Appearing on MSNBC Live With Stephanie Ruhle on Friday morning, NBC News senior media reporter Dylan Byers warned that President Trump’s reaction to the Democrats’ impeachment push was a “very strategic effort” and argued that only those getting their news from liberal media outlets would truly understand the “sins of the President.”
While noting that Trump “can’t resist the fight, the Twitter spats, the media spats, he can’t resist being the headline,” Byers went on to acknowledge “there’s also like a very strategic effort here, which is, complicate the narrative....Put people in a position where it becomes harder to understand who’s telling the truth, who’s being more outrageous, make everything seem just a little more chaotic, to the point where if you’re voters you actually – you either tune out or just decide you don’t know who to believe.”
He continued: “Or if you’re a lawmaker, you just – you basically have cover with your constituents because they feel like they don’t necessarily trust the media. They feel like they don’t necessarily trust the Democrats any more than they can trust the President of the United States.”
Of course all of that is easy to do when the media constantly provide proof of being “outrageous” and untrustworthy. Case in point, just minutes before this segment, anchor Stephanie Ruhle declared the President to be a “sociopath” and labeled all Republicans as his “enablers.” Not exactly sober news coverage.
Byers went on to praise the supposed wisdom of MSNBC viewers and readers of major liberal newspapers: “You know, I think if you have been watching our network or if you’ve been reading The New York Times or The Washington Post, I think the sort of sins of the President make a lot of sense and it’s sort of very easy to understand everything that he has done wrong.”
However, he fretted over those who got their news from other outlets:
But let’s not forget there’s a wide swath of the country watching Fox News or a wide swath of the country that doesn’t believe anything that’s printed in the pages of The New York Times or The Washington Post. The more fuel he can add to the fire, the more he can give those networks, their viewers, their readers the opportunity to just tune all of this out.
Later, while anchoring the 1:00 p.m. ET hour, Ruhle echoed the warning from Byers during a discussion with former assistant U.S. attorney Mimi Rocah, a vocal Trump critic. After Rocah excitedly proclaimed that “the American public is seeing” the President “look guilty as heck,” Ruhle worried:
The American people are seeing it if they’re watching you and I have this conversation. They’re seeing it if they’re reading The Washington Post or The New York Times. They’re not seeing it if they follow conservative media.
It’s never enough for the liberal media to simply push a narrative, they desperately want to have complete control of what all Americans think. The idea of a competing perspective being presented by other news organizations is a dire threat to MSNBC.
Help fight back against the liberal media's impeachment crusade
Here is a transcript of Ruhle’s October 4 exchange with Byers:
9:54 AM ET
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STEPHANIE RUHLE: Joining me now to talk through all of this, NBC News senior media reporter Dylan Byers. Dylan, all of this started because of a private conversation that the President had with a foreign leader, but now the President is digging back into his old playbook, making it public and normalizing it. Is he successful at normalizing it or is he just underscoring the wrongdoing and making it even more clear?
DYLAN BYERS: Well, look, obviously, as with all things Trump, I think that depends on who you talk to. I mean, there are two ways that we will see that borne out. One is in an impeachment process, should that happen, and then the other obviously is in the 2020 election. And I think, look, to a certain degree Trump can’t help himself with any of this. Right? I mean, he can’t resist the fight, the Twitter spats, the media spats, he can’t resist being the headline.
But I was talking this morning and last night with folks I know who have either worked with the President or folks who have spent a significant amount of time sitting with the President, and what they tell me is that there’s also like a very strategic effort here, which is, complicate the narrative. Make everything just seem harder. Put people in a position where it becomes harder to understand who’s telling the truth, who’s being more outrageous, make everything seem just a little more chaotic, to the point where if you’re voters you actually – you either tune out or just decide you don’t know who to believe. Or if you’re a lawmaker, you just – you basically have cover with your constituents because they feel like they don’t necessarily trust the media. They feel like they don’t necessarily trust the Democrats any more than they can trust the President of the United States.
RUHLE: Okay, then put the media aside, the President sent 240 tweets this week, only about five of them came anywhere near a legislative agenda. So can the President successfully say, “We’ve got do-nothing Democrats,” when those people who might want to drown out the media know what’s actually getting done in their hometowns?
BYERS: No, of course he can’t say that. But I think we’re sort of well beyond legislative arguments here and policy arguments here when it comes to the sentiments of the American people or at least the fight that the President is trying to wage. This is very much an emotional fight. I don’t want to say it’s a fight for the narrative. I think it’s more just a fight for sort of the hearts and minds of people who are feeling increasingly confused by this whole process.
You know, I think if you have been watching our network or if you’ve been reading The New York Times or The Washington Post, I think the sort of sins of the President make a lot of sense and it’s sort of very easy to understand everything that he has done wrong. But let’s not forget there’s a wide swath of the country watching Fox News or a wide swath of the country that doesn’t believe anything that’s printed in the pages of The New York Times or The Washington Post. The more fuel he can add to the fire, the more he can give those networks, their viewers, their readers the opportunity to just tune all of this out.
(...)
