After White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany was blasted on Fox News for accusing reporters of “desperately” wanting “churches and houses of worship [to] stay closed,” the Fox & Friends sycophants helped her rewrite history.
Our last post noted how Chris Wallace and conservative Jonah Goldberg ripped McEnany’s “indefensible and grotesque” behavior during her press briefing on Friday. During that briefing, McEnany said, “Boy, it's interesting to be in a room that desperately wants to seem to see these churches and houses of worship stay closed.” Wallace and Goldberg were far from alone in expressing outrage at McEnany’s remarks.
Naturally, there was nothing but love from the Fox & Friends lapdogs. So McEnany was able to claim, “There’s no pandemic exception to the Constitution in the Bill of Rights,” without anyone inconveniently noting that the Declaration of Independence confers the right to life as “inalienable.”
But maybe they think that only applies to fetuses. Cohost Ainsley Earhardt, working from the safety of her home, shook her head at the horror of churches staying closed as an effort to save lives.
At 3:22, cohost Brian Kilmeade got to the rehab: He gave a friendly description of McEnany’s attempt to tell reporters what to ask (also blasted by Wallace) about the Michael Flynn matter as, “Hey, I’m gonna run down a list of questions that you guys just don’t even ask me.”
“I think a lot of people were stunned by that, a lot of people applauded it,” Kilmeade continued, “but the one thing you did say is ... a comment that people, some of you don’t care whether these churches open or not. And some of the press got insulted.”
Actually, what McEnany said was worse than that, she accused the press of "desperately" wanting them to stay closed. Neither of the other two cohosts corrected the record.
Kilmeade read a quote from Wallace: “Let me just say, Sam Donaldson and me in the Reagan White House, we were pretty tough on the White House press secretaries and we never had our religious beliefs questioned or were lectured on what we should ask.” Then Kilmeade suggested Wallace got it wrong. “Were you questioning the religious beliefs of the press?” Kilmeade “asked.”
MCENANY: No, I never questioned the religious beliefs of the press. Many of our journalists are great men and women of faith and differing faiths, whether it be the Jewish faith, the Christian faith, the Muslim faith. What I was saying was, I was asked 11 questions as to why churches would be allowed to reopen. It was a bit peculiar to be asked these 11 questions in a row. And for the onus and the focus solely to be why churches are essential, I’ve never been asked why a liquor store was essential. So I was merely pointing that out.
FACT CHECK: McEnany was being asked about Trump's authority to override governors' decisions on opening churches.
None of the hosts said anything to challenge that brazen lie about an attempt to smear reporters as anti-religion or its context. That included Super Duper Christian and “tough journalist" Ainsley Earhardt.
McEnany went on to rail about journalists’ “extreme lack of curiosity” about Michael Flynn’s name being leaked and to bemoan that there are too few reporters as good as Maria Bartiromo and Catherine Herridge. But speaking of an extreme lack of curiosity… McEnany dropped her Friday falsehood about Flynn being unmasked (he was never masked, which blows a huge hole in Obamagate). Not one of the three cohosts asked any questions about that.
You can watch the Republican Rehab below, from the May 26, 2020 Fox & Friends.
I take that back: she lies just as often as the person she represents. Perfectly suited for the task (but her boss might not like the fact that she has better hair)
The “Jesus will take care of me” crowd can be counted on to forget that proud stance immediately after they or theirs are directly affected. Their total lack of empathy is not particularly Christ-like in my book.