Media Research Center executive Tim Graham spent an April 7 post complaining about a PBS/NPR poll that, in part, asked whether violence should be allowed to get the country back on track — a sentiment with which 28 percent of Republicans agreed, compared with 12 percent of Democrats — ranting that the networks are “using taxpayer money to do polling for their tilted narratives.” Graham’s instinct was to dismiss the question as “loaded” because a non-right-wing organization asked it, then play whataboutism by bringing up protests over police brutality:
When PBS and NPR ask this question, it’s loaded. It’s obviously a January 6 question, and they want January 6 to hang over this election, so they can push their Republicans-hate-Democracy spin. Many Republicans may be thinking about the 2020 rioting after George Floyd’s death, which was deadlier than January 6. At least 19 Americans were killed in the first two weeks of violent protest.
Note that Graham refused to condemn the violence of the Capitol riot, suggesting that he thought it was necessary — which would be a big change from his reaction immediately after the riot. And it’s quite rich that Graham is insisting that poll questions are “loaded” depending on who’s asking them; remember that loaded poll questions by partisan pollsters are at the heart of the MRC’s election fraud conspiracy theory. Further, nobody can accuse the George Floyd riots of being driven by a single person the way the Capitol riot was incited by Trump, and Graham is being dishonest by suggesting otherwise.
When panelist Jonathan Capehart said that ” when you’re talking about Donald Trump, breaking the rules is breaking law and order, breaking social — breaking norms, and breaking democracy,” Graham huffed in response: “As always, the lefties skip over how prosecuting Trump all over the country and trying to get his name ripped off ballots is ‘breaking norms.'”
Again, Graham’s selective silence speaks loudly: He wouldn’t acknowledge that having a president who incited a riot because he can’t accept the fact he lost an election or a presidential candidate who pretty clearly committed crimes isn’t also “breaking norms,” requiring other norm-breaking to be necessary. It’s as if Graham believes that Trump must be held above the law because he is a Republican.
Finally, Graham refuses to acknowledge that he and his fellow right-wingers have opened themselves up to being questioned about what he called “the January 6 energy of Trump voters” because they so heartily endorse Trump despite inciting a riot. If Graham didn’t want that implication to be bandied about, he and his buddies could have forcefully rejected Trump as their 2024 presidential nominee. But they didn’t, which means they effectively condone such violence. That makes questions about it perfectly reasonable, not “loaded” or “tilted.”