As Scott Whitlock noted Tuesday afternoon, CNN's perpetually aggrieved Jim Acosta was at it again, hinting at a conspiracy behind a lost broadcast connection: "I won’t read into why we lost connection just a few moments ago." Acosta's Tuesday whining shouldn't cause us to forget or ignore what he did on Monday, when he shouted questions at President Donald Trump as he sat with children during the White House Easter egg roll.
Recall that the White House press corps was apoplectic in 2012 when Neil Munro, then at the Daily Caller, shouted out a question at President Barack Obama's formal announcement that the government would be "taking steps to lift the shadow of deportation from ... young people" — many actually not so young — currently in the U.S. illegally. Munro, who thought the President had finished speaking, was bashed for incivility and tagged as a racist by multiple media members, including ABC's Sam Donaldson.
Given Acosta's behavior since Trump took office, the irony of Donaldson's participation in the pile-on is too much to ignore.
Donaldson was chief among those in the media horde who constantly shouted questions at President Ronald Reagan in the 1980s. His arguable low occurred in 1983 when, as Nancy Reagan wheeled in a birthday cake for her husband, he asked her whether she thought he "should be doing anything differently," "whether you think he should run again" for a second term, and then shouted questions at Reagan himself. Nancy's response: "How would you like a piece of cake, Sam?"
Acosta's Monday interruption at a children's event probably one-ups anything Donaldson ever did:
Transcript:
(recorded earlier Monday)
JIM ACOSTA: Mr. President, what about the DACA kids? Do you worry about what's going to happen to them, sir?
PRESIDENT TRUMP: The Democrats have really let them down. They've really let 'em down.
They had a great opportunity. The Democrats have really let them down. It's a shame how people have taken advantage of DACA, and that's a shame. It should have never happened.
ACOSTA: Didn't you kill DACA, sir? Didn't you kill DACA?
(returning to then-live CNN programming)
ACOSTA: The President didn't respond.
On CNN's Situation Room Monday evening, Acosta claimed (at 5:08 in this video) that Trump "does not have his facts straight." As usual, Acosta is wrong:
- Acosta claimed that "newcomers" crossing the border illegally "would not be eligible for DACA because the President ... ended it." That's not the point. Instead of immediate summary expulsion, which anyone would reasonably expect, they would be eligible for "catch-and-release," which in reality is often "catch, release, and, if you wish, disappear."
- Acosta then claimed that "Democrats and Republicans have both offered proposals to save the DREAMers from deportation, but ... the President has rejected those plans ..." That's because, as Laura Ingraham noted in mid-January, those "plans" have failed to meet Trump's baseline requiring "the funding of his wall, and an end to chain migration, and ... (an end to the) visa lottery system."
Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.
