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WH press association boots OANN reporter from WH briefings, sparks media wars

April 2, 2020 | | Print Article
(Photo by MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images)

The White House Correspondents Association has booted a non-establishment journalist from its rotation of mostly left-wing reporters allowed to attend President Donald Trump’s daily coronavirus briefings.

Because of concerns about social distancing, the association recently decreed that only a certain number of White House correspondents may attend the briefings at any given time. And so to make the playing field fair, the association began rotating reporters.

Fast-forward to Wednesday, when One America News Network’s Chanel Rion was not on that day’s rotation, meaning she had no other choice but to sit out that day’s briefing.

But despite not being on the rotation, Rion showed up to Wednesday’s briefing anyway and reportedly stood in the back of the room, according to Paula Reid of CBS News:

Note how Reid complained about Rion standing in the back “again.” According to the Los Angeles Times, she first stood in the back of the room on Tuesday.

“Before Tuesday’s briefing began, a representative of the correspondents association asked Rion to leave the room because it wasn’t her day to attend, but she refused, claiming she was there ‘as a guest of Stephanie Grisham,’ the White House press secretary,” the paper has confirmed.

Grisham hasn’t yet confirmed whether she had indeed personally invited Rion to the briefing.

Regardless, when word of Rion’s second violation reached the WHCA, the association responded by removing OANN from its rotation of reporters allowed to attend the briefing.

What’s unclear is how the WHCA learned of Rion standing in the back again. Some believe Reid was the “snitch” or “tattletale,” as they’re calling her, responsible for the association learning about OANN’s alleged impropriety.

Look:

Their anger isn’t necessarily unwarranted.

For one, it appears neither Reid nor her peers made any attempts to address Rion directly about her alleged violations of the association’s rules. It’s not surprising, given as the mainstream left-wing media have demonstrated a clear-cut disdain for OANN.

To hear anti-Trump propagandists like CNN chief media correspondent Brian Stelter tell it, OANN is itself nothing but a pro-Trump “propaganda” outlet.

Look:

As of Thursday morning, his dubious tweet boasted more scathing comments than it did either retweets or likes, probably because there was a rich irony to a known anti-Trump propagandist who works for a known anti-Trump propaganda network complaining about another network’s alleged propaganda.

Though to be clear, CNN’s definition of “propaganda” is essentially any word, sentence or paragraph that isn’t negative of the president.

Granted, this attitude is shared by nearly all of CNN’s peers in the mainstream media. As noted by several of Reid’s critics, it’s as if the mainstream press is a clique of uppity high school teenagers who think they’re above everybody.

Second, photo evidence from the briefing room suggests that, despite violating the association’s rules (reportedly with the blessing of Grisham, mind you), Rion kept plenty of space between herself and the other reporters present at the event.

Look:

And third, Reid of CBS has no room to speak about alleged impropriety given as her employer was recently caught sharing blatantly fake news about the coronavirus crisis.

In response to the association’s decision, supporters of OANN, including Todd Starnes formerly of Fox News (which also faces incessant attacks from the mainstream media’s propagandists) have called for the president to personally intervene.

Look:

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Vivek Saxena
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