Media Matters President Bradley Beychok: The Media Tends To Focus “A Lot On Very Little” To Manufacture Critical Clinton Coverage

From the October 11 edition of C-SPAN's Washington Journal:

Video file

PEDRO ECHEVARRIA (HOST): Our previous guest said there's an intensity of [media] scrutiny to Donald Trump, compared that to Hillary Clinton. Would you agree with that?

BRADLEY BEYCHOK: I would not. I think that Secretary Clinton has faced a barrage of media scrutiny in the last two years. She was a candidate even earlier than Donald Trump was, and I would point to three examples:

First being Benghazi, which for a time period it felt like you couldn't turn on the news where there was some new inkling of something that happened in Benghazi, which was a tragedy when we lost four Americans, but also was a very factless media environment. The conservatives would say there was a stand-down order, or that we didn't know where the president was that night in the Oval Office, or these secret emails, all of things that were absolute myths. So, I think that was the first. 

I think the second was the email controversy, which she had apologized for very early. But again, the media, as soon as you say there's an inkling of new information or maybe even just a rehash of something, it would dominate news coverage.

And then the third has been the Clinton Foundation, which the Trump Foundation is under investigation by the New York Attorney General, has had problems with their donations into Florida with Pam Bondi, their attorney general. The Clinton Foundation is a global charity rated five star by Charity Navigator. But yet, we saw a lot more coverage about the Clinton Foundation in the last year than you heard about the Trump Foundation, and that's a real travesty.

ECHEVARRIA: And so, that coverage, then -- just particularly from conservative media, or would you describe that overall on all fronts?

BEYCHOK: No, absolutely all fronts in mainstream, of course conservative media and the right-wing -- this has been a campaign cycle that is originated in Breitbart and the alt-right movement, Alex Joneses of the world. And really, that's who's leading Donald Trump's campaign now. But putting that aside, I think that mainstream media decided very early that they would give Hillary Clinton a more thorough vetting than they did in 2008, and I think they focused a lot on very little. 

Previously:

Anatomy Of A Terrible Clinton Foundation Article

Muhammad Yunus Is A Decades-Long Clinton Friend And A Nobel Prize Winner. Donations Aren't Why She Met With Him.

MSNBC's Joy Reid Calls Out “New Standard” Over Scrutiny Of Clinton Foundation That Didn't Apply To Bush Foundation

CNN's Lewandowski Lies About The Clinton Foundation: “They Haven't Saved Anybody's Lives”

Still Waiting For Newspaper Editorials Demanding The Trump Foundation Be Shut Down