MSNBC host Joe Scarborough argued Wednesday that the controversy around the battery charges against Donald Trump’s campaign manager is being overblown by a news media that is excessively hostile toward the billionaire candidate.
On “Morning Joe” Wednesday, Scarborough said “there is no straight reporting” on Trump at this point, and that the charges against his aide Corey Lewandowski have been covered unfairly.
“We’ve now wasted 10 and a half minutes on this and I’m sure that will still not be enough,” he said. “And the bigger point, you’ve only heard over the past week and a half, and again, a singular, manic focus, people continuing to compare Donald Trump to Hitler, people continuing to suggest he has Brown Shirts around him, people doing the thing to Donald Trump that Republicans did to Barack Obama, which drove me crazy.”
He said the tactic is similar to the one Republicans tried against Obama, which was to exaggerate everything Obama did as an assault on freedom and liberty in America.
Scarborough said “there is no straight reporting” on Trump, “there is only hyperbole,” but that news outlets should at least “give us the news, give us perspective.”
Lewandowski, Trump’s campaign manager, was charged Tuesday in Florida with simple battery for grabbing a reporter’s arm on Super Tuesday. The Trump campaign has said that Lewandowski will enter a “not guilty” plea and continue his work with the campaign, even amid calls for his firing from many in the media.
The reporter pressing charges against Lewandowski is Michelle Fields, a former reporter for Breitbart.com. She initially claimed that she approached Trump with a question after a press conference on Super Tuesday when “someone had grabbed me tightly by the arm and yanked me down.” She said she “almost fell to the ground.”
The police report published this week said that Lewandowski “grabbed Fields’ left arm with his right hand causing her arm to turn and step back.” Videos of the incident do not appear to show Fields falling or stumbling, though she did claim that the arm-grab left her with bruising.
During a town hall forum on CNN Tuesday night, Trump defended Lewandowski and suggested that Fields was either lying or exaggerating what happened.
“Give me a break,” Trump said.
“Morning Joe” co-host Mika Brzezinski said Wednesday that she was also skeptical of Fields.
“Nobody is actually looking at what came out of the box, out of the reporter’s mouth,” she said.
Lewandowski is scheduled to appear in Florida court on May 4.
