Trump wishes Ghislaine Maxwell well —
and the media barely reacts
Opinion by
Columnist
July 22, 2020 at 8:30 a.m. CDT
In the
seemingly insatiable desire to normalize an entirely abnormal president, many
mainstream media outlets, following President Trump’s coronavirus briefing on
Tuesday, felt compelled to fawn over his “change in tone.” (He still insisted
the virus would disappear and repeated a batch of falsehoods for
which he has previously been fact-checked. ) You would think they might have
focused on a far more newsworthy statement from Trump.
Asked
about Ghislaine Maxwell, the alleged enabler of Jeffrey Epstein who stands
accused of helping him set up a child sex ring, Trump answered: “I just
wish her well, frankly. I’ve met her numerous times over the years especially
since I lived in Palm Beach, and I guess they lived in Palm Beach. But I wish
her well, whatever it is.”
There
is something very peculiar when a White House press corps does not react upon
hearing that, and when a fleet of mainstream media reporters and editors does
not think it worthy of immediate emphasis. The president of the United States
admitted to meeting “numerous times” with an alleged co-conspirator in a child
sex ring, and no one asks: How many times? Did you see any underage girls
around? If so, did you think it peculiar? Did you ever discuss the girls with
Maxwell or Epstein?
Moreover, does Trump’s habitual defense of alleged sexual offenders
extend so far as to Maxwell and Epstein? Not a word about their victims, but he
wishes the alleged predator “well”?
“Fox
News Sunday’s” Chris Wallace received widespread praise for conducting an effective interview of
the president. Part of the exaggerated reaction to an interviewer simply doing
his job stems from the rarity of interviewers who listen intently to catch him
in the act of saying false or ludicrous things and the ubiquitous fear of
challenging the president in ways that would make him angry or upset. That in
part explains the immediate coverage of Trump’s Tuesday appearance.
Hours
after the news conference, some mention of the comment began to pop up in
mainstream coverage but did not displace the widespread “change of tone” take.
(Ironically, some Republican lawmakers began to
express outrage before some outlets focused on the comment.) One could scan the
headlines of many outlets or the cable news ticker and still be in the dark as
to his bizarre remarks. The telling moment for the media will come when
reporters have a chance at the next briefing to follow up on his remark. (They
might also ask about the Russian bounties, a topic not raised on Tuesday, and
the White House memo on excluding undocumented immigrants from the census, a
position most experts deem blatantly unconstitutional.)
Certainly,
mainstream media outlets consider the allegations against Maxwell to be serious
and horrifying. They covered the crimes of Epstein, an abuser of young girls.
If so, why give so little attention to the president’s bizarre comments about
someone allegedly involved in heinous crimes? It is almost as if they were so
dead-set on the “changed tone” line that they did not bother to listen to what
he said on an unrelated topic — or they are so prepared for some bizarre excuse
from Trump for his comments that they shy away from even raising the issue. And
if Trump is “just saying things” — weird and inhuman things — this certainly
should revive concerns that he is seriously “off." (The focus on “tone” is
itself a poor media crutch for covering a president whose tone changes have a
half-life of a few hours and who continues to spew misinformation in the same
appearance his tone is said to improve.)
Even
worse in this case, Trump is infamous for expressing sympathy for those under
prosecution, an unsubtle way of suggesting he might take care of them (as he
did with longtime confidant Roger Stone) if they do not cooperate with
authorities. It is far from clear this is what is going on with Maxwell, but to
not even ask the question seems to be an act of journalistic negligence.
The
media’s failure to interject in real time is one reason the Lincoln Project
Never Trumpers have been so successful with their quick turnaround ads. They
seem to do what the media will not: speedily highlight for the public Trump’s
bizarre comments and behavior. It shouldn’t take a political ad-making outfit
to call attention to the Trump lunacy of the day; an attentive mainstream media
should be cataloguing and challenging his deviations from truth and normal
behavior.
It is bad enough that we have a president who seems incapable of
expressing empathy for the victims of sex crimes; we should at least have
mainstream reporting to hold him accountable in real time and substantial
analysis in short order. Doing anything less fails to inform and educate the
public about just how aberrant this president truly is.
