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chris hayes
MSNBC's Chris Hayes Catches Fox News Red-Handed Deceiving Its Audience to 'Clean Up' for Trump
"Do you see what they did there, on their own network?"
Oct 17, 2024
MSNBC's evening news anchor Chris Hayes walked his audience through an overt deception perpetrated by Fox News Wednesday night as the right-wing cable outlet used selective editing of Donald Trump during Bret Baier's primetime interview with Kamala Harris.
The line of questioning from Baier stemmed from recent public remarks Trump made in which he said "the enemy from within" was the most serious danger to the nation and that he would use both the National Guard and U.S. military to go after "radical-left lunatics," which he claimed included Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), a centrist member of the Democratic Party currently running for U.S. Senate in California.
When Harris invoked these comments to criticize Trump for threatening to turn the U.S. military against people who have different political beliefs than him, Baier interrupted her to say that the former Republican president had been asked about those very remarks earlier in the day during a separate town hall-style event, also hosted by Fox.
But in the clip shown by Baier to the television audience and to which Harris was asked to respond, Fox only included a small part of what Trump actually said on the subject during the town hall, leaving out his clear repetition of calling Schiff and others "the enemy from within" who must be dealt with.
As Hayes explains during his examination of what transpired, Baier used a selected "soundbite to try to clear Donald Trump of saying a thing in which he cut out the part where says it."
Watch the segment:
"Do you see what they did there, on their own network?" asked Hayes of the selective editing by Fox producers. "[Trump] said—he repeated—'They are the enemy within... they're sick people... they're evil.' He repeated it! And then Brett Baier's like, 'Let me play you what [Trump] said today,' and just cut out the big chunk."
In her reaction to the clip showed by Baier, Harris said, "Bret, I'm sorry and with all due respect—that clip was not what he has been saying about the 'enemy within' when he has been speaking about the American people. That's not what you just showed."
When Baier tried to explain that he was just trying to show his response to a question, Harris interjected, "You and I both know that he has talked about turning the American military on the American people. He has talked about going after people who are engaged in peaceful protest. He has talked about locking people up because they disagree with him."
"This is a democracy," Harris continued. "And in a democracy, the president of the United States should be able to handle criticism without saying they are going to lock people up for doing it. And this is what's at stake, which is why you have someone like the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff saying what Mark Milley has said about Donald Trump being a threat to the United States of America."
For his part, Hayes said the entire episode—in which Trump refused to climb down from his fascist positions, but Fox still tried to "clean up" for him—represents "the same playbook we see over and over from Fox."
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Trump Campaign Already Claiming Democrats Trying to 'Steal the 2024 Election'
Republican Party politicians are so far "silent" about the lie, said MSNBC anchor Chris Hayes, "even though every last one knows how dangerous all this is."
Oct 03, 2023
With more than a year to go until the 2024 presidential election, top advisers to former U.S. President Donald Trump's campaign on Monday night claimed without evidence that the Democratic Party is trying to "steal" the election, echoing the lies spread before the 2020 election that fueled the violent January 6, 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.
Trump campaign officials called on the Republican National Committee (RNC) to "immediately cancel" the third GOP debate, which is scheduled to take place in Miami on November 8 and which Trump has indicated he will not attend, just as he skipped the first two primary debates.
Senior advisers Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita called on the RNC to essentially terminate the primary election and "end all future debates in order to refocus its manpower and money on preventing Democrats' efforts to steal the 2024 election."
Long before voters went to the polls in the 2020 election, Trump repeatedly claimed that the Democratic Party was trying to "steal" or "rig" the vote by expanding mail-in voting—which the former Republican president himself had long utilized and which was expanded to help people vote safely amid the coronavirus pandemic—and made false claims about "fake polls" and absentee ballots.
Few in the Republican Party spoke out against Trump's pre-election lies in 2020, and MSNBC anchor Chris Hayes said Monday that the party is again signaling that it will "stay silent" about the former president's baseless accusations—"even though every last one knows how dangerous all this is."
Wiles and LaCivita claimed the RNC's continuation of primary debates amounted to "an admission to the grassroots that their concerns about voter integrity are not taken seriously" and that Republicans will not work to ensure "a safe and secure election."
