Federalist senior writer Mary Katharine Ham joined CNN Newsroom on Monday to explain why media need to be precise when covering Donald Trump.
In a rally on Saturday night, Trump made reference to a Fox News segment in which a filmmaker said large waves of migrants were having trouble assimilating in Sweden. His comment spurred a media firestorm, which compounded the confusion surrounding his remark.
“When the president communicates something in the most careless way possible and is unclear, as he was with this Sweden comment the other night, it is important for us to be there and not careless about what he said,” Ham said.
“A lot of the coverage of this turned into: ‘He’s making up a big terrorist incident!'” she said. “Although it was unclear, if we could have clarified with the White House fairly quickly that he was referencing the Tucker Carlson show, it would’ve made the coverage clearer.”
.@mkhammer on Trump's Sweden remarks: He could do a better job clarifying, but "there's danger on two sides" https://t.co/Q92GcUijul
— CNN News Central (@NewsCentralCNN) February 20, 2017
“He could do it much better,” Ham said about the president’s tendency to make confusing statements, but she added the media is making it worse by drawing out the confusion instead of cutting through it. “I think there’s danger on two sides.”
