How the media covered the aftermath of Trump's conviction — and his remarks the following morning
CNN and MSNBC both cut away from former President Donald Trump's live remarks Friday about halfway through to offer fact checks, and never returned
NEW YORK — CNN and MSNBC both cut away from former President Donald Trump as he spoke live on Friday less than 24 hours after being convicted in his New York hush money trial.
The decisions, along with coverage of the trial's aftermath in general, spoke to how the nation's divisions are reflected in the media and the way journalists continue to wrestle with how best to deal with Trump as he's well into his third run for the presidency.
In what was billed as a news conference, the former president hit familiar themes with his anger about the case, criticism of some figures involved and campaign-style attacks against his anticipated opponent, President Joe Biden. Trump walked off after about 40 minutes without taking any questions.
“Clearly, without a teleprompter, he's raging against almost everything,” CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer said. The network pulled away from Trump about halfway through his talk, followed shortly by MSNBC. Fox News Channel and Newsmax, networks more popular with Trump fans, carried the speech in full. Broadcast networks did not carry it.
Both CNN and MSNBC immediately told viewers that some of what Trump had said was misleading or flat-out false. That's been a concern for years among some networks about carrying Trump's remarks live, as illustrated when Trump spoke almost daily after his trial sessions; MSNBC was most likely to skip those entirely.
Blitzer called on CNN's fact-checker, Daniel Dale, to note that there's “not a shred of evidence” to indicate that Biden had anything to do with Trump's prosecution. He also questioned Trump statements about who
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