CNN’s chief White House correspondent Jim Acosta on Wednesday tore into Fox News anchor Sean Hannity, accusing him of intentionally misleading his viewers and stoking mistrust toward reporters and news outlets.
“Hannity is a propagandist for profit, peddling lies every night,” Acosta wrote on Twitter. “He says he’s just a talk show host, not a journalist. But he’s injecting poison into the nation’s political bloodstream warping public attitudes about the press. I’m confident in the long run the truth will prevail.”
Hannity is a propagandist for profit, peddling lies every night. He says he’s just a talk show host, not a journalist. But he’s injecting poison into the nation’s political bloodstream warping public attitudes about the press. I’m confident in the long run the truth will prevail.
— Jim Acosta (@Acosta) August 2, 2018
Hannity, a pro-Trump broadcaster, on Tuesday used the opening monologue on his eponymous Fox News show to rip Acosta for complaining about being heckled at a rally President Trump held in Tampa, Fla.
“I’m actually going to give your network some advice, if you have an open mind and an open heart, maybe a little bit of humility,” Hannity said. “The people of this country are screaming at you for a reason. They don’t like your unfair, abusively biased treatment of the president of the United States.”
The insults continued later Tuesday on Fox Business Network, with Lou Dobbs describing Acosta as a “national left-wing media correspondent” who was “whining” about his interactions with the crowd.
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“He’s awfully delicate to be in this racket. Very delicate indeed,” Dobbs said.
Trump supporters at the rally Tuesday vociferously booed Acosta as he tried to cover the event for his network, which Trump frequently refers to as “fake news.”
“I’m very worried that the hostility whipped up by Trump and some in conservative media will result in somebody getting hurt,” Acosta wrote on Twitter Tuesday. “We should not treat our fellow Americans this way. The press is not the enemy.”
Just a sample of the sad scene we faced at the Trump rally in Tampa. I’m very worried that the hostility whipped up by Trump and some in conservative media will result in somebody getting hurt. We should not treat our fellow Americans this way. The press is not the enemy. pic.twitter.com/IhSRw5Ui3R
— Jim Acosta (@Acosta) August 1, 2018
He then told HLN on Wednesday that the “pitting of American against American” “needs to stop,” saying the scenes make him feel like he is in another country.
“My sense of it is that these opinions that these folks have at these rallies, they’re shaped by what they see in the primetime hours of Fox News and what they hear from some conservative news outlets that just sort of give them this daily diet of what they consider to be terrible things that we do over here at CNN,” Acosta added.
