Fox News is under fire for a Friday ad that inaccurately accused its competitors, including CNN, of failing to cover last weekend's Tea Party protests in Washington.
WASHINGTON (CNN) - Fox News is under fire for a newspaper ad they purchased Friday that inaccurately accused its competitors, including CNN, of failing to cover last weekend's Tea Party protests in Washington.
"How did, ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, and CNN miss this story?" Fox's newspaper ad asks.
The answer: They didn't.
CNN provided live coverage of the rally in Washington on Saturday, dispatching more than a dozen personnel, including multiple camera crews and the CNN Express Bus, to cover the event. Deputy Political Director Paul Steinhauser was live at Freedom Plaza; Correspondent Kate Bolduan reported live from the Capitol and throughout the crowd; All Platform Journalist Jim Spellman provided live hits all day after traveling for weeks on the Tea Party Express Bus; and CNN Correspondent Lisa Desjardins was live for CNN and CNN Radio from the National Mall.
CNN's Rick Sanchez weighs in on Fox's ad
CNN's coverage also included numerous live reports and interviews with protesters and newsmakers, including rally day speaker Sen. Jim DeMint and activist Art Gerhart, who was on the set with anchor Don Lemon to discuss the event.
In addition, CNN.com provided a live stream of the rally throughout the day.
ABC referred Friday to a statement by Matt Kibbe, president of FreedomWorks - the group that organized the event – characterizing the network's coverage that day as "fair and honest." The rally story was featured on the network's morning shows, nightly news broadcast, in extensive radio reporting and online.
MSNBC also pointed to its own reporting. "Just like every other network mentioned in the ad, MSNBC covered last Saturday's protest," the network said in a statement.
CBS detailed its coverage of the event in a statement issued Friday afternoon.
"CBS News had multiple crews on site with our Congressional Correspondent Nancy Cordes reporting," the network said in a statement. "It was the lead story on the CBS EVENING NEWS; CBS Radio News provided hourly reports during the day and CBSNews.com had the story in its rotating lead all day. They also processed the Nancy Cordes video and linked it throughout the site."
And CNN criticized Fox for its inaccurate statement. "Fox News' ad released today is blatantly false regarding CNN's coverage of the 9/12 rally," CNN said in a statement.
Watch some of CNN's Tea Party coverage here, and read some of our in-depth reporting.
I hope that CNN has learned a lesson here. I scolded you folks during the last 4 weeks or so that it was apparrent that your Company was becoming a little biased toward the conservative elemnets. I stated that you folks may be pursuing a poor choice of directions. So here you go...........FOX DOESN'T play by the same rules as all the other Media Competitors. You folks ALMOST fell for the "poor us" Conservative whimpering. Please do not turn you back on your loyal moderate following. ALSO, please let Lou Dobbs take a hike to FOX. That is truely his loyalities...he is about as much of an Independent as I am a Martian.
I do not understand how the FCC lets the Fox so-called News get away with so much misinformation, and at times plain old lies. Not to mention some of their talk shows like Hannity or ORiley who have no idea what the concept of truth in reporting means.
Is there no accountability in broadcasting anymore?
No, if FOX says you didn't cover it, then you didn't cover it. You aren't talking back to them, are you? Chairman Rush will be very angry with you. Remember, they are fairly unbalanced!
FOX NEWS IS A COMPLETE JOKE!
That is not a News Station and its Totally not fair and Balanced look at the Journalist half of them look like ex- Porn stars and the Garbage they spew they wouldnt know the truth if it smacked them down want a good laugh tune into Fixed News!
What ? Is anybody shocked by "Faux News" inaccurate ad ? Gee. Lets see what Bill O'Reilly and Glen Beck have to say on their "Faux" shows this evening about all of this...
Fair & Balanced as always...lmao as usual with "Faux News"
ok so NOW do you (yea, I'm talking to you "Christian" Conservatives") see how ClusterFlux lies about anything and everything they don't agree with? How they distort the truth to suit their own diabolical whims?
Hey, I thought Christian's weren't supposed to lie?
Not content to exaggerate the news, Fox News is now making the news up as it goes along!
Wow, who wrote this article? "...its'..." ? Learn how to use your possessive apostrophes!
That's Fox for you: Inaccurate and Biased.
How about you respond to your lack of coverage of the ACORN scandal? There's absolutely no denying that.
Fox News Lied?
oh my god the horror!!
With the Mainstream Media facing an all time low in credibility, don't you think it's time for Ted Turner to get his head out of his ass and start running a REAL news organization? Fox news by FAR is the most watched news channel for a reason. Start doing your job, report the facts on both sides no matter where they take you. Then you will see ratings finally start to increase. Keep up the sub-par work CNN has been doing for over a decade, and you will find yourselves out of work, out of business.
Get a clue.
Fox NEWS? There are a shill for the Republican Party. No NEWS there. Come on guys. Why even validate them? When Spin, Omission and Conjecture make NEWS, we are headed for trouble.
This seems vaguely 1930's Germanyish to me.
To what extent can CNN and the other media networks sue for libel? It's a clearly inaccurate statement, made with the stated intent of defaming the other networks. It would have taken less time to fact-check the claim than it did to purchase the advertisement. If you let this go, how many more advertisements exactly like this will they run?
When will Fox ever tell the American People the TRUTH about anything. Maybe after all their sponsors get fed up and leave they will
wake up .
Gee - and to think they all tried to say Al Franken didn't know what he was talking about in his book.
I submit this to ALL GOP pinheads screaming constantly about this or that bogus story CNN isn't covering at the moment but obviously Fox is - SOME journalists worry more about trying to get the facts BEFORE a story is released while, for Fox, it appears that as long as it looks good for the GOP or bad for the DNC they'll run it immediately.
It's kind of tough to defend this ad - lying in print.
Oh boy watch how CNN exposes Flux news now.
Go CNN!!
Wakey wakey, FOX-y!
CNN, please cut them some slack. Don't be too harsh on them. It's not easy being ignorant and dumb!
I faithfully follow CNN online everyday. However, for some reason, I missed
Fox "News" doesn't care about the accuracy of anything. They provide entertainment for the lowest common denominator, not hard news & facts.
Just like Fox News just as uninformed as the repuglicans!!
fox news. half the information for the dumbest americans. just great. if you watch fox news and beleive everything they say, you truely are a dope. half of these losers need to get off the couch, drop their social security and medicare and get back in the workforce if they find government programs socialist. these idiots can tea bag themselves all they want. as a great philosiphisor once said "stupid is as stupid does". can i get an amen? the south will rise again. if they can lose the extra 100 pounds they seem to have over the rest of society.
The networks seem surprised that Fox lies. No one else is surprised. That is what they do.
Why would all the networks cover a Fox sposored rally?
ROFL
Plenty O'Tool???