NBC News admitted it aired a deceptively edited clip Sunday of Attorney General Bill Barr talking about former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn’s case.
The clip, aired on host Chuck Todd’s “Meet the Press” program, showed Barr being asked by CBS News’ Catherine Herridge how the decision to dismiss Flynn’s case will be viewed upon looking back.
Todd played a clip that showed Barr responding by saying that “history is written by the winners, so it largely depends on who’s writing the history.” (RELATED: Trump And Fauci Team Up To Knock Down Question From NBC Reporter)
WATCH:
Today on Meet The Press, @chucktodd wildly took context out of an answer AG Bill Barr gave about his decision to drop the case into Gen. Michael Flynn.
I cut Todd’s segment along with Barr’s full answer together. Look at how blatantly dishonest this is. pic.twitter.com/tODOEwL48V
— Greg Price (@greg_price11) May 10, 2020
Todd chastised Barr for the comment, saying he was “struck by the cynicism of the answer – it’s a correct answer, but he’s the attorney general. He didn’t make the case that he was upholding the rule of law. He was almost admitting that, yeah, this was a political job.”
However, the clip that NBC News played did not show that Barr did, in fact, say that the decision “upheld the rule of law.” The network was immediately called out on the deceptively edited clip, and NBC’s “Meet the Press” Twitter eventually admitted wrongdoing in a reply tweet.
“You’re correct,” NBC News’ show tweeted after Department of Justice spokeswoman Kerri Kupec trashed the clip in a tweet. “Earlier today, we inadvertently and inaccurately cut short a video clip of an interview with AG Barr before offering commentary and analysis. The remaining clip included important remarks from the attorney general that we missed, and 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
The network and show have not yet said if they will issue an on-air correction. The Justice Department moved to drop the case against Flynn Thursday after internal memos sparked red flags regarding the investigation into him.
White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany was just one of many who called NBC News out for the clip before the network commented. McEnany called it “completely dishonest editing” in a tweet Sunday.
President Donald Trump wrote that Todd “should be FIRED … for this fraud” Sunday evening. Trump tweeted that Todd “knew exactly what he was doing” and called the network “Fake News.”
Trump’s tweet was in response to one from Mollie Hemingway, a senior editor at The Federalist, who criticized the network for admitting the error in a tweet. Curtis Houck, the managing editor of Newsbusters, added that the tweet was “merely a reply” and therefore “doesn’t appear on their main timeline.”
“Absurd and cowardly,” Houck tweeted.