Fox News seems to be having a bit of trouble explaining away Trump’s just-disclosed, hour-long conversation with Russian president Vladimir Putin for which there is no official record, which was attended by no other American official and in which Trump relied on Putin’s Russian translator.
This afternoon, the Outnumbered show tried to portray the secret discussion as “lingering over dinner.” Cohost Harris Faulkner suggested that the only reason people are critical of it is because “Democrats have just got to be jealous over this.” With a straight face, Faulkner argued that the meeting was just part of Trump’s awesome deal-making skills.
But earlier, on Fox & Friends, Curvy Couch cohosts helped Trump’s former campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, spin the meeting as Trump’s irresistible desire to be near his overwhelmingly lovely wife.
Media Matters caught the dialogue (my emphases added), starting with cohost Ainsley Earhardt's invitation to Lewandowski to attack other media reports and concerns about the meeting:
EARHARDT: So we saw at the G20 summit [German Chancellor] Angela Merkel invited the leaders of 20 different countries to have a dinner. We remember the video of Melania [Trump] sitting next to [Russian President] Vladimir Putin and talking with the interpreter in between them. Well, the mainstream media’s trying to say now that that was a separate meeting, that the president, our president, had a separate meeting with Vladimir Putin that lasted an hour. And they’re saying it took place at that dinner. Our president is tweeting, saying, “Fake news story of secret dinner with Putin is sick. All G20 leaders and spouses were invited by the chancellor of Germany, press knew, the fake news is becoming more and more dishonest. Even a dinner arranged for top 20 leaders in Germany is made to look sinister.” What’s your reaction?
LEWANDOWSKI: Forty people were at that dinner. Obviously the 20 G20 leaders and their spouses. Our best representative, who is stunningly beautiful and incredibly intelligent, sat next to Vladimir Putin at the request of the German chancellor. She had a conversation with Vladimir Putin. It was her dinner partner for a few hours. Big deal. And then you know what the president did? Our president? He got up and he walked over and he saw his beautiful wife, the first lady of the United States, and he had a conversation with her. How was this a—how was this anything other than the president of the United States going over and seeing the first lady, who, by the way, speaks five languages, is incredibly beautiful, and is incredibly intelligent, and is a great representative of our country?
DOOCY: Well here’s the thing, Corey, as you know, this is the mainstream media’s opportunity to connect Russia, Russia, Russia, once again with the president, to make it look like there was some subterfuge or something else going on at that particular dinner.
LEWANDOWSKI: Yeah, but there’s nothing there.
DOOCY: No, I get it.
LEWANDOWSKI: Look, the president wasn’t even seated near her and there were 40 people. This is—the president, if he drives in the car for 35 seconds, there’s a giant press pool behind him, all of a sudden it’s a secret meeting? There’s nothing secret about this. There were literally hundreds and hundreds of cameras when the president spoke to Vladimir Putin. We saw the replay a thousand times probably of the handshake. And then he’s seated at the dinner with 39 other people. Putin’s on the other side, next to the first lady of the United States, and all of a sudden it’s a secret meeting? There’s nothing secret when there’s 40 people at a dinner.
Lewandowski constructed a straw man argument here. Nobody has said it was a secret that Trump talked to Putin. But it is very much a secret what they said. And there are plenty of reasons why we need to know.
But, as usual, Doocy and Earhardt were looking out for Trump’s interests, not the American people’s and not even their viewers. So they never corrected Lewandowski.
Watch the fake news about the real news below, from the July 19, 2017 Fox & Friends.
Absolutely incredible (but confirmed by the POTUS, himself, in that interview with NYT) that the man who was the first to get on the Trump bus has now been thrown under it. I am, of course, referring to Jeff Sessions. I guess loyalty is a one-way street for the Dear Leader.