NBC’s “Meet the Press” host Chuck Todd found himself in hot water he was busted for using deceptively edited footage of Attorney General Bill Barr to make a point about the dismissal of the case against former Trump adviser Michael Flynn.
Donald Trump jumped in on the controversy, announcing via Tweet on Monday “Sleepy Eyes Chuck Todd should be FIRED by “Concast” (NBC) for this fraud. He knew exactly what he was doing.”
“Meet the Press” was forced to issue an apology after Todd played heavily-edited footage from Barr’s recent CBS appearance.
In the clip, Barr said, “Well, history’s written by the winners,” appearing to reference the dismissal of charges against Flynn. Todd used the clip to criticize Barr, saying that he did not “make the case that he was upholding the rule of law.”
However, Todd’s clip left out Barr’s qualifying statement that “a fair history would say it was a good decision because it upheld the rule of law.”
Barr has been under attack since last week’s announcement that the Department of Justice would no longer pursue charges against Trump’s first National Security Adviser.
Justice Department spokeswoman Kerri Kupec called out the network for its disingenuous representation of Barr’s statements. “Meet the Press” apologized for the incident, stating that they had “inadvertently and inaccurately cut short a video clip of an interview of AG Barr,” adding that, “we regret the error.”
Very disappointed by the deceptive editing/commentary by @ChuckTodd on @MeetThePress on AG Barr’s CBS interview.
Compare the two transcripts below. Not only did the AG make the case in the VERY answer Chuck says he didn’t, he also did so multiple times throughout the interview. pic.twitter.com/PR1ciceMmE
— KerriKupecDOJ (@KerriKupecDOJ) May 10, 2020
Todd himself has yet to respond.
