Last week saw the press once again assuming their hyperactive roles, abandoning fact-based reporting for emotionally charged, targeted hits on President Trump — and common sense.
The week kicked off with Trump announcing he was taking over the Washington D.C. law authority, and that led to all manner of claims that crime statistics showed that it was not needed. Then the facts on those stats came in, something the press was not interested in exploring. The week culminated with the peace summit in Alaska, and there were attempts at keeping holdover stories like gerrymandering and deportation raids alive.
It was a competitive frame, so let’s get to tabulating by tugging on the hip waders, trudging through the muck and mire that is our media complex, and determining who took top (bottom) honors this week.
THE CONTENDERS
(Dis)Honorable Mention – National Public Radio - In Alaska, the for-now publicly funded radio network had a scathing breaking news report of “government papers” being discovered at a hotel. It was nothing more than an agenda packet, with “sensitive” intel such as the seating chart for the lunch and the menu items offered for the meeting.
The Daily Beast - In an amazingly stunted attempt at journalism, they stated Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is “slaughtering” military veterans. (These are men on Death Row who just happen to also be vets, including one serial killer.) Hunter Biden finds himself in legal trouble with the First Lady for following a Beast article, one that the outlet was forced to remove for being incorrect. Ahead of the recent summit with Vlad Putin, it was claimed that President Trump is not actually aware of where Alaska is located. We were supposed to care that Karoline Leavitt may have stopped wearing a cross necklace, all because of “South Park.”
Washington Post – The deportation “scandal” is shown to be less severe by the fact that the outlet is reduced to petitioning for stories about ICE raids. The paper delivered this gem of tortured rewriting of the D.C. crime realities. They then went on to attempt to make a hero of the man who assaulted law enforcement with a Subway sandwich.
The @WashingtonPost tries to disprove Trump's claim that D.C. is crime-ridden, but instead delivers a work of art.#Newseum pic.twitter.com/NINn3JGyVw
— Brad Slager: CNN+ Lifetime Subscriber (@MartiniShark) August 12, 2025
NBC NEWS – After reporting that a four-year-old was “deported," once the facts showed it was a parent removed and decided to take their child with them, the network quietly changed the headline’s claim. Ken Dilanian rested on the canard that D.C. crime statistics were way down, as the journalist who lives and works in the District was seemingly unaware of the recent news of the police commander punished for falsifying the crime stats. Kristen Welker was openly lobbying to not strike a peace deal to end the Russia-Ukraine war. In a racially-focused story, we were shown what is nothing more than the simple fact that black people can enjoy hobbies.
New York Times - It seems an overthrow of the Trump administration is all the rage at the paper. They first proposed a military coup to take place, then declared that a new Constitution needs to be written for Democrats to be able to rise back into power. They gave a weepy tale of a man abducted and sent to El Salvador, while his family was unaware of his status – less vital in their reporting was his being a member of the gang Tren de Aragua. Peter Baker is unaware of the differences between cities run by local governments and Washington, D.C., which comes under the jurisdiction of the president.
THE WINNER
CNN
Once again, the network rose up to bottom honors on the sheer will of its volume of badness.
Dana Bash had a busy week of dysfunctional reporting. She began with a glowing interview with Vermont independent Senator Bernie Sanders, forgetting that the man will be in his late 80s as she coaxed him to run for president in 2028.
She responded to Trump’s move in D.C. by reverting back to January 6, of course.
Jake Tapper thought he had Texas Governor Greg Abbott trapped with a question on redistricting, and Abbott calmly pantsed the star anchor by delivering facts.
Bakari Sellers was shamed as he tried to demean President Trump’s accomplishments while showing he was completely oblivious to the peace deals that have been reached this year.
The channel was outraged that Trump moved an Obama portrait to a “hidden” area; reality proved that it is actually displayed on the White House Grand Staircase, along with other presidential portraits.
The ratings horror continues for the cable channel, as the gulf between them and Fox News with audience sizes only widens.
Always a fun exercise: You could combine the audiences of every program on CNN starting at 4:00pm and ending at midnight, and The Five still beats all of them… pic.twitter.com/4avhYVjjo1
— Joe Concha (@JoeConchaTV) August 13, 2025
Editor's Note: The mainstream media continues to deflect, gaslight, spin, and lie.
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