When a Border City's Local News Anchors Expose CNN Live on Air, You Know We're Winning. [Watch]
Back in December, as the media congratulated itself for standing up to anything Donald Trump-related while steeling itself against the possibility that there might be another side to the issue, CNN’s Dana Bash made it clear how hurtful the words “fake news” were and how they tried their hardest to get to the bottom of every story.
“The attacks on the media work. And it breaks my heart,” Bash said, according to The Hill.
“Are reporters humans who get things wrong? Of course. But we wake up every morning trying to get things right. By demonizing reporters and calling our work ‘Fake News,’ it is chipping away at a critical pillar of American democracy.”
A critical pillar of American democracy that works so hard to get things right that it rescinded an invitation for a local television station to partner with them on a story after they realized it wouldn’t support their narrative.
As part of their coverage of the border fence debate, CNN decided to reach out to San Diego’s KUSI-TV to ask what locals think about the barrier separating their little chunk of America from Mexico.
The end result was this 40-second segment posted Thursday detailing exactly what happened.
“A sign of the times in this debate on the shutdown,” anchor Anna Laurel says. “CNN asked if KUSI would provide a reporter to offer our local view of the debate, especially to learn if the wall works in San Diego.”
KUSI is an independent local news station in California. CNN probably expected someone to come on and tell them how the wall was a crime against humanity and it was a waste of money.
They weren’t going to get that.
“KUSI offered our own Dan Plante, who’s reported many times that the wall is not an issue here,” anchor Sandra Maas said.
Thursday morning, @CNN called the KUSI Newsroom asking if a reporter could give them a local view of the debate surrounding the border wall and government shutdown. After we informed them about our past reports, they declined to hear from us.
More info: https://t.co/RX4mB6EdNE pic.twitter.com/r0SAvWxFIm
— KUSI News (@KUSINews) January 11, 2019
“In fact, most officials believe that it is effective. The issue we face is the migrants and the debate over their treatment.”
This would have been an interesting segment — Plante, certainly not offering a take that CNN wasn’t used to, spurring some conversation on a network that’s not necessarily known to view the wall with any great kindness.
I say, of course, “would have been.” It didn’t happen for reasons that aren’t going to shock you.
“Now, knowing this, CNN declined to have us on our programs,” Laurel says, “which often present the wall as not required in other places like the stretch of the Texas border that the president visited earlier today.
“They didn’t like what they heard from us,” Laurel concludes.
“Just some background for you,” Maas says.
Well, imagine that. And imagine what would have happened if this would have been Fox News. There would have been gnashing of teeth and rending of Balmain T-shirts from every celebrity on Twitter. The silence on this one couldn’t be more deafening.
However, one outlet that wasn’t staying silent was KUSI. They were willing to speak out about how blatant this all was. If there was any sign that conservatives are winning, it’s that.
Thankfully, CNN managed to spoil its own carefully crafted narrative without any help from KUSI:
I found some steel slats down on the border. But I don’t see anything resembling a national emergency situation.. at least not in the McAllen TX area of the border where Trump will be today. pic.twitter.com/KRoLdszLUu
— Jim Acosta (@Acosta) January 10, 2019
Nice wall there, Jim.
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