Just when you thought mainstream media couldn’t sink lower, they surpass expectations with a new low.
CBS News Capitol Hill correspondent Scott MacFarlane is prompting eyerolls for comments made during an interview with former NBC host turned podcaster Chuck Todd, where he attributed his mental health struggles following the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump to the actions of Trump’s supporters.
“For those of us there, it was such a horror because you saw an emerging America,” MacFarlane told Todd.
“And it wasn’t the shooting, Chuck. This was – I got diagnosed with PTSD within 48 hours. I got put on trauma leave, not because, I think, of the shooting, but because you saw it in the eyes, the reaction of the people.”
“They were coming for us,” MacFarlane said of Trump supporters. “If [Trump] didn’t jump up with his fist, they were going to come kill us!”
“I know,” Todd replied in agreement.
In another segment of the interview, MacFarlane claimed, “Many of us on press row, as we talked about this on our text chains for weeks after, were quite confident we’d be dead if he didn’t get back up.”
The CBS News journalist further alleged that multiple Trump supporters blamed reporters for the shooting, saying, “‘You did this. This is your fault. You caused this. You killed him,’ and they were going to beat us with their hands. I mean, they were going to kill us. And respectfully, the Secret Service had bigger issues [than] protecting us. When he jumped up triumphantly, it saved us.”
“I can’t eliminate from my mind’s eye the look in their faces,” the journalist added.
“That’s what America is right now. It’s not rational. It’s an irrational thought to think the media shot somebody from the top of a building, but the lack of rationality is what connects January 6 to this.”
“How do we pull out of this as a country is the defining question of our time,” he concluded.
The incident in question occurred on July 13, 2024, when former President Trump survived an assassination attempt at a campaign rally near Butler, Pennsylvania. The attacker, 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, fired eight rounds from an AR-15-style rifle, grazing Trump’s right ear. The assault killed one spectator, Corey Comperatore, and critically injured two others before Crooks was neutralized by a Secret Service counter-sniper.
Trump credited a last-second head turn toward a chart for saving his life.
Reflecting on the near-death experience this week, Trump said, “It remains my firm conviction that God alone saved me that day for a righteous purpose: to restore our beloved Republic to greatness and to rescue our Nation from those who seek its ruin.”