Right wing media has been falsely telling their viewers that crime is surging under President Biden, even though violent crime decreased significantly.
“(T)he report was almost entirely ignored by right-wing media outlets, which have pushed a false narrative that crime is surging under President Joe Biden,” CNN reported, noting the US registered the “steepest annual decline in murders in decades.”
But right wing media operations aren’t sharing that good news about violent crime in the lead up to an election. In fact, they’re even peddling lies to hide the facts from their audience.
CNN noted that Fox News “mentioned the FBI data just once on its air Monday… devoting 28 seconds to the subject,” and even then “told viewers, ‘critics say the report is not accurate because it does not include big cities,’ a false claim promoted by Elon Musk and other Trump supporters on social media.
This conspiracy of silence on crime data was consistent throughout right wing media, with Newsmax and OAN TV both maintaining silence along with nearly the entire fleet of right wing websites, except for Newsmax.
The actual crime statistics show murder and non-negligent manslaughter decreased by 11.6% compared to the previous year and rape decreased by an estimated 9.4%.
It’s noteworthy that the Right is led by convicted felon Donald Trump, while fear-mongering about ‘surging crime.’
Trump was also found liable for rape and fraud. Trump’s crimes are excused and justified and denied, while he pins fake crimes on innocent people; for example, Trump and Vance have incited violent threats in Springfield, Ohio against Haitans based on lies.
Donald Trump is not new to incitement, he’s been doing it the entire time he’s been in the political spotlight from telling his supporters he’d pay for their bail if they assaulted a protester to his caravan lies being repeated on right wing social media and radicalizing the mass shooter of a Pittsburgh synagogue to the deadly self-coup he incited on January 6, 2021.
Speaking of that, on Tuesday the FBI reported Justin LaGesse pleading guilty to felony destruction of property during the deadly 1/6 insurrection and January 6 defendants Kenneth and Caleb Fuller of Minnesota, accused of pushing against the policy line, rejected a plea offer and will proceed to trial in January.
In the 43 months since January 6, 2021, “more than 1,488 individuals have been charged in nearly all 50 states for crimes related to the breach of the U.S. Capitol, including nearly 550 individuals charged with assaulting or impeding law enforcement, a felony.”
But right wing media continues to whitewash 1/6, with Trump saying he will pardon the offenders, including those who assaulted law enforcement, and Republican lawmakers serenading the accused. The overarching point is that it’s not crime when they do it.
The law is what they say it is.
That’s why conservatives are hiding the good news of a reduction in violent crime under President Biden, while ignoring their own leader being found guilty by a jury of his peers for 34 felonies. When people rage against this infuriating hypocrisy, they’re missing the point that populist strongman types like Trump invoke a “rule by decree” method of power, whereby the law is what they say it is and nothing more.
The dark, gloomy worldview being fed to one side of the political spectrum is at large odds with reality. The economy is recovering remarkably well, the stock market is hitting new highs, but you wouldn’t know it within the epistemic closure of the right wing media.
This pattern is so rife with disinformation to blow smoke around a wannabe dictator that it mimics blatant manipulation tactics of Russian media.
Sarah has been credentialed to cover President Barack Obama, then VP Joe Biden, 2016 Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, and exclusively interviewed Speaker Nancy Pelosi multiple times and exclusively covered her first home appearance after the first impeachment of then President Donald Trump.
Sarah is two-time Telly award winning video producer and a member of the Society of Professional Journalists.
Connect with Sarah on Post, Mastodon @PoliticusSarah@Journa.Host, & Twitter.