Liberal commentator Ryan Shead said the latest ramp-up of election disinformation from Trump is a consequence of the former president's acquittal by Republicans in the U.S. Congress when he was impeached for inciting the January 6 insurrection.
As Vanity Fair correspondent Molly Jong-Fast wrote in May, Trump's lies about "stolen" elections are a central part of his 2024 strategy.
"Trump's supporters, by ignoring the 'fake news' and simply taking his word—or that of his propagandists—are left in post-truth reality," wrote Jong-Fast. "Even Trump seems to acknowledge how essential the subject of 2020 'fraud' is in the 2024 primary, telling The Messenger this week how if he didn't talk about it, 'I would actually be rebuked by a large portion of the Republican Party.'"
Trump is currently polling far ahead of his opponents in the Republican primary race, beating Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis by 48 points in the latest Morning Consult poll. The national survey showed Trump is currently tied with Biden.
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Corporate Media Mostly Ignoring GOP Ploy to Cut Social Security and Medicare
"Social Security and Medicare are on the ballot next month," said Matt Gertz of Media Matters for America. "If the American public doesn't know that, it's in part because the press isn't telling them."
Oct 14, 2022
Corporate media outlets are mostly ignoring a Republican ploy to use the debt ceiling fight to gut Social Security and Medicare if the GOP regains control of Congress--a plot that one leading watchdog on Friday called "perhaps the single most consequential story" of the midterm elections.
"Social Security and Medicare are on the ballot next month," said Media Matters for America senior fellow Matt Gertz. "If the American public doesn't know that, it's in part because the press isn't telling them."
Common Dreams reported earlier this week that Social Security and Medicare defenders are warning that the popular programs--which each serve tens of millions of older Americans--face "grave danger" in the event Republicans retake control of Congress in January.
The warning came after four House Republicans hoping to chair the lower chamber's budget committee told Bloomberg Government that "Social Security and Medicare eligibility changes, spending caps, and safety-net work requirements are among the top priorities" if the GOP is back in charge.
The Republican lawmakers indicated in the article that "next year's deadline to raise or suspend the debt ceiling is a point of leverage" to force Democrats to allow policies including raising the retirement age and slashing Social Security and veterans' benefits, in keeping with the GOP's recently adopted policy agenda.
Despite congressional Democrats sounding the alarm on what Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.) said would be an "economically catastrophic" policy, "there's been virtually no coverage from major TV news shows, newspapers, and other mainstream outlets," Gertz noted.
"There has been shockingly little coverage of this development given its significance," Gertz continued. "It earned a scattering of mentions in publications including New York magazine. And Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and MSNBC's Chris Hayes detailed the stakes on his show Wednesday night."
"But the story hasn't been referenced elsewhere this week on MSNBC, or on CNN, or on Fox News," he added. "The nationally broadcast morning and evening news shows on ABC, CBS, and NBC haven't discussed it. It hasn't been mentioned in the pages of major newspapers, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, and USA Today."
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MSNBC Declines to Voluntarily Recognize Newsroom Union Effort
Organizers said that "we want to support one another and make this an even better place to build a career."
Jun 17, 2021
As current and former employees, media colleagues, and labor rights advocates on Thursday celebrated an announcement that MSNBC's workers have decided to form a union, the cable news channel's president made clear that leadership won't voluntarily recognize the effort.
"At a time when journalists and journalism itself are under siege, we want to join our peers who have paved the road before us in standing up for our rights."
--MSNBC bargaining unit
MSNBC is owned by a division of NBCUniversal, which is a subsidiary of Comcast. In a series of tweets, the editorial staff of MSNBC and The Choice--a news channel on the streaming service Peacock--said that over 200 workers have signed a union petition to join the Writers Guild of America, East (WGAE).
"We are organizing to advocate for equal pay for equal work; diversity at every level of production; clear job descriptions and access to career development; a say in the post-Covid-19 workplace; and fair compensation for the hours we all spend to deliver the news," organizers said.
"We are standing up for each other and our work--because this is who we are," organizers added. "After 10 months of organizing, we are asking for voluntary recognition of our union and look forward to constructive negotiations with MSNBC and Comcast for a fair contract. #ThisIsWhoWeAre."
The tweets echoed a lengthy statement from the MSNBC bargaining unit shared by WGAE, which said in part that "at a time when journalists and journalism itself are under siege, we want to join our peers who have paved the road before us in standing up for our rights."
