News Media Anger Spreads

Despite calls for him to cool his overheated rhetoric after the deadly synagogue shooting and pipe bomb mailings, President Trump on Monday continued his assault on the news media by once again branding them as the “Enemy of the People” and accusing them of stoking rage, according to The NY Post.

“There is great anger in our Country caused in part by inaccurate, and even fraudulent, reporting of the news. The Fake News Media, the true Enemy of the People, must stop the open & obvious hostility & report the news accurately & fairly,” he wrote to his more than 55 million Twitter followers.

“That will do much to put out the flame of Anger and Outrage and we will then be able to bring all sides together in Peace and Harmony. Fake News Must End!” the president posted, just two days after 11 people were gunned down by a man yelling “all Jews must die” at a Pittsburgh synagogue.

A number of Democratic and Republican lawmakers made the rounds of the Sunday news shows to call for unity and encourage the president to tamp down his name-calling and attacks on the media.

AP Photo

As incidents of anger toward media spreads into local communities, The Associated Press reports The Radio Television Digital News Association is spreading safety and self-defense tips to journalists, most notably advising limits on the use of one-person news crews. The RTDNA has begun compiling anti-press incidents, like last week when an intruder was shot after kicking down glass doors at Fox’s local station in Washington. The National Press Photographers Association is developing workshops to spread safety advice to its members.

So far this year the RTDNA’s “press freedom tracker” counts 39 incidents of journalists being attacked in the United States, including the June 28 shooting at the Capital Gazette in Annapolis, Maryland, where five people were killed. In less lethal examples, a man purposely crashed a pick-up truck into the side of a Dallas television station, a Miami reporter and a photographer were physically attacked while doing a live shot and a North Carolina crew had its power cable cut while covering a demonstration.

Last year, the first time a count was kept, there were 48 such cases for all of 2017.

While one-person crews have become more popular for television stations looking to cut costs, the Radio Television Digital News Association recommends that their use be curtailed in certain times and places, said Dan Shelley, RTDNA executive director.