Topic: Media Research Center
We've documented how the Media Research Center mocked and denigrated E. Jean Carroll for claiming that Donald Trump sexually assaulted her in a department store dressing room more than 20 years ago (while lionizing Tara Reade for making unsupported claims that Joe Biden engaged in sexual misconduct). As a civil trial on Carroll's allegations approached, the attacks continued.
Tim Graham's April 26 podcast complained that a PBS newscast did "eight minutes of negative coverage about the civil rape trial of Donald Trump as alleged by journalist E. Jean Carroll," adding:
Their Trump-trashing story was titled "Trump faces civil trial in rape and defamation case brought by writer E. Jean Carroll." They not only touted Carroll's unproven story of rape in the Bergdorf Goodman department store (she can't remember which year it was), they added other witnesses. "Jessica Leeds alleged Trump groped her on the flight in 1979. And People magazine writer Natasha Stoynoff has accused him of groping her in 2005 at Mar-a-Lago while she was there to interview him."
An April 30 post by Mark Finkelstein bristled at the idea that sexual assault victims should be trusted:
This is what passes for an MSNBC legal "analyst." On Jonathan Capehart's Saturday morning show, MSNBC legal analyst Glenn Kirschner said that cross-examining people who claim to be sexual assault victims, such as Trump accuser E. Jean Caroll, is a "disservice."
Kirschner grudgingly acknowledged that the Sixth Amendment—that inconvenient thing!—gives defendants the right to confront and cross-examine their accusers. But Kirschner said that as a former prosecutor, it was "heartbreaking" for him to see sexual assault victims "falsely accused of making stories up."
But how is a jury supposed to decide who is being "falsely accused"—the accuser or the person being accused—unless the accuser is subjected to cross-examination? And who made Kirschner the arbiter of who is telling the truth and who is "making stories up?"
The real "disservice" would be to justice—if Kirschner's notion were ever adopted, and sexual assault accusers were simply taken at their word.
For that matter, what if Tara Reade, who has accused Joe Biden of having sexually assaulted her, decided to bring suit? Think Kirschner would go on television to bemoan the right of Biden's lawyers to cross-examine her? Rhetorical question.
Then again, the MRC has been silent about questions that have been raised about Reade, and its own reference to Reade defecting to Russia is in a June 1 post by Curtis Houck that is otherwise mostly about his usual attacks on White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre.
Graham served up more whining in his May 3 column:
Liberal outlets rushed to make time for the latest courtroom testimony from Trump rape accuser E. Jean Carroll. It doesn’t matter that she’s like Brett Kavanaugh’s sketchy primary accuser, Christine Blasey Ford, in failing to know the date of this alleged assault. But her Monday testimony drew six minutes on the PBS NewsHour and drew stories in both The Post and The Times. But there was nothing for little Navy Joan or her mother.
Tara Reade whataboutism came up again in a May 8 post about a new Newsmax show featuring MRC buddy and right-wing radio host Chris Plante:
On the inaugural episode of Newsmax’s Chris Plante: The Right Squad, conservative talk radio star Chris Plante and his assembled panel tore into the leftist media for ignoring the credible allegations of sexual assault of Tara Reade by then-Senator Joe Biden, in favor of non-stop coverage of the flimsy allegations by E. Jean Carroll against former President Donald Trump.
Plante wasted no time getting into the well-deserved media bashing. Plante opened the show by pointing out the media’s hypocrisy: “While the media is focused in a laser-like way on the E. Jean Carroll and her civil trial against former President Donald Trump. Everyone has apparently forgotten all about Tara Reade.”
“She's accused President Joe Biden of sexually assaulting her and she has pretty good standing here,” Plante noted.
When Trump was found to be liable for sexually abusing Carroll, the MRC unsurprisingly complained about that too. Houck whined in a May 10 post:
Between Monday night and Tuesday morning, the “big three” networks of ABC, CBS, and NBC spent 43 minutes and 47 seconds on former President Trump being found liable for sexual abuse in a New York civil suit brought by lefty advice columnist E. Jean Carroll. At one point in those roughly 44 minutes, Carroll let slip that CBS Mornings co-host and Democratic donor Gayle King admitted off-camera she said “hooray” Tuesday when she heard the verdict.
Tsk, tsk to E. Jean as she let slip an answer to a question many wonder: Do liberal journalists openly cheer or high-five when something goes their way?
We can assume there was lots of booing in the MRC offices over the fact that Carroll won her lawsuit against Trump. Indeed, as the trial was getting started, Houck wrote in an April 25 tweet: "How warped is E. Jean Carroll? Remember how she even creeped out Anderson Cooper when she said in 2019 that "most people think of rape as sexy"? Utterly deranged and spoke volumes about her pscyhe." In fact, Carroll has explained her comment by noting that "we are saturated with entertainment shows which continually show rapes to gather an audience."
Graham returend to complain in his May 12 podcast that the CNN town hall with Trump "obsessed over scandals" initially, including the Carroll trial. A May 23 post by Finkelstein complained that an MSNBC host was "touting vigilant Trump litigant E. Jean Carroll attempting to add new cash demands every time Donald Trump calls her a 'wack job' on television -- in this case, on the CNN town hall."
Graham wasn't done yet, however, spending a June 4 post complaining that Carroll is planning to work on a book with a dissident Trump family member whom the MRC also happens to hate:
You might think the liberal snobs who dominate the audience of National “Public” Radio would look down on the romance novel. But NPR can’t resist hyping a romance novel…when it’s written by heroes of the #Resistance.
On Friday night’s All Things Considered, NPR reported Donald Trump’s bitter niece Mary Trump is writing a romance novel and posting it in chapters on Substack. This story dominated the ATC web page on Friday:
[...]
Openly gay Mary Trump claimed she's never read a romance novel, and now she's writing one. The plot of The Italian Lesson sounds very typical; "An American woman goes to a hill town in Tuscany, opens a café, meets this hunk."
She’s getting by with a little help from her friends….who are also renowned for being “hypercritical” of Trump.
Graham didn't explain why his website was effectively censoring the fact that its favorite sexual-assault accuser had defected to a hostile foreign country.