"We are proud that the hard-working newsroom employees at MSNBC decided to unionize with the WGAE," said Lowell Peterson, the union's executive director. "They join thousands of their colleagues in the news and entertainment industries who recognize that collective bargaining is the most effective way to win a voice at work and to build sustainable careers."
WGAE represents about 7,000 workers, including newsrooms at ABC News, Bustle, CBS News, Fast Company, HuffPost, The Intercept, Salon, Slate, VICE, and Vox as well as Gizmodo Media Group and Hearst Magazines.
"We hope and expect MSNBC to remain true to its commitment to progressive values by respecting its employees' decision and recognizing our union promptly."
Rashida Jones, president of MSNBC, said Thursday in a statement to the New York Times that "we're looking forward to continuing the type of direct, open, and honest communication that has already resulted in meaningful change at the network."
In a message to employees that circulated on social media, Jones said that the network will not recognize the union without a secret ballot election supervised by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB.)
"I respect our employees' right to decide whether they want to be represented by a union, and I believe our employees should be able to make such an important decision through a standard election process," she said.
"An election supervised by the government allows all affected employees the chance to express their view on unionizing through a secret ballot," Jones added. "It is important to give everyone who would be included the chance to understand what this would mean before making their choice."
The Hill noted that "unions have long criticized requests for NLRB secret ballot elections as being designed to give management opportunities to dissuade employees from joining the union."
MSNBC show hosts Chris Hayes and Joy-Ann Reid expressed support for the union effort on Twitter:
Others in the media industry, including former MSNBC employees, highlighted pay concerns among off-camera workers and called the union effort "overdue."
The American Federation of Teachers--the nation's second-largest education union--and the Labor Caucus in the U.S. House of Representatives also expressed support for the organizing at MSNBC:
Andrew Joyce, a segment producer at "The Rachel Maddow Show" who helped lead the MSNBC union effort, told the Times that "we as journalists believe that democracy works, as a nation, state, country, city or in a workplace; things work better when policies are made with input from the people."
The developments came as The New Yorker, Pitchfork, and Ars Technica unions announced that after more than two years of negotiations between the NewsGuild of New York and Conde Nast, they averted a strike and reached an agreement in principle on first contracts.
Congratulating the unions on "accomplishing a groundbreaking agreement that sets new standards for fair compensation, equity, and job security in our industry," president Susan DeCarava said that the NewsGuild of New York "is immensely proud of all that our members have achieved due to their unflinching solidarity and resolve in addressing long-standing inequities at Conde Nast."
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#FireChrisHayes Trends as MSNBC Anchor Attacked for Covering Biden Accuser Story
Journalist Glenn Greenwald said the reaction to Hayes reporting on a news story which reflects poorly on the former vice president "shows what MSNBC has cultivated."
Apr 30, 2020
The hashtag #FireChrisHayes was trending on Twitter Thursday as the MSNBC anchor came under attack from liberals for airing a hard news report Wednesday night on allegations from former Senate staffer Tara Reade that former Vice President Joe Biden--the presumptive Democratic Party presidential nominee--sexually assaulted her in the Capitol building in 1993.
"The fact that 'firing' Chris Hayes is trending because he said the media needed to cover allegations of sexual misconduct made by a women even when they're directed at powerful people who are respected is...just....peak 2020," tweeted Lindsey Boylan, a progressive candidate for Congress in New York's 10th District.
In his report on the allegation, Hayes went through the facts and soberly presented the case both for and against the allegation. The measured analysis provoked ire from Democrat-aligned critics like conspiracy theorist Bill Palmer, who demanded MSNBC remove the longtime "All In" host for reporting the news.
The network at press time did not have the segment available for viewing on either its main site or on its YouTube channel.
As Common Dreams reported, the Reade scandal has prompted calls from Democrats for Biden to address the allegation. But the candidate himself has thus far remained silent, though his campaign has repeatedly denied the charges.
Progressives on Twitter Thursday pushed back against the attacks on Hayes.
Journalist Glenn Greenwald pointed out out that Hayes' own network was at least in part to blame for the partisan fire directed at the host.
"Chris Hayes has been one of the media's most virulent, relentless and arguably effective Trump critics--an all-consuming loathing for the president--but #FireChrisHayes was trending because he covered the sex assault allegations against Biden," tweeted Greenwald. "Shows what MSNBC has cultivated."
