The Media Research Center just couldn’t stop raging that Donald Trump got busted for violating decorum roles at Arlington National Cemetery by filming his partisan appearance there in a prohibited area. Clay Waters whined in an Aug. 31 post about the “hostile reporting on Trump’s Arlington National Cemetery controversy,” complaining that one outlet “didn’t mention that Trump was there at the request of the Gold Star families.” But that’s irrelevant, because the cemetery, not the families, have final say on where things get filmed. Alex Christy joined the rage parade in another post that day:
Boston Globe columnist Kimberly Atkins Stohr and New York Times counterpart David Brooks agreed on Friday’s PBS News Hour that Donald Trump’s recent visit to Arlington National Cemetery was “really one of the lowest political moments” they could recall.
Host Geoff Bennett set the scene by recalling that “The Army said in a statement, a rare statement, ‘that the campaign was made aware of federal laws prohibiting political activity at the cemetery.’ And they confirmed the reporting that a campaign staff — Trump campaign staffer—abruptly pushed aside an employee of the cemetery. This was a female employee who, according to the Times, didn’t want to press charges because she was afraid of retaliation from Trump supporters.”
Bennett should have added that the campaign claims it had permission to bring a photographer and that Trump was invited by Gold Star families who lost loved ones during President Biden’s withdrawal from Afghanistan.
With vital context missing, Stohr began, “You know, there was a time that being disrespectful in any way at Arlington National Cemetery, one of the most sacred places in our nation, would have put an end to a political career.”
Christy ignored the vital context that the cemetery has final say on filming there and it’s irrelevant whether the families invited Trump. He unironically concluded by huffing that “daily events might not matter as much as they used it is because voters don’t trust the media to give them the full picture, like PBS declined to do on Friday.” Christy didn’t either, which nobody should trust the MRC to give the full picture.
Tim Graham again falsely framed the controversy in a Sept. 1 post by claiming it was merely about “daring to visit Arlington National Cemetery when Biden and Harris wouldn’t,” whining instead that “an anonymous cemetery functionary tried to block Trump from any photography,” ignoring that the cemetery has guidelines and regulations on photography that Trump ignored.
Jorge Bonilla screeched “REGIME MEDIA” (as if the MRC isn’t auditioning to become regime media by actively campaigning for Trump) in antoher Sept. 1 post:
Across the Sunday TV dial, the political affairs shows sought to provide political cover for the Biden-Harris Administration’s neglect of the families of the 13 service members killed during the ISIS-K attack at the Hamid Karzai International Airport on August 26th, 2021. The four major shows did this by continuing to scandalize former President Donald Trump’s visit to the Arlington National Cemetery.
[…]The Regime Media tried, across their most prominent Sunday talk shows, to insist on this contrived “scandal”. But the real scandal remains the treatment accorded to the Abbey Gate families by the Biden-Harris administration subsequent to the gross negligence that led to the ISIS-K attack on Abbey Gate.
Bonilla made sure to bury the actual “scandal” by leaving references to Trump’s violations of cemetery decorum buried in transcripts.
Christy put on his comedy cop cap and firearm and whined that late-night TV talked about the incident in a Sept. 4 post:
ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel returned from his summer vacation on Tuesday by welcoming former GOP congressman-turned CNN talking head/Democratic National Convention speaker Adam Kinzinger to his show to discuss that experience as well as to omit the most vital detail of Donald Trump’s recent visit to Arlington National Cemetery: that he was there at the invitation of Gold Star families.
Actually, the most vital detail — which Christy omitted once again — is that Trump was being filmed in an area of the cemetery where photography is permitted, which is irrelevant to whether the Gold Star families invited him. He continued censorship of that vital detail as he ranted about Kimmel and Kinzinger:
As it was, later in the interview, Kimmel turned to recent headlines, “This photo op situation that he concocted at Arlington National Cemetery, you’ve been there. You’re a veteran, you know, you’ve served. You’ve been in the — I mean, explain why that’s so — that’s such a vile thing to.”
Trump was there at the invitation of Gold Star families who lost loved ones during President Biden’s withdrawal from Afghanistan. They were also in the photo Kimmel referenced. Finally, the campaign insists they were allowed to have a photographer. Like Kimmel, Kinzinger ignored these vital details as he ranted:
To go there, to have one of his staff members push a worker, who probably was pretty angry because she saw what was happening. Which is, these people that she’s been committed, probably her life, to honoring, he’s going to go there and make a mockery of it. And he went in and turned it into a campaign event. Got his picture. Smiled with his thumbs up, for God’s sakes. And what — so what you can do is now, if you politicize Arlington National Cemetery, everybody running for Congress, everybody running for the Senate, is going to have to go there and get their picture taken at Arlington to show that they’re a good, solid American. You cannot politicize fallen American soldiers, come hell or high water. That is a red line you can’t cross. He crossed it happily, and he’s defending himself and not just defending himself. Going after the worker that one of his people shoved. And that is just so beneath the presidency.
Yes, he’s defending himself against people like Kimmel and Kinzinger who do not give their audience all the facts surrounding the visit.
You mean like Christy failed to give all the facts?
Graham tried to steer things toward his preferred narrative in his Sept. 4 column, whining that “the media attack Trump for having the chutzpah to show up at Arlington Cemetery at their invitation. The only scandals that aren’t Fake News are the Republican scandals.”
Nicholas Fondacaro returned to playing partisan games over the incident in his Sept. 4 hate-watch of “The View”:
In a disgusting display of how vicious the left can be, Sara Haines, a co-host for ABC’s The View lashed out at the Gold Star families who posed with former President Trump in Arlington National Cemetery, on Wednesday. She instead that Trump should have ignored their requests for a photo and suggested listening to them was like swimming in the 9/11 Ground Zero Memorial. Additionally, co-host Joy Behar didn’t understand why outrage would be directed at President Biden over the disastrous Afghanistan withdrawal.
For the second day in a row, The View cast fixated on the photo-op. This time however, one of the cast members couldn’t resist taking a swing at the Gold Star families that wanted to be around the former President.
According to Haines’s unrestrained hatred, Trump should have ignored the families because it was like a family of a 9/11 victim telling her to go swimming in the memorial fountain, an analogy for which she received back up from faux conservative Alyssa Farah Griffin:
Graham returned in a Sept. 6 column to whine that CNN’s Jake Tapper and guest Jeffrey Goldberg “decried Trump visiting Arlington Cemetery with grieving Gold Star families and filming the visit. Neither man acknowledged uncomfortable truths, such as John McCain filming a campaign advertisement at Arlington, not to mention the professional photographs Joe Biden had taken there.” As usual, Graham is being dishonest; the question is over Trump making photographs in the cemetery’s Section 60, where photography is prohibited. Graham offered no evidence that either Biden or McCain had photos taken there.
The MRC has pretty much stayed way from talking about the incident ever since — a sign that even they understand that Trump was wrong.