On the eve of the Democratic convention, CNBC’s Joe Kernen wanted to know why the media have failed to challenge Hillary Clinton on the issue of her personal wealth and the controversy surrounding the Clinton Foundation.
Kernen, a Squawk Box co-anchor, pointed out that the media have been suspiciously silent on the subject of Clinton’s finances. During a discussion regarding a recent book about the Clintons, he referenced the two journalists who exposed the Watergate scandal: “Where’s Woodward and Bernstein on any of this?”
Peter Schweizer, author of Clinton Cash, appeared on the July 22 Squawk Box episode to discuss his book about how the Clintons have made millions since leaving the White House.
Schweizer claimed that the media have not asked Clinton a single question about recent accusations of fraudulent financial dealings during any interviews or debates leading up to the Democratic National Convention.
“I think any other political figure in America with a 4,000 word front page investigative piece in The New York Times alleging money from the Russian government, the transfer of uranium, would at least warrant one question from the mainstream media,” said Schweizer.
Kernen admitted he was not particularly surprised by the Clintons’ financial scandals, and noted, “That’s 20 years of this, she has to do something a lot worse than this to derail the Clintons.”
Informed by Schweizer that the mainstream media had gone “radio silent” on the subject, Kernen concluded, “No one cares. It's classic. It's the Clintons.”
During the current presidential race, the media’s bias in favor of the Clintons has become extremely evident.
From January to May 2016, the broadcast networks only spent 4 minutes and 24 seconds covering the Clinton Foundation scandal, but devoted more than 8 times that to discussing the decades-old controversy of Donald Trump pretending to be his own publicist. In May, MSNBC’s Chris Matthews dismissed “Whitewater and Vince Foster and all this crud,” as “garbage.” Last month, ABC and NBC refrained from covering Bill Clinton’s shady meeting with Attorney General Loretta Lynch during the ongoing FBI investigation regarding Hillary Clinton’s email server.