"Also, with this completely deranged backlash against Chris Hayes for the crime of covering what a news story--one that just happens to be unfavorable to Dems--you see the extreme career incentives for cable hosts never to tell their audiences anything they don't want to hear," Greenwald added.
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Chris Matthews Slammed for Spreading Misinformation About Sanders' Democratic Socialist Agenda on Post-Debate Panel
"Because in American media, peddling wild conspiracies about socialism isn't disqualifying—being a socialist is."
Feb 07, 2020
MSNBC host Chris Matthews drew rebukes on social media Friday night after suggesting that as a Democratic Socialist, Sen. Bernie Sanders could lead a dictatorship in which establishment political figures would be "executed," should he win the presidency.
Following the Democratic primary debate, Matthews joined other MSNBC commentators including Joy Reid and Chris Hayes in a panel discussion in which Matthews expressed concerns about Sanders's democratic socialist ideals, which he claimed the Vermont senator has not clarified.
"I believe if Castro and the reds had won the Cold War there would have been executions in Central Park and I mght have been one of the ones getting executed," Matthews said, referring to former Cuban President Fidel Castro. "I don't know who Bernie Sanders supports over these years, I don't know what he means by socialism."
Matthews admitted that Sanders has suggested, "We're going to be like Denmark."
"Okay, that's harmless, that's basically a capitalist country with a lot of good social welfare programs. Denmark is harmless," he said, still appearing unconvinced that as president, Sanders aims to push the U.S. in the direction of many wealthy countries which offer universal healthcare, tuition-free public college, and other strong universal programs.
"It's pretty clearly in the Denmark category," Hayes replied. "I mean, that's what he says and that's what his agenda calls for, right?"
The discussion followed a question posed during the Democratic debate in which ABC News moderator George Stephanopoulos asked the seven candidates whether they were afraid of having a Democratic Socialist as the 2020 presidential nominee.
Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) was the only candidate to raise her hand, after a long pause.
During the debate, Sanders reiterated his support for joining other developed countries, particularly in Scandinavia, in providing the public with healthcare and education that is free at the point of delivery, guaranteed paid leave, and other robust social welfare programs which are broadly popular among the American electorate and which, he said, will "bring people together."
"The way you bring people together is to make it clear that we're not going to give tax breaks to billionaires and large corporations," Sanders said. "They're going to start paying their fair share of taxes. That's what the American people want. And I'll tell you something else. The way you bring people together is by ending the international disgrace of this country being the only major nation on Earth not to guarantee health care to all people as a human right."
On social media, a number of critics lambasted Matthews for promoting misinformation about the senator's vision.
Author and MSNBC commentator Anand Giridharadas, who has been vocal several times this week regarding the network's frequent dismissal of the people who would benefit the most from Sanders' proposals and of his agenda's popularity, expressed regret that he had been unable to push back on Matthews' comments in person.
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MSNBC Anchor Chris Hayes Praised for Denouncing 'Path of Least Resistance' Taken by Network Executives
"Chris Hayes is modeling exactly where our journalism should be in 2019. Too many outlets bend to the powerful when the very institutions they represent are supposed to operate as a check on that power."
Oct 15, 2019
Issuing a harsh rebuke to his own employers for taking "the path of least resistance" by declining to report on allegations of sexual assault against movie producer Harvey Weinstein, MSNBC anchor Chris Hayes on Monday night was widely applauded for taking a different path.
In his closing monologue on his show "All In with Chris Hayes," Hayes compared NBC News executives with hundreds of Republican lawmakers and government officials who refuse to speak out publicly against President Donald Trump amid reports that they privately express grave concerns about his policies and decision-making.
"The insidious destructive force of the path of least resistance is everywhere you look," Hayes said. "Heck, I feel the tug of it myself as my own news organization is embroiled in a very public controversy over its conduct."
Hayes's former NBC colleague, journalist Ronan Farrow, spent months reporting on allegations against Weinstein in 2017--allegations which would help spark the worldwide #MeToo social justice movement.
But, Farrow suggests in his new book, Catch & Kill, the network refused to air the reporting out, correctly predicting that the Weinstein story would lead to scrutiny of one of its own longtime anchors--former "Today Show" host Matt Lauer.
