In typical Roger Ailes fashion, Fox News used video images that told an entirely different story than the one their voice-over was telling. Like they did to try and smear president Obama's election day when they promoted a bogus new Black Panthers video to make it appear that voters were being intimidated to vote for Obama, this morning a F&F's segment discussed President Obama's meeting with the Black Lives Matters group and ran video of blacks rioting in the streets to negatively portray the group to Fox News viewers.
Fox & Friends decided to present a slightly different picture, opening up the segment with intentionally chosen footage of riots in the African American community. Heather Childers said in the clip, “The violent riots several years ago in Ferguson and Baltimore now drawing praise from President Obama — praise,” she emphasized.
Of course, the President’s meeting Thursday had nothing to do with the violence that erupted in those cities as Fox would have its viewers believe, but rather focused on the peaceful protests of many urban communities, organized in response to the police killings of young black youths. The protests that the President was speaking about “shined a light on the injustice that was happening,” as he praised Black Lives Matter leadership, seated beside Maryland CongressmanElijah Cummings.
We were not the only people to realize Fox News’ deceptive use of the footage. CNN’s Brian Stelter took to Twitter to call out Fox & Friends, noting it as “insidious use of video”:
Insidious use of video: Fox mentions Obama meeting with #BlackLivesMatter leaders, shows RIOT video, not protest vid https://t.co/25jl3NKZ1n
— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) February 19, 2016
Fox News will continue to do this because they've never been penalized for their journalistic malfeasance.
