In France, such an act would resemble a crime of lèse-majesté. Not in the United States, where Donald Trump is known for his swerves, his excesses and his lies. Early Wednesday November 4, French time, while the result of the presidential election was still not known, two news channels allowed themselves to interrupt the American president, who nevertheless held a long-awaited speech.
“We are listening to the president speaking from the White House, but we have to stop because there are several claims that are just not true,” NBC News host Savannah Guthrie justified. Donald Trump had just said he had “Won this election”, while certifying that “Frauds” could have tainted the ballot.
Same decision on MSNBC, where Brian Williams spoke again while the Republican candidate was still speaking. Saying to himself “Reluctant” at the idea of cutting it, the host justified himself by saying that his statements were not “Not well founded at all”.
CNN cuts the signal
This act of censorship is not a first since the arrival of the businessman in power in 2016. CNN, who let the president go to the end on Wednesday, while specifying that “Virtually everything President Trump said was not true”, had rebelled a year earlier.
It was June 18, 2019, during Donald Trump’s first campaign rally. Two minutes after taking the floor, the president shifts to his favorite subject, media criticism. The activists then start chanting “CNN sucks! “ (“CNN stinks!”). Six minutes after the start of the meeting, the system cuts off the signal. Unheard of for an American president.
At the time, it was a break for the news channel, long accused, despite its progressive color, of playing Trump’s game, “By putting it more on the air than Fox News, under the pretext that it was audience”, Alexis Pichard analysis, author of Trump and the media, the illusion of war, published October 6 (VA Editions).
Liberating disobedience
CNN’s disobedience is proving liberating. On April 13, Donald Trump broadcast, during a press point, a propaganda clip of government action on Covid-19. MSNBC and CNN interrupt the broadcast. The attitude of the channels then spreads oil on social networks. In spring, “First Twitter and then Facebook delete certain presidential messages”, continues the researcher.
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