"In Farrow's view, he was unable to break through what was effectively a conspiracy of silence from NBC News management," Hayes said.
Watch:
While NBC has claimed Farrow's reporting was not adequately sourced to air, the reporter went on to publish an explosive article in The New Yorker about the Weinstein allegations just two months later.
After leaving NBC News, Hayes said, Farrow was able to do "the kind of journalism that you want to do as a journalist, that everyone who works in this business should want to facilitate."
On social media, Hayes won applause for taking what many media critics called a brave stance against his powerful employer.
Journalism professor and media critic Jay Rosen wrote that Hayes's statement could mark the beginning of a reckoning at NBC--through a possible change in leadership or an independent investigation into Farrow's departure from the network.
After Hayes's monologue, Rosen wrote, "status quo won't hold."
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Predicting Even More Horrifying Conditions, Historical Journalist Describes Parallels Between Trump Migrant Detention and Concentration Camps
The administration's treatment of migrants is part of a pattern of dehumanization that has disturbing precedent for what could come next
Jun 07, 2019
Don't expect the camps housing migrants on the border to close anytime soon--if anything, expect conditions to get worse.
That was the message from journalist Andrea Pitzer during an appearance with MSNBC's Chris Hayes on Thursday night. Pitzer, whose book "One Long Night" is an exhaustive history of the uses of concentration camps over the last century, said that the lessons of the past indicate that President Donald Trump's war on migrants isn't anywhere close to being over.
"My research showed pretty conclusively that these camps don't just close themselves," said Pitzer, who stressed that the usefulness of the camps for governments targeting marginalized groups for abuse is one of the main reasons for their staying power.
"They're going to get bigger and conditions inside them are going to get worse," Pitzer said.
Pitzer's appearance on "All In" came after a week of disturbing news from U.S. detention camps on the southern border and beyond. On May 31, Common Dreams reported that migrants were being forced into dangerously overcrowded conditions in an El Paso detention center, with people climbing onto toilets to breathe easily. On June 1, the first day of Pride Month, a trans woman from El Salvador died in ICE custody.
Common Dreams reporters also detailed Wednesday that the Trump administration is canceling "education, recreation, and legal services for unaccompanied migrant children in federal shelters across the country," and on Thursday described how former Trump Chief of Staff John Kelly is profiting off of child detentions--a policy he helped develop while in the White House--in the private sector.
The administration's treatment of migrants is part of a pattern of dehumanization that has disturbing precedent for what could come next, said Pitzer.
Of particular concern, Pitzer added, is that while the number of people coming to the border is increasing, the administration appears uninterested in and incapable of handling the influx.
"They don't seem to have a plan on how to deal with this, other than to punish the refugees, the asylum seekers," said Pitzer, "or to have Mexico take care of it."
Pitzer, who noted the latter solution was not very realistic, added that without a clear plan for migrant detention, conditions in the camps were sure to get worse.
"I expect to see contagious diseases, malnutrition in some cases, and mental health crises," Pitzer said. "We're going to have that very soon; there might be reports already coming of that."
Watch the full segment:
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Attacks Meant to 'Silence' First Two Muslim Women in Congress Won't Succeed, Says Rep. Ilhan Omar
"I think we are seeing what happens when people really see these attacks for what they are."
May 15, 2019
For the first time in American history, there are two female Muslim members of Congress--and the relentless attacks on the pair from the right are designed to "silence" them.
"We cannot allow those who seek to divide and intimidate us to succeed" -- Rep. Ilhan Omar
That was the read from Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), referring to efforts from President Donald Trump and other members of the Republican Party, both in Washington and in the media, to portray her and Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) as anti-Semites.
Tlaib was targeted by the president on Monday, as Common Dreams reported, for comments the congresswoman made to Yahoo News podcast "Skullduggery" in which she said that while Palestinians lost their homeland to the creation of the state of Israel, there was at least a "calming effect" knowing it was done for a people that had just been slaughtered in the Holocaust.
"When someone like the president tweets something like that, it's not an attack only on myself, but it becomes an attack on all Muslims, it becomes an attack on women of color, it becomes an attack on immigrants and refugees," Omar told MSNBC host Chris Hayes, referring to attacks from the president in April on Omar's comments about 9/11. "That message was being used to vilify anyone who shared an identity with me, to other them and to say you don't belong."
