The way MSNBC’s Jen Psaki sees it, the presidential race started in earnest last week.
Psaki said on her Sunday show, “Inside with Jen Psaki,” “… no matter how long Nikki Haley stays in this race, this week will mark the start of the general election. Because this week, the frame of how Joe Biden and Donald Trump will make their case to the American people started to really take shape.”
As she continued, she had what actually could be a warning for the media: “It is spectacle versus substance. Chaos, as Nikki Haley would put it and has put it a number of times, versus normalcy. The thing is, one of those things may be more exciting, more headline-grabbing. But the other is actually more focused on what the majority of the American public care about.”
The chaos is Trump, who has just been ordered to pay $83 million in damages to writer E. Jean Carroll after he was found liable for sexually assaulting and then defaming her. That’s just the latest of his many legal troubles.
Psaki, who worked for Biden as White House press secretary, then said, “On the other side, there is normalcy, steadiness, and perhaps most importantly, a focus on the country and not on yourself. The big question now is which side will be more appealing to the people in just about half a dozen swing states come November?”
Psaki noted that the Republicans don’t have to choose chaos, saying they could pick Haley. Psaki said, “The thing is, there's also an off-ramp for Republicans. They have two choices right now in the primary. They could nominate a conservative former governor and former U.N. ambassador who happens to be a woman, or the guy who is liable for sexual assaults, liable for defamation, liable for fraud and is still facing four criminal indictments and 91 felony counts.”
Haley, however, seems like a long shot. You almost wonder if she is sticking around just in case Trump implodes under his legal woes.
Psaki said, “It seems unlikely, at this point — they’ve given no indication at least — that they will take that off-ramp. But if they don't, the challenge is that this strategy, based on chaos in the courtroom and echoing off Adolf Hitler every chance it gets, may not be as appealing to the broader electorate of voters Trump would need to lend himself back in the Oval Office.”
Haley on the attack
Speaking of Haley, she used her time on Sunday morning to go after Trump.
Asked on NBC’s “Meet the Press” about Trump’s “birther” attacks against her, Haley told moderator Kristen Welker, “I laugh every time I see one of his tweets, every time I see him throw a temper tantrum. Because I know Donald Trump very well. When he feels insecure, he starts to rail, he starts to rant, he starts to flail his arms, and he starts to get upset. When he feels threatened, he starts to throw all kinds of things out there. I would always tell him he was his own worst enemy. He’s proving that right now.”
Yet, Haley stopped short of saying Trump’s loss to Carroll in last week's defamation case verdict should disqualify him from the ballot. Haley said, “I think the American people decide who should be disqualifying. … I absolutely trust the jury, and I think that they made their decision based on the evidence. I just don’t think that should take him off the ballot. I think the American people will take him off the ballot. I think that’s the best way to go forward — is not let him play the victim, let him play the loser.”
New Baltimore Sun owner helped bankroll lawsuit against city schools
For this item, I turn it over to Poynter media business analyst Rick Edmonds.
A Baltimore Banner investigative story late last week added fresh details about new Baltimore Sun owner David D. Smith’s crusade over what he calls corruption in the city school system. The nominal plaintiff in a suit alleging that enrollment figures had been fraudulently inflated for years told the Banner that funding for the effort came from Smith.
Since Smith’s purchase of the Sun was announced two weeks ago, speculation has been that the paper will take up his cause. Smith has not confirmed that but implied as much in a first meeting with the Sun’s news staff, saying he rarely read the Sun and was unimpressed with print journalists.
WBFF Fox45, a local broadcast affiliate of Sinclair Broadcast Group, where Smith is executive chairman, has run numerous pieces on the enrollment issue.
The Banner reported that the potential conflict of interest has not been disclosed in the TV news reports. That is out of step with best practice, Kelly McBride, chair of the Craig Newmark Center for Ethics and Leadership to Poynter, told the Banner. “I think it is a general principle in journalism that the public values transparency,” McBride said, but she conceded that owners who feel otherwise can choose to mandate advocacy of their views.
The rival Banner’s revelation may push forward a reckoning as soon as this week about whether Sun journalists and executives will want to keep working for an owner with that concept of the role of a metropolitan newspaper.
Where’s Bill?
