Jonathan Lemire: Fox News’s Providing a Safe Harbor When Trump Is Under Siege

EXCERPT:

LEMIRE: "In the past it seems these outbursts are triggered by impending bad news, pressure being applied. In this sense, according to people that I've talked in the last day or so around the President, a few things at once. He is, just like we all are, waiting for the Mueller report. They don’t know when it’s coming. I spoke to Rudy Giuliani late last night, who suggested their guess is as good as ours. They think soon. They have not been given a heads-up as to when that would be. That's number one. Secondly, of course, you have the ongoing pressure being applied by the House Democrats, with investigation after investigation after investigation. Third, the President is complaining to people around him, and we saw this a little on Twitter too, he’s being in his estimation unfairly blamed for what happened in New Zealand. The shooter in his manifesto did have a single mention of the President, suggested he was key to white identity, I’m paraphrasing, and the President feels that he’s being sort of put up as someone who’s responsible for this violence. No one, of course, is saying that directly but the President has had time and time again to condemn white nationalism and white supremacy. He’s not done that. The last one, sort of amusing aside but I talked to somebody who said it was real, Fox News tweets where he in the past felt like he was under siege, Fox News provided a safe harbor and he felt like this weekend that was not the case. Judge Jeanine Pirro, who's one of his most loyal backers, was suddenly taken off the air and to have these weekend anchors deliver some criticisms of him, he lashed out at that too."