CNN did not waste any time after the presidential election making it clear that they intended to shift gears from being part of the Resistance™ under the Trump administration to going full state-run TV under the Biden administration.
Their resident media hall monitor Brian Stelter, who routinely bashed Fox News for allegedly being soft on former President Trump, was one of the more notable examples of CNN media figures wearing their liberally biased hearts on their sleeves. He gushed over what their comms team told him about how Biden would supposedly be restoring respect between the White House and the press corps, and after Biden was inaugurated, Stelter infamously declared that press secretary (and former CNN commentator) Jen Psaki’s press briefings were a “refreshing” change.
So while it will be no surprise to anyone how the network framed a story on President Biden’s handling of the coronavirus over the last 100 days, it’s one of the more egregious examples of CNN doing Pravda proud and because of that, it deserves documenting for the record.
The headline alerted readers right off as to what type of “news” article it would be:
“How the US went from having one of the worst Covid responses to being a global leader in vaccinations under Biden”
The first two paragraphs then informed us how CNN’s “reporting” was sourced – via “three of the administration’s top Covid advisers and two other White House officials.” In other words, the basis for the CNN “report” on what a magnificent leader Biden allegedly was on the coronavirus fight was what his advisers and White House officials were telling them:
For the last 100 days, President Joe Biden and his top advisers have mounted an urgent, wartime effort to get millions of coronavirus vaccines into the arms of Americans in order to beat back a pandemic that has upended the world for the better part of year.
The effort, described to CNN during in-depth interviews with three of the administration’s top Covid advisers and two other White House officials, has allowed the US to go from having one of the worst Covid responses in the world to being a global leader in getting shots in arms. The interviews reveal how the Biden team inherited a pandemic at its zenith with a high demand for vaccines and little supply, along with no long-term plan to vaccinate millions of Americans. The President, at times impatient, pressed his advisers harder on ways to improve the federal government’s response to the virus.
Not surprisingly, the propaganda piece was touted by White House deputy press secretary Andrew Bates and was retweeted by Biden’s chief of staff Ron Klain:
.@CNN: "How the US went from having one of the worst Covid responses to being a global leader in vaccinations under Biden" https://t.co/qCHnRQPyPX
— Andrew Bates (@AndrewJBates46) April 27, 2021
What’s not mentioned anywhere in the piece? Trump’s Operation Warp Speed, which was absolutely crucial to getting the vaccine ready and available in record time:
Excuse me? Operation Warp Speed was started under Trump. The contracts with the major pharmaceuticals were negotiated under Trump. The first vaccine doses were rolled out and administered under Trump. Biden is continuing to use the infrastructure put in place under Trump. https://t.co/H5cVsDZxav
— Boris Ryvkin (@BRyvkin) April 28, 2021
Biden has done such a good job continuing to use of the vaccines that were developed under the Trump administration and continuing the pace of vaccinations set by the Trump administration that we should just give President Grandpa all the credit. https://t.co/LW7JDMjwVb
— sean brett (@BaconKnight) April 28, 2021
"The Biden team inherited a pandemic at its zenith with a high demand for vaccines and little supply."
We were vaccinating a million people a day and ramping up rapidly when Biden took office. This article is credulous Biden propaganda. https://t.co/jpxFh3uhww
— Mark Hemingway (@Heminator) April 27, 2021
I mean, even media darling Dr. Fauci credited Operation Warp Speed for laying the groundwork for the Biden administration’s handling of vaccine distribution, as did Fauci’s boss Dr. Francis Collins as well as the widely respected former head of Operation Warp Speed Dr. Moncef Slaoui. But even at that, CNN still can’t be bothered to give the prior administration any credit.
After reading the piece, I asked myself this question: If this had been written by an administration official, what would have been different?
I think we all know the answer to that question. We also know something else: CNN is not a news organization.
(Hat tip: Twitchy)
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