American Revolution, of course.
A short and sweet summary the day after, with broader coverage the night of on Fox News. In sum, a large anti-Israel protest ended up at the White House, which resulted in several arrests, a near-breach of the fence outside the White House, with media and non-essential White House personnel being evacuated.
The scene was eerily reminiscent of the attack on the White House during the fiery but mostly peaceful George Floyd riot in Washington, D.C., which resulted in President Donald Trump being evacuated to the White House bunker, and multiple injuries among Secret Service personnel and other law enforcement personnel.
How did the other networks cover the calls for an intifada outside the White House, you ask? Here’s a quick rundown.
ABC: Absolutely nothing on Saturday night. Nothing on Good Morning America, ABC This Week, or World News Tonight.
CBS: A brief report on the daytime (less violent) portion of the march, replete with overhead shots on Saturday’s Weekend News. Nothing on Sunday Morning, Face The Nation, or Sunday Weekend News.
NBC: Nothing on the Nightly News or Meet The Press.
Absolute zero on the networks.
As for CNN, they went out of their way to suppress news of the riots. Afternoon coverage ran with a daytime video package of the D.C. protest filed by correspondent Gabe Cohen.
Jim Acosta did go live with brief reports of the night-time confrontations along the security fence, with reporting from Priscilla Alvarez. But once Acosta went off the air, CNN went back to the Gabe Cohen daytime package. The scary stuff disappeared.
To recap: the media went out of their way to avoid covering a violent pro-Hamas protest at the White House. Reasonable persons may conclude that, by blacking out Saturday night’s events, they actively participated in an insurrection. Paging Merrick Garland.
