Ignorance is bliss: rightwing media largely keeps quiet on Trump-Epstein saga
Fox News and other conservative networks have mostly avoided covering the president’s ties to the sex trafficker
When House Democrats released emails which showed Jeffrey Epstein claiming Donald Trump “knew about the girls”, rightwing news channels in the US reacted the same way: with silence.
Viewers of Fox News and other conservative networks would have had no idea that the president allegedly spent hours at Epstein’s home with one of his victims. Rightwing media largely kept quiet on all of it, apart from a notable slip when a progressive guest on Sean Hannity’s show repeatedly told his audience: “Trump’s all over the Epstein files.”
Related Knowledge Center: Democracy and politics
News organizations are scrambling to find a coverage approach that adequately informs the American public about the country’s slide from democracy to authoritarian rule.
Related Knowledge Center: Information integrity
In an increasingly fractured media landscape, truth has been a casualty in the public discussion. Coverage has been warped by the business needs of struggling news organizations, and a significant segment of the public relies on bad-faith outlets that are little more than propagandists. While fact-checking has become routine, some organizations are exploring other ways to combat the trends. And misinformation spewed by AI-driven chatbots has become more of a feature than simply a bug.
Fact-checking and its detractors