Sen. Ted Cruz says CNN’s Brian Stelter acts as if he’s traded in his “Reliable Sources” gig for a job as “chief of rapid response, DNC.”
The Texas Republican sparred with Mr. Stelter on Monday over media bias and lies by omission after the latter pounced on a deleted tweet about Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.
At issue was an old photo of the Democrat, which led Mr. Cruz to believe she was violating her own social distancing orders regarding the coronavirus pandemic.
Why senators shouldn’t rush to dunk on others based on a too-good-to-be-true tweet. @TedCruz deleted his shot after @GovWhitmer corrected him pic.twitter.com/n2SiLmnb4U
— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) April 13, 2020
The Republican deleted a joke about the governor possibly paying $11,000 in fines after he realized a former LA Times reporter “had tweeted pics that mistakenly ran on the ABC local news broadcast.”
Mr. Cruz’s deletion didn’t occur before Mr. Stelter chastised the senator for “rush[ing] to dunk on others based on a too-good-to-be-true tweet.”
The Republican responded with a trio of tweets for the CNN host.
“Gosh, Brian, why does your tweet omit the MSM error that started it? Or does CNN only exist to attack GOP?” he asked. “Here’s the correction from the local ABC affiliate: ’A photo of Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signing a bill surrounded by people is part of old video we mistakenly used on a recent COVID-19 story.’”
“Your job title is literally ’chief media correspondent’ for CNN. And yet you ignore the MSM culpability. I simply believed their reporting was accurate. It’s almost as if your real job title is ’chief of rapid response, DNC.’ “
Mr. Stelter did not respond to the Republican’s comments.
3/3 Your job title is literally “chief media correspondent” for CNN. And yet you ignore the MSM culpability. I simply believed their reporting was accurate. It’s almost as if your real job title is “chief of rapid response, DNC.”
— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) April 13, 2020
• Douglas Ernst can be reached at dernst@washingtontimes.com.
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