For several weeks now, Fox News and conservatives have downplayed and denied the threat of the coronavirus and COVID-19. Taking their cues from Trump (or perhaps more likely, Trump is taking his cues from Fox News), the conservative propaganda machine has been churning out content dismissing the threat.
But now that COVID-19 has reached pandemic levels and over a million people worldwide have been infected, Fox News is pivoting, claiming they’ve always taken the threat seriously. In response, The Daily Show with Trevor Noah assembled a damning supercut that features Fox News’s talking heads denying the threat of COVID-19.
The supercut, titled “Saluting the Heroes of the Coronavirus Pandumbic”, features the Fox News rogues gallery: Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Geraldo Rivera, Lou Dobbs, Tomi Lahren, Jesse Watters, Ainsley Earhardt, Dr. Drew (who I inexplicably expected more from?), Judge Jeanine Pirro, along with Medal of Freedom (ugh) recipient Rush Limbaugh.
Following suit are the conservatives in congress like Matt Gaetz and Devin Nunes, as well as Trump’s cronies Kellyanne Conway, Larry Kudlow, Mike Pence, and Trump himself. The montage ends with Trump and Hannity reversing course and declaring they’ve always taken the threat seriously (they haven’t).
Fox News has never been a real news channel, but it has never threatened the lives of its viewers so directly as it has during this pandemic. Considering that the average age of its viewers skews older, the cable channel has put America’s most vulnerable citizens at risk with deliberately misleading and inaccurate information.
The Twitter hashtag #FoxNewsLiedAndPeopleDied, as well as variations of that same sentiment have been trending on social media for several days. But will Fox News and its owners, the Murdoch family, face any consequences for endangering the public?
The Washington League for Increased Transparency and Ethics(WASHLITE), a Washington non-profit corporation has filed a complaint against Fox News and the Murdochs, claiming the network “willfully and maliciously engaged in a campaign of deception and omission regarding the danger of the international proliferation of the
novel Coronavirus, COVID-19.”
Vanity Fair journalist Gabriel Sherman said during an interview with MSNBC’s AM Joy, “When I’ve been talking to Fox insiders over the last few days, there’s a real concern inside the network that their early downplaying of the coronavirus actually exposes Fox News to potential legal action by viewers who maybe were misled and actually have died from this.”
He continued, saying “So I think this is a case where Fox’s coverage, if it actually winds up being proved that people died because of it, this is a new terrain in terms of Fox being possibly held liable for their actions.”
Still, the Murdochs are billionaires, which means they will likely never face legal repercussions. The only way to truly hold these people accountable is to vote them out in November.
Until then, we hope that democrats do the smart thing: create a television ad using this supercut and buy airtime on Fox News so that all of its viewers are forced to confront the danger their beloved channel has put them in.
(via HuffPost, image: screencap/The Daily Show with Trevor Noah)
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