News Opinons Politics

Chuck Todd of NBC’s ‘Meet the Press’ Blames Russia for ‘Fake News’

Chuck Todd used his Meet the Press program Sunday on NBC to attack “fake news” — and blamed Russian disinformation, rather than shoddy journalism, for convincing Americans not to trust the mainstream media.

His show, featuring guests whom he described “top players in journalism, diplomacy and technology,” claimed that “Russian tactics” of “truth manipulation” have migrated right here to the United States.”

Todd’s primary culprit: the Trump administration, which he noted on day one pushed “an easily disprovable lie about his inaugural crowd size.”


He ignored the other “day one” lie: that Trump was colluding with Russia, a lie the media pushed relentlessly.

Todd’s first guest was New York Times executive editor Dean Baquet, who admitted earlier this year that his newsroom had been built around the Russia story for two years.

Todd did not ask Banquet about that: instead, he asked Baquet about whether “the truth itself is on trial,” an idea with which Baquet enthusiastically agreed.


Georgia assistant principal accused of stealing nearly $1K in Walmart merchandise at self-checkout
NJ councilwoman condemns ‘ignorance’ of comparing ICE agents to Nazis during heated meeting
Trump taps Colin McDonald for newly-created role of assistant attorney general for fraud enforcement
Ilhan Omar demands impeachment of Noem amid DHS funding battle: ‘We must abolish ICE’
Video appears to show Alex Pretti spit at federal agents, violently damage SUV days before fatal CBP shooting
Ilhan Omar blames Trump’s rhetoric for surge in death threats, including spray attack: ‘So obsessed with me’
Rubio Defends Maduro Raid in Fiery Exchange with Rand Paul: ‘We Did Not Remove an Elected Official’
Breaking: New Video Reportedly Shows Alex Pretti Violently Attacking, Destroying Equipment on ICE Vehicle Days Before Shooting
Delusional Rocker Neil Young Gifts Music Catalog to Greenland, Claims It Will Help Them Cope With Trump
‘This Is Not a Game Show’: Marco Rubio Refuses to Go Along with Dem Senator’s Hearing Tactics
Did You Catch the Fatal Flaw in Obama’s Comments on the Pretti Death? It’s a Whopper That Even He Can’t Get Away With
Amazon Enacts Mass Layoffs as AI Rocks Tech Industry
Fox News Poll: 59% of voters say ICE is too aggressive, up 10 points since July
Fox News Poll: Donald Trump starts 2026 with 44% approval
Chuck Schumer lays out ICE demands to avoid government shutdown

See also  Maine’s bipartisan brand of political nepotism

Next, Todd turned to Martin Baron, the executive editor of the Washington Post — another paper that pushed the Russia collusion hoax, and which also led the way in trying to debunk Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA)’s effort, recently vindicated, to expose the truth about the FBI’s abuse of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) courts.

Baron complained: “We live in an environment where people are able to spread crazy conspiracy theories and absolute falsehoods and lies.” He blamed social media — not the conspiracy theories validated by his own paper.

Baron also griped that Americans had become “numb” to the supposedly “15,000 false or misleading claims” by the president that his paper has been tracking. Not only are many of those supposedly false “claims” actually true, or defensible differences of opinion, but the Post is seemingly numb to the major anti-Trump lies it has pushed.

Todd asked Baquet if journalists would have to “market” the idea that they are there to tell the truth — in the course of continuing to push the idea that Russian propaganda, not media malpractice, is to blame to public mistrust.

Baquet said that he and Baron needed to continue “very aggressively defending our institutions, defending the truth and defending our important role in democracy.”

Again, no mention of the corrosive effect that the Russia hoax has had on our democracy — or the role that the media has played in the ongoing impeachment debacle over Ukraine, including the Post‘s own misreporting of leaked testimony from closed-door hearings in the House Intelligence Committee.

See also  More than a million veterans left without primary care providers because of VA staffing losses, watchdog warns

Todd would not admit that the media’s leading institutions had failed by their own standards — only that they might be “culturally” out of touch with the rest of America.


Georgia assistant principal accused of stealing nearly $1K in Walmart merchandise at self-checkout
NJ councilwoman condemns ‘ignorance’ of comparing ICE agents to Nazis during heated meeting
Trump taps Colin McDonald for newly-created role of assistant attorney general for fraud enforcement
Ilhan Omar demands impeachment of Noem amid DHS funding battle: ‘We must abolish ICE’
Video appears to show Alex Pretti spit at federal agents, violently damage SUV days before fatal CBP shooting
Ilhan Omar blames Trump’s rhetoric for surge in death threats, including spray attack: ‘So obsessed with me’
Rubio Defends Maduro Raid in Fiery Exchange with Rand Paul: ‘We Did Not Remove an Elected Official’
Breaking: New Video Reportedly Shows Alex Pretti Violently Attacking, Destroying Equipment on ICE Vehicle Days Before Shooting
Delusional Rocker Neil Young Gifts Music Catalog to Greenland, Claims It Will Help Them Cope With Trump
‘This Is Not a Game Show’: Marco Rubio Refuses to Go Along with Dem Senator’s Hearing Tactics
Did You Catch the Fatal Flaw in Obama’s Comments on the Pretti Death? It’s a Whopper That Even He Can’t Get Away With
Amazon Enacts Mass Layoffs as AI Rocks Tech Industry
Fox News Poll: 59% of voters say ICE is too aggressive, up 10 points since July
Fox News Poll: Donald Trump starts 2026 with 44% approval
Chuck Schumer lays out ICE demands to avoid government shutdown

See also  Gambling industry bankrolls members of Congress who push pro-gambling legislation

“I think we cannot dismiss everybody who supported Donald Trump,” Baquet offered, somewhat generously.

The rest of the program was devoted to the idea that Russian disinformation, and distrust of the media spread by Trump and the Republicans, was to blame for declining public confidence in journalism.

Not once did Todd look at the media’s role in pushing conspiracy theories in a barely-disguised effort to take down the president.

Story cited here.

Share this article:
Share on Facebook
Facebook
Tweet about this on Twitter
Twitter