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FLASHBACK: Media Sniffed ‘Fascism’ After Trump Fired Comey in 2017
President-elect Donald Trump’s announcement that he has selected Kash Patel to take over the FBI from current Director Christopher Wray immediately sparked media theories that the move was designed to let the new President improperly use the bureau as an instrument of revenge against his political enemies.
During Saturday evening’s live coverage on MSNBC, The Atlantic’s Tom Nichols blasted it as an “extraordinarily dangerous” pick, while over on CNN, ex-FBI official Andrew McCabe, now CNN’s senior law enforcement analyst, claimed Patel’s elevation “can only possibly be a plan to disrupt, to dismantle, to distract the FBI and to possibly use it as a tool for the President’s political agenda.”
On Sunday’s Good Morning America, ABC’s Jon Karl branded Patel as “the FBI Director nominee for retribution,” adding that “you can bet that there will be a lot of pushback, certainly from Democrats, but I think you’re going to see significant pushback from at least some Republicans as well.”
All of this echoes the media’s panicky reaction in May 2017, after Trump fired then-FBI director James Comey (paving the way, of course, for the later appointment of Wray). When that news broke on May 9, 2017, CNN’s Jeffrey Toobin blasted it as “a grotesque abuse of power,” while MSNBC’s Chris Matthews detected a “whiff of fascism” in the air.
The next morning on CBS, correspondent Nancy Cordes relayed how “Democrats savaged the President’s decision, calling it ‘Nixonian,’ ‘mind-boggling,’ and ‘a cover-up.’” By May 17, CNN’s David Gergen decided: “I think we are in impeachment territory for the first time.”
MRC’s Geoffrey Dickens examined all primetime cable news coverage from the night Comey was fired (May 9, 2017). He found that journalists used the words ‘Nixon’ ‘Watergate’ and ‘massacre’ a whopping 118 times on MSNBC, CNN and Fox News between 7 and 11pm ET in just that one evening. “MSNBC was most zealous, using those terms 58 times to liken Trump to Nixon,” Dickens wrote. “CNN came in second with 36, while Fox News Channel finished in third with 13.”
Yesterday’s announcement of Patel’s appointment means, of course, that Trump is intent on firing Wray, who has 3 years left in his 10-year term, so we can expect to hear a lot more frantic media condemnations, as well as speculation of what horrors might ensue if Patel takes over the FBI. From the NewsBusters’ archives, here’s a quick review of how the media lost their minds the last time Trump canned one FBI director in favor of another:
■ “A grotesque abuse of power, by the President of the United States. This is the kind of thing that goes on in non-democracies. That when there is a investigation that reaches near the President of the United States, or the leader of a non-democracy, they fire the people who are in charge of the investigation. I have not seen anything like this since October 20, 1973 when President Nixon fired Archibald Cox, the Watergate special prosecutor....Can we point out that emperor is not wearing any clothes?”— Legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin on CNN’s The Situation Room, May 9, 2017.
■ “A little whiff of, fascism tonight, I think it’s fair to say. A little whiff of, ‘I don’t care about the law, I’m the boss.’”— Host Chris Matthews on MSNBC’s Hardball, May 9, 2017.
■ “In the end, he [Richard Nixon] destroyed the public’s confidence, hollowed the presidency, and tarnished his legacy forever...The question for Washington this morning, is another president using his power to stop an investigation and will Congress stand by and watch while it happens?... It was not so long ago that the United States endured through a president obsessed by his enemies, who felt looked down by the press and by elites, and believed that he had to play dirty to win an unfair game....The capital is filling with echoes of Watergate and the question this morning is whether the centuries-old system of checks and balances will swing into action?”— Host Joe Scarborough on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, May 10, 2017.
■ “I personally think it’s over. I don’t think there’s anything that can be done that can stop this at this point. This cacophony, this gushing of lies, problems, questions, chaos that will stop its presidency in its tracks because they won’t be able to get anything else done and tomorrow there will be something new. And tomorrow there will be something new. There was always more chaos on the horizon.”— Co-host Mika Brzezinski on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, May 11, 2017.
■ “This is, look, something out of a Godfather movie. This isn’t something that comes out of the Constitution or the way our government does business. Demanding loyalty of someone who’s heading an investigation into your own administration? That borders on obstruction of justice. I don’t think we’re there yet, but this is totally improper and out of place to even be holding a conversation like that.”— Longtime CBS anchor and correspondent Bob Schieffer on CBS This Morning, May 12, 2017.
■ “I think this is a potentially more dangerous situation than Watergate and we are at a very dangerous moment. And that’s because we are looking at the possibility that the President of the United States and those around him during an election campaign colluded with a hostile foreign power to undermine the basis of our democracy: free elections....What we see is that at every turn this President is impeding the ability of those who were chosen to investigate to do so. Including the House and Senate committees. So it is truly a dangerous moment. It is different than Watergate.”— Carl Bernstein on CNN’s Reliable Sources, May 14, 2017.
■ “Donald Trump in much of his rhetoric and many of his actions poses a danger to American democracy....There is just one real check on the president — impeachment....There are only two forces left that can place some constraints on Donald Trump: the courts, and the media....The media must cover the administration’s policies fairly. But it also must never let the public forget that many of the attitudes and actions of this president are gross violations of the customs and practices of the modern American system, that they are aberrations and they cannot become the new norms....Our task is, quite simply, to keep alive the spirit of American democracy.”— Host Fareed Zakaria on CNN’s Fareed Zakaria GPS, May 14, 2017.
■ “I see politicians putting power and politics over principle... and I am incredulous. I see lies treated as truths...and I am disgusted. I see justice denied and likely obstructed....and I am fearful....I find myself returning in my mind to dark days from the past, trying to remember how we as a nation felt, when Pearl Harbor was attacked, when Kennedy was shot, when Watergate took down a President, when terrorists rained terror from the skies. We somehow overcame. And I do believe that we shall overcome, someday. Perhaps, hopefully, someday soon. But in the end, prayer will not be enough. Action, sustained action, will be required.”— Former CBS Evening News anchor Dan Rather in a May 16, 2017 Facebook post.
■ “Donald Trump’s ignorance of everything about government, his ignorance about the FBI, his ignorance about the law, his ignorance about James Comey himself as a person, has now led Donald Trump to the greatest danger of his life. The only danger that he has ever faced that is greater than the bankruptcy of Atlantic City casinos, President Donald Trump now sits at the threshold of impeachment. John McCain said tonight, that the Trump scandals have reached a ‘Watergate size and scale.’ Watergate got President Nixon impeached. On the verge of impeachment he resigned. He resigned as he faced impeachment in the house of representatives for exactly, exactly what James Comey’s memo says Donald Trump did, obstruction of justice.”— Host Lawrence O’Donnell on MSNBC’s The Last Word, May 16, 2017.
■ “I was in the Nixon administration as you know. I thought after watching the Clinton impeachment. I thought I would never see another one, but I think we are in impeachment territory for the first time....I think if you look at the three bombshells we’ve had — the Comey firing the last week, then the sharing of this highly classified with the Russians of all people and now, telling Comey to drop the case — what we see is a presidency that’s starting to come apart.”— CNN political analyst David Gergen on Anderson Cooper 360, May 17, 2017.
For more examples from our flashback series, which we call the NewsBusters Time Machine, go here.
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