In hyperpartisan environment, MSNBC drawing fire for anti-Trump, pro-Harris programming

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There is so much bias and bluster in cable news that it’s hard to know what to believe.

Depending on the network, the coverage can seem like bouncing between alternate galaxies.  

And overall trust in the media has of course plummeted to new lows.

Most people don’t even trust the fact-checkers, so we don’t have a basic agreement on what’s true or not in this insane presidential race, a common base of information that everyone can then debate.

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That’s true even of the podcasters and social media influencers who have made such an impact in the mediasphere.

Fox News draws the most scrutiny, of course, because its audience far eclipses that of its two main cable news rivals. But there is almost no scrutiny of MSNBC as an uber-liberal organization. Maybe that’s because so many New York Times and Washington Post employees are either paid contributors or regular guests, so the leftist environment comes to seem normal.

Once in a blue moon, someone writes the "hey, that place is pretty darn liberal" piece. But another barometer is former Biden press secretary Jen Psaki, who has her own show, and Symone Sanders-Townsend, the former top aide to Vice President Kamala Harris, co-hosting a weekend show. 

Former President Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris (Getty Images)

To be fair, there are some good journalists at MSNBC. Whatever Steve Kornacki says at the big monitor, I believe him. MS also benefits from news packages by seasoned NBC reporters.

Mediaite’s Colby Hall says it’s common knowledge that "MSNBC has figured out a lucrative model designed around programming that appeals to progressive, liberal, and left-of-center viewers, eyeballs that they then sell to multibillion-dollar corporations to advertise pharmaceutical products, cars, and fossil fuels…

"With a crucial election approaching, MSNBC’s naked advocacy for the Harris-Walz campaign has only become louder and further afoot from what a news network would reasonably do."

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Hall says he’s made the same arguments about Fox, "but MSNBC pretty much gets a pass from the same set of group-thinkers eager to farm engagement from one another on social media."

I’ll have more to say on that in a moment.

"There is also the relentless pro-Harris fawning pervasive on the network, perhaps best exemplified by Chris Hayes saying that Kamala Harris’s performance in her debate with Trump was the ‘best performance’ in history because Trump ‘couldn’t control her mind.’ There is Donny Deutsch admitting that he ‘kind of fell in love’ with Harris after her campaign kickoff speech."

MSNBC host Jen Psaki speaks at the Texas Tribune Festival in Austin on Sept. 6, 2024. (Joseph A. Wulfsohn/Fox News Digital)

Bottom line: "Perhaps most damning is the complete lack of reporting on air of stories that are in any way negative about Harris… Let’s not pretend that they are anything close to a news outlet when, in recent weeks, they have looked more like an arm of political propaganda working on behalf of the Democratic Party."

Now, what most critics overlook, because it doesn’t fit the narrative, is that Fox has a news division, of which I am a part. These hard-working journalists and producers do their best to play it straight. 

Naturally, the most attention is paid to the high-profile conservative hosts on the opinion shows after 5 p.m. But it’s a mistake to represent that as all of Fox News.

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Here’s the proof. On big nights – conventions, debates, elections – Fox’s coverage is anchored by Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum of the news division, in my view the best in the business. On CNN, the coverage is anchored by Jake Tapper and Dana Bash or Anderson Cooper.

But at MSNBC, it’s an all-liberal pundit lineup: Rachel Maddow, Nicolle Wallace, Joy Reid, Chris Hayes, Lawrence O’Donnell, maybe Alex Wagner. Ever since Brian Williams, well after the controversy that cost him the NBC anchor job, left MSNBC, there hasn’t been even the fig leaf of a nationally known broadcaster who attempts to play it down the middle.

Every network makes its choices and is conscious of its audience. The result may be, as Hall says, dishing out propaganda for the campaign.

Martha MacCallum and Bret Baier of Fox News (Alex Wroblewski/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Maggie Haberman, the ace New York Times reporter who is also a CNN analyst, has a sunnier view:

"I think that the media does a very good job covering Trump," she said on NPR. "There are always going to be specific stories that could have been better, should have been better, that are written on deadline, and people are not being as precise as they should be."

But Haberman argues that there is an industry "dedicated toward attacking the media, especially as it relates to covering Donald Trump and all coverage of Trump. And I think that Trump is a really difficult figure to cover because he challenges news media process every day, has for years. The systems are just fundamentally – they were not built to deal with somebody who says things that are not true as often as he does or speaks as incoherently as he often does." 

She adds that the press is not a monolith and "most of the information that the public has about Trump is because of reporting by the media."

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Sure, the right wing goes after the media, widely viewed as liberal – CNN’s nighttime panels are often 6 to 1 against Trump – for criticizing their man or swooning over Kamala. Trump himself is at the forefront of the attacks on the "enemy of the people," often ripping individual journalists. 

But there’s also a left wing that attacks conservative outlets, and not just Fox, for supposedly being fiercely protective of Trump and harshly critical of Harris. 

Being caught in the crossfire is rather unpleasant, as Maggie knows better than anyone. But taking the heat is part of the job we all signed up for.