CNN and Fox News did broadcast the press statement completely, but also issued words of caution afterwards. CNN presenter Jake Tapper spoke of a bad day for democracy, “lie after lie, without any evidence”.
America expert Victor Vlam calls the switching off of the transmitters remarkable, especially at this “tense moment for the country”. “They fear the ramifications of what Trump is saying could be enormous,” said Vlam. “Stories of fraud can cause people to take to the streets and can lead to unrest and even riots.”
Trump’s statements are regularly checked on the American networks, but switching off by multiple channels at the same time has never happened before. “This can lead to social unrest, that’s the difference.”
Correspondent Marieke de Vries also mentioned it NOS Radio 1 News unprecedented for news outlets to interrupt a statement by the president to point out disinformation. Furthermore, social media such as Twitter and Facebook label many messages from Trump. Twitter also explicitly uses the word misleading. The platforms now seem to be doing a lot more against the spreading fake news than in previous elections.
‘Horse remedy’
Still, the decision of the TV channels to leave Trump will not have been taken heartily, Vlam thinks. He speaks of a difficult dilemma. “You don’t want to censor the president. This will misrepresent many of Trump’s supporters.”
He therefore does not expect the media to decide more often not to broadcast Trump’s speeches in full. “For them there is a danger that people will turn away from them and think that they are being censored. I think they themselves see it as a horse remedy.”
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