It was once non-controversial for a legacy news organization to land an interview with a leading White House candidate, but former President Trump's appearances on three different networks this year caused a frenzy among liberal gatekeepers.
Despite being out of office for nearly three years, Trump continued to dominate news cycles as he overcame a disappointing GOP midterm performance and took control of the 2024 primary race. Throughout 2023, he held commanding leads both in national and state polls against his rivals. Meanwhile, he has faced four rounds of indictments and multiple civil lawsuits, putting an unprecedented legal cloud over his candidacy.
While he doesn't offer many interviews to media outlets he deems hostile, Trump did so with three liberal networks in 2023. All of them were accused by the left of "platforming" a man they deem a danger to democracy.
Trump broke his years-long boycott of CNN in May by participating in a town hall, where he sparred with anchor Kaitlan Collins on various topics, from Jan. 6 to his 2020 stolen election claims to his handling of classified documents.
While Trump supporters in the live New Hampshire audience cheered him on – at one point he called Collins "nasty" – liberals raged on social media at CNN, slamming the proceeding as "disgusting."
"CNN should be ashamed of themselves," Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., reacted on X. "They have lost total control of this ‘town hall’ to again be manipulated into platforming election disinformation, defenses of Jan 6th, and a public attack on a sexual abuse victim. The audience is cheering him on and laughing at the host. This falls squarely on CNN… This was a choice to platform lies about the election & Jan 6th w/ no plan but to have their moderator interrupted without consequence."
Perhaps even more jarring was the backlash the town hall sparked within CNN. The network's media reporter Oliver Darcy authored a full-blown screed, writing in his newsletter, "It's hard to see how America was served by the spectacle of lies that aired on CNN Wednesday evening."
Veteran CNN journalist Christiane Amanpour offered a stunning rebuke of her then-boss, CNN CEO Chris Licht, making clear she disapproved during a speech at the Columbia Journalism School.
Licht, who had struggled to earn the trust of CNN's rank-and-file as he tried to steer the network towards being non-partisan, appeared to have completely lost the staff's faith at that point. The town hall marked the beginning of the end of his tenure; a month later, after an unflattering Atlantic profile of him was published, he was fired.
Trump granted NBC News' Kristen Welker an interview as part of her debut as the new moderator of "Meet The Press" in September.
Hoping to deter the uproar that CNN faced earlier in the year, the inaugural interview was pre-taped and included multiple rounds of fact-checking by Welker following each segment.
But that still wasn't enough, as the viral mob targeted Welker and the Peacock network for welcoming Trump in the first place.
Los Angeles Times television critic Lorraine Ali blasted NBC for continuing the media's "disturbingly familiar pattern" of "normalizing extremist chicanery for ratings." Media critic Bill Carter scolded Welker for treating Trump like a "normal, legitimate candidate, not one who tried to blow up our democracy and faces 91 felony indictments," adding, "Downright dangerous journalism to legitimize this guy- in the name of having a ‘talked about’ premiere."
Former NBC host Katie Couric lectured the network on how she would have conducted the interview, which she insisted Trump would have abandoned midway through because of her grilling.
"If it's videotaped… I would have had so many facts and figures ready, and I would have been really focused on predicting what he was going to say… I would have some system," Couric said. "And I think absent of that, if he still insists his lies are- or he's telling the truth or he's not fabricating stuff, I think I would have done interstitials within the body of the view and said- I would have done freeze frame. And then later, as the interview aired because it was videotaped, it wasn't live, I would've said, ‘Actually, despite his protestations, this is not true.’ And I would have given the reasons why."
Couric continued, "We are here to get the truth. And I think, unfortunately, through all his bluster and bravado and bullying, he gets his way. And I think he has to be held accountable. So I like that they videotaped it. But to do a fact check after the fact and to do it online, it just doesn't work."
Spanish-languate network Univision faced similar wrath in November when it welcomed Trump for an hour-long interview, his first time speaking to the Spanish-language network since he famously kicked Univision anchor Jorge Ramos out of a 2015 campaign event.
Mexican-American journalist Enrique Acevedo pressed Trump on a wide range of issues, including immigration, the border, foreign policy, and whether he wo the DOJ as president, but he was accused by liberal critics of being too "friendly" with the former president.
However, unlike CNN and NBC News, the rage towards Univision was unique in that the ire was directed at Trump's outreach towards the Hispanic community. Trump and Republicans have made electoral gains with Latino voters in recent elections, one of the most significant political trends of the era.
LIBERALS ARE PEEVED AT UNIVISION FOR OFFERING TRUMP A PLATFORM: ‘A MAJOR PROBLEM’
Latino actor John Leguizamo urged a boycott of the network, saying, "I am asking all my brothers and sisters who are actors, artists, politicians, activists to not go on Univision."
"The View" left-wing co-host Ana Navarro had a similar sentiment, saying "It is time for us Latinos to hold Univision accountable."
The New York Times published a report in December that "howls of protests against Univision" because of the Trump interview "haven’t stopped" a month later.
Acevedo pushed back on liberal critics who slammed him for not being tougher on Trump in a Dec. 13 column, arguing that giving Trump space to make his claims that viewers could judge for themselves was the point.
But the need for Acevedo to continue defending the Nov. 9 interview on Dec. 13 indicates that many viewers, along with powerful Hispanics, expect Univision to remain a destination for liberals.
Fox News' Brian Flood contributed to this report.
