Ex-RNC head gets new gig: Propping up Republican lies for NBC News
The extent to which the media has normalized Donald Trump’s 2021 coup and 2024 candidacy is truly alarming, and NBC News has been one of the biggest offenders. After longtime “Meet the Press” host Chuck Todd, in a flourish of quantum sleight of hand, improbably departed the show from both sides of his clown car, Kristen Welker took over the wheel. She looked to be a breath of fresh air before suddenly going full-blown Chernobyl, scheduling a fib-festooned interview with the guy who literally tried to end American democracy before calling to terminate the Constitution. And guess what! The people who bring us “Meet the Press” are at it again. Former RNC Chair and ex-Romney Ronna McDaniel is joining NBC News as an on-air contributor—because news departments need to be fair to both the reality-based and non-reality-based sides of every issue. It’s just common sense. The New York Times: The hire adds a reliably conservative voice to NBC’s stable of political analysts. Ms. McDaniel is also expected to provide commentary on MSNBC, NBC’s left-leaning cable cousin and a network that former President Donald J. Trump and his allies often accuse of being an arm of the Democratic Party. “It couldn’t be a more important moment to have a voice like Ronna’s on the team,” Carrie Budoff Brown, who oversees NBC News political coverage, wrote in a memo, adding that Ms. McDaniel would provide “an insider’s perspective on national politics and the future of the Republican Party.” Ms. McDaniel will be especially involved in the coverage of the 2024 campaign, including election nights. Granted, it’s difficult these days to find Republicans who’ve never subscribed to Trump’s barmy Big Lie, but they’re out there, and any one of them would be a more valuable addition to NBC’s team than McDaniel. This is a little like NBC Sports hiring the Atlanta Olympics bomber to do color commentary for the two-man luge. Then again, why should they let a silly thing like a years-long campaign to undermine truth, democracy, and the rule of law get in the way of scoring a big, Romney-less name like Ronna McDaniel? Well, for this reason, naturally: In July 2023—long after it was clear that all the claims about 2020 election-rigging had been confected by Trump’s cotton candy-machine of a cranium—McDaniel still refused to admit that President Joe Biden had won fair and square. “I think saying that there were problems with 2020 is very real. I don’t think that’s election denying,” she told CNN’s Chris Wallace in July 2023. “I’m from Wayne County [Michigan]. We had a woman send a note saying ‘I’m being told to backdate ballots.’ We had to look into that. That’s deeply concerning. When you have friends who are poll-watching and being kicked out, that’s deeply concerning. We have every right to look at that.” Yeah, but they did look at that, though. Everyone did. Including Trump’s own attorney general, who decided there was nothing particularly fishy about the election. And Trump’s own election cybersecurity chief, who confidently asserted that the 2020 presidential election was the most secure in U.S. history. When Wallace pressed McDaniel, she first regurgitated the weak-sauce acknowledgment that “Joe Biden is the president” before eventually saying, “I think there were lots of problems with 2020. Ultimately he won the election, but there were lots of problems with the 2020 election. I don’t think he won it fair. I don’t. I’m not going to say that.” As Philip Bump noted in The Washington Post last July, McDaniel’s hemming, hawing, and hedging are a lot more destructive to our democracy than they might initially appear. CNN has consistently asked Americans whether Biden won legitimately in 2020 or not. Over time, about two-thirds of Republicans have consistently said he didn’t. The percentage who say there’s solid evidence that Biden didn’t win has dropped as the lack of such evidence has become increasingly apparent — but Republicans then just transition to a McDaniel-esque I suspect he didn’t win legitimately. This is self-reinforcing in the way that so much in the Trump era has been self-reinforcing. McDaniel won’t say Biden was legitimately elected because the base doesn’t want to hear it — but the base doesn’t want to hear it in part because leaders such as McDaniel won’t simply admit without qualifications that Biden won. Of course, as Bump himself notes, Republican officials like McDaniel are simply afraid to say Biden won legitimately, because if they do, Trump will visit the 10 Plagues of Mar-a-Lago on their heads, starting with the festering boils and ending with Secretary of State Marjorie Taylor Greene. But is that really an excuse? And if lying liars are allowed to leave their GOP sinecures for greener (as in more callow and naive) pastures, what possible incentive will they have to stop lying? In fact, it took McDaniel a full year after the 2020 election to finally admit that Biden had won—and even then she was unwillin
JoriPress
The extent to which the media has normalized Donald Trump’s 2021 coup and 2024 candidacy is truly alarming, and NBC News has been one of the biggest offenders. After longtime “Meet the Press” host Chuck Todd, in a flourish of quantum sleight of hand, improbably departed the show from both sides of his clown car, Kristen Welker took over the wheel. She looked to be a breath of fresh air before suddenly going full-blown Chernobyl, scheduling a fib-festooned interview with the guy who literally tried to end American democracy before calling to terminate the Constitution.
And guess what! The people who bring us “Meet the Press” are at it again. Former RNC Chair and ex-Romney Ronna McDaniel is joining NBC News as an on-air contributor—because news departments need to be fair to both the reality-based and non-reality-based sides of every issue. It’s just common sense.