Omar made the comments in an interview with Hayes Tuesday. The conversation touched on recent controversies over remarks from Omar and Tlaib on Israel that have been mischaracterized by the right in an effort to delegitimize criticism of the Middle Eastern country, a major U.S. ally.
But, said Omar, the deeper intent of the relentless attacks is to remove her and Tlaib from the public square--an intent that the American people are wise to in ways they perhaps weren't in the past.
"I think we are seeing what happens when people really see these attacks for what they are," said Omar. "It is designed to silence, sideline, and almost eliminate the public voice of Muslims from the public discourse."
Omar added that she is hopeful that Americans will come together to oppose the lies and attacks against her and Tlaib.
It's a message the freshman congresswoman pushed in an op-ed for CNN earlier Tuesday, co-authored with Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.). In their piece, the two women argued that Muslims and Jews in America have more in common than sets them apart and need to have solidarity in the face of a nascent white nationalist movement that's becoming ever more violent and dangerous.
"As a Muslim American and a Jewish American elected to the United States Congress, we can no longer sit silently as terror strikes our communities," the two congresswomen said in the opinion piece. "We cannot allow those who seek to divide and intimidate us to succeed."
The rhetoric and the rising right-wing movement have had an effect on the security of American Jews and Muslims, reported HuffPost.
Anti-Semitic incidents in the U.S. have been on the rise in recent years, reaching near-record levels last year, per the Anti-Defamation League. There has also been an increase in anti-Muslim bias incidents in recent years, with a 15 percent increase in hate crimes targeting American Muslims from 2016 to 2017, according to the Council on American-Islamic Relations.
"Whatever our differences," wrote Omar and Schakowsky, "our two communities, Muslim and Jewish, must come together to confront the twin evils of anti-Semitic and Islamophobic violence."
The president has been tied to elements in the American right that perpetuate those bigotries on a number of occasions, once infamously referring to a neo-Nazi march as being comprised, at least in part, by "good people."
One of Omar and Tlaib's most vociferous critics, Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-Texas), was a moderator for a virulently Islamophobic Facebook page before deciding to run for office; another member of the House GOP caucus, Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa), has longstanding ties to anti-Semitic and white supremacist factions in both American and European politics.
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'Call It a Crisis': New Report Details Failure of Cable and Network Outlets to Accurately Describe Climate Emergency
"Words matter."
Apr 29, 2019
Name and shame.
That's the dual directive from a new report that calls on news organizations to use appropriate language when discussing the climate crisis--even as the report calls them out for inaction.
The report--titled "'Call It a Crisis': The Role of U.S. Network News in Communicating the Urency of Climate Change" (pdf)--analyzed the coverage of ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News to determine just how much urgency the influential outlets bring to their reporting.
According to David Arkush, managing director of Public Citizen's Climate Program, the specific words that journalists and news anchors use--or choose not to use--matters.
"The words we use to characterize an issue make a difference in how it is perceived and prioritized politically," said Arkush.
When outlets with massive nightly audiences like the ones the report studied "consistently fail to use language that conveys that climate change is a crisis or emergency," Arkush added, "they unwittingly put a heavy thumb on the scale in favor of complacency and inaction."
Fox News was the worst offender, with the use of "climate crisis" coming in for only five mentions during the coverage period--all of which, as Public Citizen noted, were efforts to "minimize the issue with false logic, mockery or misinformation." But other news networks weren't much better than the conservative channel.
The only network to use the term in double digits was CNN, and only 16 of the 26 mentions were by a host. Van Jones, whose eponymous show ran every other Sunday during the survey period, accounted for six of those mentions.
Networks should name the problem clearly to avoid confusion, said Allison Fisher, outreach director for Public Citizen's Energy Program.
"Climate coverage on broadcast and cable television news is still at best spotty and at worst riddled with misinformation," Fisher said. "Calling it a crisis indicates that the stakes are high and that the issue is urgent. Most of all it signals to viewers that the time to act on climate is now."
How to report on the climate crisis has long been an issue for news organizations. In July 2018, MSNBC host Chris Hayes said on Twitter that while he was personally invested in the story, the topic was "a palpable ratings killer."
"So the incentives are not great," said Hayes.
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