Lawrence O’Donnell slams media's inability to hold Trump accountable despite his inflammatory rhetoric

NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK: MSNBC’s Lawrence O'Donnell delivered a scathing critique of the mainstream media's coverage of Donald Trump on his Thursday, August 8, night show, calling it a repeat of the failures from the 2016 election, The Raw Story reported.

His comments, which quickly went viral, highlighted what he sees as the media's ongoing inability to properly hold the former president accountable for his falsehoods and inflammatory rhetoric.

Lawrence O'Donnell torches media for biased coverage of Donald Trump

Lawrence O'Donnell did not hold back as he addressed his audience, drawing direct parallels between the current state of media coverage and the 2016 presidential campaign.

"It was 2016 all over again, today," he began.

"Donald Trump spoke at his home in Florida for over an hour, and all the major cable news networks, including this one, carried it live. Just like they all did repeatedly in 2016. It would be hard to find a sentence that Donald Trump said today that did not include at least one lie," O'Donnell asserted.

O'Donnell's frustration stemmed from what he described as a systemic failure across all news networks to effectively fact-check Trump in real time.

While he acknowledged that some outlets made attempts to fact-check Trump’s speech after it concluded, he argued that this was insufficient. "That, of course, is way too late and utterly useless. No network tried to fact-check every lie Donald Trump told," he claimed.

In O'Donnell’s view, the media has all the necessary tools at their disposal to challenge Trump's falsehoods immediately as they’re broadcasted.

He pointed out that widescreen TVs could easily display a live scroll fact-checking Trump’s claims as he makes them. The fact that this was not done, he suggested, reflects a broader unwillingness or inability within the media industry to adequately confront Trump’s deceptive rhetoric.

Adding to his critique, O'Donnell noted that while Trump's speech was given extensive live coverage, Vice President Kamala Harris' speech was almost entirely ignored by the same networks.

This disparity in coverage was particularly egregious to O'Donnell, who emphasized that none of the major networks carried Harris’ remarks live after Trump’s appearance.

Even MSNBC, O'Donnell's network, only partially covered Harris’ speech, opting to broadcast the Olympics as her speech began.

"And to make a bad news coverage situation worse, none of the networks — none of them — covered Kamala Harris' speech live after the Trump appearance. None of them," O'Donnell said, clearly frustrated.

He took it upon himself to rectify this oversight on his show, airing Harris' speech in full, unedited, and as if it were live.

Following his on-air comments, O'Donnell took to social media to continue slamming the mainstream media.

He wrote on X (formerly Twitter), "Compare the tame (fearful?) behavior of reporters in Trump 'press conference' to reporters behavior in Biden White House press briefings. Trump has been given special treatment by media from day one and still gets it."

Lawrence O'Donnell's sharp critique of media draws praise

Lawrence O'Donnell's fiery delivery and sharp critique of both Donald Trump and the mainstream media was hailed by social media users.

One X user commented, "He is truly all we have left," while another remarked, "Lawrence O'Donnell is a real one. He always be speaking the truth."

One person said, "He was a JOURNALIST OG BOSS tonight!!!" while another wrote, "He tells it like it is. He is the only real honest journalist left (with maybe a few others)."

One individual remarked, "Lawrence is a pro. He speaks truth to power. Finally, someone is calling out the failure of the media," while another commented, "Lawrence is the only one who calls these people out. Not going back."

One netizen noted, "Lawrence O'Donnell is of of the very few American Journalists who understands giving #Trump a free pass to spew lies is a cancer in your democracy and society."

Another individual added, "Lawrence O’Donnell is a national treasure."

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