The Media Must Admit Their Complicity in Russiagate | The American Spectator

This past week Fox News host Greg Gutfeld called on the U.S. mainstream media to offer an apology to Donald Trump.

Those who played a “starring role” in amplifying the Russiagate conspiracy against President Trump must face consequences, Gutfeld said — and an apology is warranted. The U.S. media needs to make serious amends to many people for its role in spreading the now — thoroughly debunked — Russiagate hoax.

The Fox News host is quite right regarding President Trump, but the overture is insufficient. Such a gesture would be too limiting relative to the weightiness of the offense perpetrated by several U.S. officials, the media and what was ultimately affected by it — America, itself. The apology due Donald Trump pales in comparison to what is owed to the American people — an admission of culpability.

The U.S. electorate — having handed a decisive victory to Donald Trump — must now examine with eyes open why there has been a loss of trust in the mainstream media. Americans must bring into specific relief what the fourth estate actually put in peril through their years-long efforts to bring down a sitting president.

In October of last year, a Gallup poll found that a meager 31 percent of Americans trust the mass media “to report the news ‘fully, accurately and fairly’” — an all-time low.

It’s surprising the number is even that high, after the media’s relentless characterization of a candidate (on the path to overwhelmingly win the presidency) as a “racist,” a “tyrant,” and a “fascist.”

Much of our mainstream media has patently become the “institutional voice” for the “political left” — essentially ‘activists.’

A 2023 study out of Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications found that “just 3.4 percent of American journalists identify as Republicans.”

National Public Radio, ostensibly the voice to “all the American people,” has at its Washington, DC, headquarters “87 registered Democrats working in editorial positions and zero Republicans. None,” the New York Post reported.

News outlets, of course, may choose to represent any political position towards which they are favorably inclined. But perhaps for the sake of clarity, it would be helpful — and fair — if they were just honest about it.

If The New York Times continues to be a substantially left-leaning news source, it should forego the charade that it endeavors to represent “all sides” or report the news in a “dispassionate” way.

Take the paper’s headline just after the 2024 presidential election: “Stunning Return to Power After Dark and Defiant Campaign.” And the Washington Post offered the same referring to the president elect as “a felon.”

Apparently, the American electorate — giving Donald Trump an overwhelming mandate — did not experience Donald Trump as “dark” and “defiant.” Rather, they embraced his plain-spoken manner. At least, that’s what the polls suggested — and what the voters reaffirmed.

After Trump shocked many by defeating Hillary Clinton in 2016, the term “media bubble” arose to explain journalists’ breath-taking level of “astonishment” — they were bewildered by the loss.

Caught flat-footed, they had missed the Trump phenomenon and swore they would “never” be shamed again.

Yet, here we are — again. And this time, the stakes are much greater than the trite expression: Oh well — it’s just politics.

Consider this headline in the middle of the Biden presidency, “Nearly 60 percent see mainstream media as a threat to democracy.” A New York Times-Siena College poll found 59 percent of voters view the media as a “major threat to democracy,” while 25 percent saw it as a “minor threat.” Overall, 71 percent of voters agreed that democracy is under threat.

The voters it seems believed that what the media was engaged in was more than “just politics.” Americans were concerned with what the media elite were oblivious to — America, itself — and its republican, democratic institutions. Apparently, the U.S. electorate saw what the media elite either didn’t see or didn’t care to see — and now that’s coming to light.

There have been recent devastating revelations made by Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard. The director released a trove of documents which she described as “overwhelming evidence” of a coordinated effort by senior Obama-era officials (allegedly at the behest of then President Barack Obama, himself) to suppress intelligence and then politicize information previously dismissed as unreliable by U.S. intelligence agencies — the Steele Dossier with which Hillary Clinton seems to be inextricably attached. The officials then — with full knowledge of the dossier’s lack of merit — falsely accused President Donald Trump of colluding with Russia to win the election.

Earlier this month, a similar intelligence assessment was made by CIA Director John Ratcliffe. In an interview with the New York Post, he cited an internal review suggesting that American public opinion had been manipulated through repeated media leaks and “anonymous sources” quoted by the Washington Post, the New York Times, and other major media — for which the Times and Post won Pulitzers.

And there’s more: The appendix to former Special Counsel John Durham’s report released by the Senate Judiciary Committee sheds new light on the affair: George Soros’ alleged ties to Russiagate have been exposed in the declassified annex of the Durham report. Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley describes it as “one of the biggest political scandals and cover-ups in American history.”

Major American news media outlets played a significant role in amplifying the subversive plot against a president of the United States. Yet, the same media accuse the Trump administration of trying to “rewrite history,” attempting to shift culpability away from themselves and hide the lie they perpetuated for almost a decade.

The American people cannot allow this fraud to go unanswered; this was not merely “politics as usual” — it was an orchestrated assault against America and the democratic institutions so many have fought and died to protect. The Obama officials responsible for misrepresenting intelligence information, the media elite and other political personalities who perpetuated their conspiracy against Trump, should make restitution to the American people — they should openly take responsibility for their actions by admitting their culpability in manufacturing consent — America’s democratic institutions are too precious to accept anything less.

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