Following a weekend of far-left riots laid waste to parts of Los Angeles and shutdown vital thoroughfares, ABC, CBS, and NBC used their lead Monday morning news shows to show sympathy with the “anti-ICE” “demonstrators” and “protesters” grappling with President Trump’s “remarkable and unprecedented escalation” by sending in the California National Guard to restore order over Democrat Governor Gavin Newsom’s objections.
Throughout the five first-hour reports (and two more with highlights in the second hour), the tone refused to blame the mob for the destruction of property. Instead, it was dispassionate reporting of the tense scenes and only pointed language for Trump’s latest illegal immigration raids, which rioters used as a pretense to cause chaos while waving foreign flags.
ABC’s Good Morning America was predictably inflamed over this (pun intended). Here was co-host Robin Roberts’s tease at the top:
Escalating tensions in Los Angeles...Chaos in the streets of Los Angeles. After immigration authorities conduct a series of sweeps, as President Trump deploys 2,000 national guardsmen. Now threatening to send in hundreds of Marines, as California Governor Newsom accuses the President of inflaming tensions. Demonstrators blocking the highway, lighting cars on fire. Police using flash bangs to break up the crowds.
Tossing to chief national correspondent Matt Gutman, co-host and former Clinton official George Stephanopoulos by again using the e-word of “escalating tension” and harped on the fact that Trump’s ordering in of the National Guard “is the first time since 1965 that a president’s ordered troops in over the objections of the governor.”
“California Governor Newsom condemned the action as inflammatory, called on the administration to rescind it, said they were manufacturing a crisis,” he dutifully declared.
Correspondent Matt Gutman was on scene and showed off the violence with another buzzword of “clashed” to describe the violence on the part of “protesters.”
After kvetching about “Trump’s extraordinary deployment of the California National Guard,” Gutman played tape of the violent scenes and reports of injuries as a lead-in to more Trump bashing:
Chief White House correspondent and Biden regime apple polisher Mary Bruce threw more gas on the fire in defending Newsom and characterizing Trump as having overstepped his authority and basic humanity by wanting the riots put down:
NBC’s Today wasn’t any better. In the teases, co-host Craig Melvin decried the “stunning images” while co-host Savannah Guthrie said “protests turn[ed] violent” with “new chaos in Los Angeles” as “protesters and police clash[ed].”
“President Trump sending in the National Guard against the governor’s wishes,” she added.
She doubled down on the “violent clashes” part in the actual report, acknowledging “parts of the city thrown into chaos,” but Melvin soon replied with the subtle turn to blame Trump: “Trump defying the state’s wishes, sending in 2,000 national guardsmen over the weekend. California Governor Gavin Newsom calling it, the President’s actions, unconstitutional and saying a lawsuit will be filed as early as this morning.”
Correspondent Liz Kreutz wove Trump’s name throughout her report as the undercurrent and thus, if he weren’t President, everything would have been just peachy and not, say, a far-left mob’s lack of respect for law and order.
She then dubbed the mob “anti-ICE protesters” and even directly said Trump’s policies were to blame for the crimes committed (click “expand”):
[I]t seems to be a temporary moment of calm here in downtown LA after what’s been an extremely tense night and weekend here. This is some of the damage from these protests. These were Waymo cars that were set on fire. We were here yesterday as protesters set several of them ablaze. We saw protesters take over the interstate, intense clashes with police who deployed pepper spray, rubber bullets, teargas to disperse the crowd. This as President Trump has deployed 2,000 National Guard troops here, a move that the governor is calling illegal and says it’s only inflamed the protests.
Overnight, police in riot gear facing off with anti-ICE protesters in downtown LA, now declared an unlawful assembly area. The clashes escalating over the weekend after first erupting Friday following workplace raids by federal agents at multiple locations across LA. On Saturday, President Trump evoking a rarely-used law to evoke the National Guard, defying California’s governor who said it would only inflame protesters, which only inflamed protesters that took over a major highway.
After spinning the destruction of property as “[d]emonstrators voicing their anger over ICE in the city,” she spoke to protester Veronica Farias, who invoked January 6 as she held a sign that read “#NoIce, #NoRaids, #NoCages, #NoTrump.”
This went on (click “expand”):
KREUTZ: Border Czar Tom Homan telling our Jacob Soboroff the raids will continue in the coming days and that officials who stand in the way of local law enforcement could be arrested.
JACOB SOBOROFF [TO HOMAN]: Are you saying that about Mayor Bass and Governor Newsom? Are they at risk of being arrested?
TOM HOMAN: I’ll say it about anybody. You cross that line.
KREUTZ: Governor Newsom firing back.
NEWSOM (D-CA): Come after me. Arrest me. Let’s just get it over with, tough guy. They’re trying to incite violence. They’re trying to impose the kind of rhetoric that only makes the conditions worse that quite literally put people’s lives at risk.
KREUTZ: Now, the governor is also condemning the violence. LAPD says they’re currently going through video from these protests and that anybody seen breaking the law will be held accountable. As for that move, guys, to bring in the National Guard, that move is so rare by the President, that last time that happened was 1965. Then-President Lyndon B. Johnson called in the Alabama National Guard to protect civil rights protesters[.]
Over on CBS Mornings, co-host and Democrat donor Gayle King began by describing the riots as “violent protests in Los Angeles with some demonstrators setting fires and throwing things at police to protest a series of immigration raids by federal agents” and emphasized the new talking point about Trump having deployed the National Guard over the respective state governor’s wishes since 1965.
LA-based correspondent Jonathan Vigliotti started off on a decent note, admitting “[w]e’re actually limited in what we can show because of all the graffiti that’s been scrolled on the buildings yesterday and today.”
Blaming the “tensions remain[ing] high” on “immigration sweeps,” Vigliotti showed all the usual moments with the freeway mob and then the cars being lit on fire and then notes of lament from Bass and McDonnell.
He then laid into Trump:
The latest escalation point? President Trump’s deployment of 2,000 National Guard troops to LA, against the wishes of city and state leaders, including California Governor Gavin Newsom, who accused the President of ‘trying to manufacture a crisis...to create chaos.’ Trump denied those claims.”
After a clip of Newsom “fir[ing] back,” Vigliotti concluded with, yes, the 1965 factoid (as if to drive home the insinuation of Trump as some authoritarian).
Congressional correspondent Nikole Killion had a second segment about “this issue...igniting the public and lawmakers on party lines”:
At least Killion was the only network personality Monday to point out Trump has support for these deportations: “A CBS News poll shows 54 percent of Americans approve of the President’s program to deport undocumented immigrants, although nearly half believe the administration is trying to deport more people than expected.”
So, yes, the liberal media are not on the side of law and order anytime it’s their side rioting.
But like we saw after January 6, rioters from the other side of the aisle were seen as enemies of the state.
To see the relevant transcripts from June 9, click here (for ABC), here (for CBS), and here (for NBC).