The hire adds a reliably conservative voice to NBC’s stable of political analysts. Ms. McDaniel is also expected to provide commentary on MSNBC, NBC’s left-leaning cable cousin and a network that former President Donald J. Trump and his allies often accuse of being an arm of the Democratic Party.
“It couldn’t be a more important moment to have a voice like Ronna’s on the team,” Carrie Budoff Brown, who oversees NBC News political coverage, wrote in a memo, adding that Ms. McDaniel would provide “an insider’s perspective on national politics and the future of the Republican Party.” Ms. McDaniel will be especially involved in the coverage of the 2024 campaign, including election nights.
Granted, it’s difficult these days to find Republicans who’ve never subscribed to Trump’s barmy Big Lie, but they’re out there, and any one of them would be a more valuable addition to NBC’s team than McDaniel. This is a little like NBC Sports hiring the Atlanta Olympics bomber to do color commentary for the two-man luge. Then again, why should they let a silly thing like a years-long campaign to undermine truth, democracy, and the rule of law get in the way of scoring a big, Romney-less name like Ronna McDaniel?
Well, for this reason, naturally: In July 2023—long after it was clear that all the claims about 2020 election-rigging had been confected by Trump’s cotton candy-machine of a cranium—McDaniel still refused to admit that President Joe Biden had won fair and square.
“I think saying that there were problems with 2020 is very real. I don’t think that’s election denying,” she told CNN’s Chris Wallace in July 2023. “I’m from Wayne County [Michigan]. We had a woman send a note saying ‘I’m being told to backdate ballots.’ We had to look into that. That’s deeply concerning. When you have friends who are poll-watching and being kicked out, that’s deeply concerning. We have every right to look at that.”
Yeah, but they did look at that, though. Everyone did. Including Trump’s own attorney general, who decided there was nothing particularly fishy about the election. And Trump’s own election cybersecurity chief, who confidently asserted that the 2020 presidential election was the most secure in U.S. history.
When Wallace pressed McDaniel, she first regurgitated the weak-sauce acknowledgment that “Joe Biden is the president” before eventually saying, “I think there were lots of problems with 2020. Ultimately he won the election, but there were lots of problems with the 2020 election. I don’t think he won it fair. I don’t. I’m not going to say that.”
As Philip Bump noted in The Washington Post last July, McDaniel’s hemming, hawing, and hedging are a lot more destructive to our democracy than they might initially appear.
CNN has consistently asked Americans whether Biden won legitimately in 2020 or not. Over time, about two-thirds of Republicans have consistently said he didn’t. The percentage who say there’s solid evidence that Biden didn’t win has dropped as the lack of such evidence has become increasingly apparent — but Republicans then just transition to a McDaniel-esque I suspect he didn’t win legitimately.
This is self-reinforcing in the way that so much in the Trump era has been self-reinforcing. McDaniel won’t say Biden was legitimately elected because the base doesn’t want to hear it — but the base doesn’t want to hear it in part because leaders such as McDaniel won’t simply admit without qualifications that Biden won.
Of course, as Bump himself notes, Republican officials like McDaniel are simply afraid to say Biden won legitimately, because if they do, Trump will visit the 10 Plagues of Mar-a-Lago on their heads, starting with the festering boils and ending with Secretary of State Marjorie Taylor Greene. But is that really an excuse? And if lying liars are allowed to leave their GOP sinecures for greener (as in more callow and naive) pastures, what possible incentive will they have to stop lying?
In fact, it took McDaniel a full year after the 2020 election to finally admit that Biden had won—and even then she was unwilling to acknowledge he did so legitimately.
Business Insider, Nov. 19, 2021:
Ronna McDaniel, chair of the Republican National Committee, acknowledged publicly for the first time on Thursday that President Joe Biden won the 2020 election.
"Painfully, Joe Biden won the election and it's very painful to watch," McDaniel told the audience at a breakfast in Washington hosted by the Christian Science Monitor. "He's the president. We know that."
McDaniel has established a "Committee on Election Integrity" at the RNC and claimed on Thursday that there were "lots of problems" with the 2020 election, despite there being no evidence of widespread election fraud. McDaniel's very delayed concession that former President Donald Trump lost the election is a testament to just how many Republicans either believe or refuse to contradict the false claim that Trump actually won the election.
Imagine having to pretend to love, respect—and believe!—Donald Trump this much in order to keep your job. How could that possibly be worth it? And what would it do to your psyche? It’s like selling your soul to Satan for an egg salad sandwich and 10% off your next case of Boone’s Farm.
Fortunately for McDaniel—and unfortunately for our republic—NBC News made her an offer she couldn’t refuse. Meaning it was this or part-time peep show janitor.
It’s still not remotely clear that McDaniel—whose big debut is on, you guessed it, “Meet the Press” this Sunday—made the right choice. Campaign Action
Check out Aldous J. Pennyfarthing’s four-volume Trump-trashing compendium, including the finale, Goodbye, Asshat: 101 Farewell Letters to Donald Trump, at this link.
