On Wednesday afternoon, Media Research Center research director Rich Noyes made his latest appearance on the Fox Business Network’s Cavuto: Coast to Coast, taking the media to task over their raucous, premature “dancing...in the streets” over the Donald Trump Jr.-Russian lawyer story.
Host Neil Cavuto set Noyes up by explaining that “depending what you read,” this story signals that this will be “another Watergate-like summer” with “collusion” accusations abound. He also made clear that “this doesn't look good for the White House which is a fairly good conclusion.”
Noyes agreed that “it's an important development, but the media development have just been all-consumed with this story” with the best example being Tuesday’s CBS Evening News devoting nearly 70 percent of their newscast to “this one story.”
“I mean, this is — they’re covering this like it’s an airplane crash and an earthquake put together. We look at the CNN morning show this morning, three hours long, two hours and 15 minutes on the Trump Jr. story, 10 minutes on everything else then the rest of that is commercial. So, I mean, this is a media that for months has been consumed with this story,” he added, in a nod to mini-study now published by Alex Xenos.
Taking issue with the media’s assertion that they now “have some evidence” of collusion, Noyes pointed out:
What you are talking about for the last several months? It was just conjecture and speculation and let's see where this goes because it’s just a few e-mails. It might indicate something, but, you know, the investigation has not really gone through its courses on this.
Later, Noyes stated that “the liberal news media has been searching for a justification for their relentless coverage of this,” including repeated instances of “break[ing] into regular programming to cover hearings.”
“I mean, this has been the consuming story of 2017. Now they have something they’re going to use it to justify it. But again, let's see where this goes. Let’s see what happens when, you know, the evidence is cross examined. Let’s — you know, it’s a little too early to be dancing the way the media are in the streets,” he concluded.
Here’s the relevant transcript from FBN’s Cavuto: Coast to Coast on July 12:
FBN’s Cavuto: Coast to Coast
July 12, 2017
1:23 p.m. Eastern
NEIL CAVUTO: Alright, well, the media, of course, has been looking at this from a variety of standpoints, but when it comes to Donald Trump and Donald Trump Jr. more to the point in those e-mails, is it collusion? Well, depending what you read, that seems to be the conclusion here and worse, it’s another Watergate-like summer. Now, it depends what you read, what you follow. At the very least, a lot of media outlets are saying this doesn't look good for the White House which is a fairly good conclusion and that the son lied. He said that he had no such meetings with Russians and in fact he did arrange this one. So, to the Media Research Center’s Rich Noyes on that. Rich, alright, so a young guy who may as naive as the whole political process misrepresented himself. What did John Dean say? In variance with the facts, but that’s as far as it goes. Now, you wouldn't read that in the media, but how is it looking to you?
RICH NOYES: Well, I think it's an important development, but the media development have just been all-consumed with this story. You know, we look at the evening newscast last night, 70 percent of the CBS Evening News was about this one story. I mean, this is — they’re covering this like it’s an airplane crash and an earthquake put together. We look at the CNN morning show this morning, three hours long, two hours and 15 minutes on the Trump Jr. story, 10 minutes on everything else then the rest of that is commercial. So, I mean, this is a media that for months has been consumed with this story. They’ve been talking about collusion for months. Now, they’re trying to say that, well, we have some evidence. What you are talking about for the last several months? It was just conjecture and speculation and let's see where this goes because it’s just a few e-mails. It might indicate something, but, you know, the investigation has not really gone through its courses on this.
CAVUTO: Yeah and you’re right. History shows that things develop or they can't develop. One of the things that might've happened and maybe this harkens back to remember the David Frost interview that Richard Nixon had after he had left office when he told David Frost I gave them a sword, I gave my enemies a sword, the media wasn’t fair to me, said I think many people would agree. The media didn’t flip over him. It was mutual, apparently, but that the President argued that the whole Watergate, that is Richard Nixon at the time, provided the means by which they could dig that sword through him. Do you think that this is an opportunity to justified the media’s attack on Donald Trump and say, alright, your own son would represent himself and make a bigger deal about this than is warranted.
NOYES: Well, I mean, I think for months now at least the liberal news media has been searching for a justification for their relentless coverage of this. I mean, they’ve been covering — you know, they’re break into regular programming to cover hearings. They’ve been giving this, you know, hundreds of times more coverage than, say, tax reform, or the health care bill. I mean, this has been the consuming story of 2017. Now they have something they’re going to use it to justify it. But again, let's see where this goes. Let’s see what happens when, you know, the evidence is cross examined. Let’s — you know, it’s a little too early to be dancing the way the media are in the streets.
CAVUTO: Yeah. We’ll see. I have a feeling it's going to be a long summer though. Rich Noyes, thank you. Always good seeing you.
NOYES: Thanks.
