Authored by Jenna McCarthy via Jenna’s Side Substack,
“Sure, we misquoted him. But now he’s weaponizing our mistake!”
Remember that fateful January day when the sitting President of the United States ordered all his angry, disappointed supporters to rush down to the Capitol—where they were busy certifying his opponent’s stolen Electoral College victory—and fight like hell? I mean, that was bold. Crazy, even. It almost sounded as if he was inciting violence.
Except—tiny plot twist—he didn’t say that. I know, you saw it all over the news and everything, but what he actually said was, “We’re going to walk down to the Capitol and we’re going to cheer on our brave senators and congressmen and women.”
Slightly different ring, no?
But let’s be honest; “Go, Congress!” makes a lousy lead-in to a Trump Spurs an Insurrection story. So when the BBC was putting together a little pre-election documentary about the famed day, they decided to rewrite the script. They grabbed that “walk down to the Capitol” line, snatched a completely different quote from nearly an hour later in his speech (notably, “We fight, we fight like hell”), and then chopped out everything in between—including peacefully and patriotically, in case anyone’s keeping track.
The result? Oh, just a bunch of mostly benign words being rearranged into a call to arms. No big deal.
@flufrstf #BBC #Jan6 #Trump ♬ original sound – FlufferstuffTheBlameless
It’s bad enough that a once respected media outlet was so blatant in their bias. It’s humiliating that they were busted, hilarious that they think anyone will believe it was accidental, and egregious that their journalistic PR-wrangling cronies are actually trying to defend them. But the fact that, even after the BBC issued an apology and an admission of guilt, the rest of the media mafia is trying to spin this into Orange Man Attacks Journalists is almost too much to take.
THE BBC, BASICALLY: “Look, editing is hard. Who among us hasn’t unknowingly rearranged someone’s words to mean the exact opposite of what they actually said? It’s called craft. You wouldn’t understand.”
But, you see, Trump is the bad guy here, because he didn’t just notice; he said something. Actually, he didn’t just say something, he filed a lawsuit. A big-with-a-B (as in billion-dollar) lawsuit.
“They actually changed my January 6 speech, which was a beautiful speech, which was a very calming speech, and they made it sound radical,” Trump said.
“I think I have an obligation to [proceed with legal action], because you can’t allow people to do that.”
And even though the BBC admitted they were in the wrong, even though two of their top executives promptly escorted themselves out of the building in the wake of the editing scandal, and even though the “documentary” has now been confirmed to be about as honest as a reality TV reunion… the true crime, according to the press, is, well, Trump.
Whatever you say, Guardian.
“There’s a political context to this attack—and it is an attack—it’s a concerted full-frontal assault on the BBC for what was absolutely an editorial mistake,” said broadcaster Steven Barnett. “It’s the kind of mistake that is easily accounted for, easily apologized for… and once you see that program, you will realize that that edit made absolutely no difference to the overall impartiality of that biography of Donald Trump leading up to the 2024 presidential election.”
So, just so we’re clear: “news” outlets are now accusing politicians of “weaponizing editing errors”—as if asking journalists and editors not to remix speeches like a bad rap track is some unreasonable, dictator-level request and not basic kindergarten fairness. It would be like your teenager admitting they were texting when they wrecked the car—then accusing you of “holding it against them” when you won’t pay for the repairs.
The subtext of the coverage is basically: How dare the peasants expect accuracy?
From StopTrump.org.uk, because of course.
And the BBC saga is only one chapter in the Media Bias scrapbook. CBS had to quietly settle a $16 million lawsuit because 60 Minutes edited Kamala Harris’ answers so creatively that she actually appeared intelligent. Kristi Noem accused Face the Nation of “whitewashing the truth” by selectively chopping out entire chunks of her replies, to which the network sheepishly responded by announcing they’d now only air full, unedited interviews. Apparently they realize their editing bay is a lawless frontier where any sentence might wake up missing an organ.
Regardless, every headline still finds a way to imply Trump is the problem. The BBC admitted it Frankensteined his speech. Editors resigned. The entire world noticed. But the narrative is, “Editing decisions were once behind the scenes—now Trump is turning them into weapons.”
No, kids. The weapon was forged when newsrooms decided that “shortening clips for time” included playing God with context. Trump is merely the first person with the resources (and the pettiness… and the cojones) to fire back.
Poor, tortured journalists lament that they’re being scrutinized “more than ever.” Yes. Yes, you are. Because it turns out when people discover you’ve been editing interviews like they’re Hollywood trailers instead of news broadcasts, they realize you’re not journalists—you’re screenwriters.
“I would call this a big screw-up, a big journalistic screw-up, but in a very small, narrow way, because it was one small part of a long documentary, and most importantly, because nobody seemed to notice it at the time,” said CNN’s Brian Stelter.
Oh, well, nobody noticed it at the time? I guess we’re good.
One editor quoted by the AP complains that every cut is now “under a microscope.” Good. If you can stitch together two unrelated fragments of a presidential speech like a Build-A-Bear, you deserve a microscope, a spotlight, and possibly a babysitter.
My favorite part is the quiet panic underlying all these articles: the realization that normal people, armed with transcripts and internet access, can now compare what aired to what was actually said. In 1992, that would’ve required a team of interns and a sacrifice to the gods of VHS. Today, it’s a Tuesday morning for any bored guy on Reddit.
The media in a meme.
No wonder the press is stressed. The era of “trust us, it’s fine, this is totally what they said—er, meant” is over. When you make a living off deception, that’s bad news. But sure, mainstream media. Tell us more about how you’re the real victims here.
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