NBC allegedly tells reporters not to use word 'riots' in George Floyd coverage

NBC News came under scrutiny Thursday for allegedly telling its reporters to refer to the events in Minneapolis this week as "protests" and not "riots," according to one of its anchors.

Craig Melvin, an MSNBC host and co-anchor of "Today," shed some light as to how his network is framing its reporting.

"This will guide our reporting in MN. 'While the situation on the ground in Minneapolis is fluid, and there has been violence, it is most accurate at this time to describe what is happening there as 'protests' -- not riots,'" Melvin tweeted Thursday morning.

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Melvin's tweet raised eyebrows among critics who accused the network of downplaying the violence that took place in the city to protest the death of George Floyd.

"What kind of alternate reality is this where the mass looting and burning of businesses is not considered a riot by a news network? A protest is what we had here in LA last night. What’s happening in Minneapolis is the textbook definition of a riot. Protesters don’t loot. Period," local Fox affiliate reporter Bill Melugin tweeted.

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"Tell that to the store owners whose businesses burned down," Media Research Center Vice President Dan Gainor tweeted in response.

"NBC says that the riots are not riots. Those 'protests' must have magically caused spontaneous combustion that lit buildings on fire, threw flatscreen TVs into the hands of innocent 'protestors' and caused hands to slam hammers into cash registers. What a wild series of events!" filmmaker Robby Starbuck tweeted.

NBC News did not immediately respond to Fox News' request for comment.

The protests in the Twin Cities were sparked by the death of 46-year-old George Floyd, a black man who died Monday after a white police officer kneeled on his neck for several minutes as he was being arrested over alleged forgery.

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Video footage that went viral from the arrest showed Floyd telling the police officer "I can't breathe" as passersby begged the officers to get off him. Moments later, his lifeless body was laying on the ground.

The four police officers involved with the arrest have been fired from the Minneapolis Police Department. Criminal charges have yet to be made but a federal investigation is underway.