Even after radical left-wing groups vandalized news buildings, they still get defended by their friends in the media. After NBC scoffed at President Trump for calling out Antifa agitators Sunday, MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell complained on her show Monday that the president was “cherry picking” Antifa to “go after his political enemies.”
The host not only defended Antifa but also claimed without evidence, that it was actually the "right wing" at these demonstrations to blame for the violence, instead.
Mitchell first brought up this argument to New York Times’ White House Correspondent Peter Baker. She fretted that President Trump was “politicizing intelligence” when “in fact, there is more white supremacist outside agitation involved" (she added the "right wing" later on):
Our own Frank Figliuzzi, our contributor who was at the FBI for years and now is one of our counterterror and justice contributors, pointing out that from his sources, it's not just Antifa -- and in fact, there is more white supremacist outside agitation involved -- but what William Barr has chosen to pinpoint is Antifa, the extreme-hard left, the anarchy on the left.
A little while later, Mitchell brought up Figliuzzi’s dubious claim again about Antifa not being the ones to blame; instead, she said there was "more right wing, white supremacist groups" there. While Mitchell defended the violent left-wing group, she had no problem attaching violent white supremacists with "the right." She complained President Trump and the Attorney General William Barr were “cherry picking” to single out “their political enemies” by designating Antifa as a terrorist organization:
Meanwhile, President Trump, as I was suggesting, and the Attorney General, Bill Barr, are blaming Antifa for the violence that has erupted over the last four days and nights, despite reporting from NBC News contributor Frank Fugilizi, former career FBI counterintelligence official that, in fact, there are more indications of more right-wing, white supremacist groups or activists present among the outside agitators. The president says he will designate Antifa a terrorist organization. Antifa has no known headquarters or central organization. There is no legal procedure for such a designation against a domestic group. NBC news investigative reporter Tom Winter joins me now. Tom, I know you've spent days, the weekend, going into not only Antifa and what the indications are in this situation, but the President and the Attorney General maybe cherry-picking the intelligence to go after the president's own political enemies. What have you discovered?
It’s interesting that Mitchell calls Antifa, the president’s “political enemy” as if they are not the enemies of every American who believes in the rule of law. It’s also telling that MSNBC will blame these riots on a fringe militia group while ignoring the mass violence caused by Antifa anarchists, which has been documented. The Department of Homeland Security in fact warned state and local leaders of Antifa’s “domestic terrorist violence” in 2017.
