Topic: WorldNetDaily
Both WorldNetDaily and the Media Research Center were quick to come to the defense of Donald Trump's son, Barron Trump, over disparaging remarks said about him, in particular from a "Saturday Night Live" writer, and equally quick to note a defense of the younger Trump from one particular corner:
WND's Chelsea Schilling noted that "Chelsea Clinton, daughter of former President Bill Clinton, came to Barron’s defense in a Sunday Facebook post: 'Barron Trump deserves the chance every child does-to be a kid. Standing up for every kid also means opposing POTUS policies that hurt kids.'" The MRC's Nicholas Fondacaro touted how "former first daughter Chelsea Clinton spoke up and defended the president’s son" -- then, because the MRC can't let anything nice about a liberal simply stand, went on to complain that "ABC and NBC, of course, touted her defense Monday morning, but none of them mentioned the offense originated from an SNL writer, a show they love to quote."
But neither Schilling nor Fondacaro noted a certain previous incident that likely made Chelsea Clinton feel protective of Barron Trump. It took place on Rush Limbaugh's early 1990s TV show, and we'll let Media Matters take it from here:
Bill Clinton had been president-elect for just a few days when, on November 6, 1992, Limbaugh launched one of the nastiest attacks of his career against an innocent target: 12-year old Chelsea Clinton.
Complete video of that day's program does not appear to be available online, but a portion of Limbaugh's attack was aired in a 1995 documentary about Limbaugh by PBS' Frontline. Also, a transcript of the program is posted in the Nexis database.
Limbaugh began the segment by noting that the New York Daily News' David Hinckley published a list of who's entering and leaving the White House. Limbaugh stated: "He says, In: A cute kid in the White House. Out: Cute dog in the White House.' Could -- could we see the cute kid? Let's take a look at -- see who is the cute kid in the White House."
The program then put up a picture of Millie, the Bush family's dog. Limbaugh responded, in mock confusion, "No, no, no, no. That's not the kid." The program then puts up a picture of Chelsea Clinton, with Rush saying, "that's the kid."[...]
After the audience had finished laughing and applauding, Limbaugh said, according to Nexis' transcript: "No, just kidding."
The following week, Limbaugh issued an apology, but it's unclear from the transcript alone how sincere he's being; the full video of both the original smear (a brief segment is here) and the apology are not available online.
That's an integral part of this story, but WND and the MRC ignored it.
In 2011, MRC NewsBusters blogger Noel Sheppard tried to engage in some serious revisionism to claim Limbaugh never actually insulted Chelsea Clinton. Sheppard cited only an anonymous blog post for support which claimed that "Rush has always maintained the incident was an accident."
Fondacaro touted how the "SNL" writer was suspended over his attack on Barron Trump, but Limbaugh suffered no consequences for his smear of Chelsea.
Of course, Limbaugh himself could clear all of this up by releasing the full video.
