When we list the types of media bias, one of them has always been Bias by Story Selection. When 60 Minutes devoted a softball segment to January 6 rioter Ray Epps on Sunday, the question was why him? And why now? Why did the media obsess over January 6 for two years and never get to this?
The only previous utterance of "Ray Epps" on CBS News was Adam Kinzinger ripping Ted Cruz over conspiracy theories on the June 12, 2022 Face the Nation.
Tristan Justice at The Federalist explored this in an analysis headlined "Ray Epps 60 Minutes Interview Raises More Questions Than Answers." Justice noted "The network follows The New York Times in giving the Jan. 6 agitator a glossy profile, dismissing as “conspiracies” the allegations that Epps was in covert cooperation with federal law enforcement."
It wouldn't be the first time CBS picked up on a Times narrative.
Epps is on video agitating for people to enter the Capitol, on January 5 and 6, and he was never charged. But people were prosecuted for merely "parading" inside the Capitol and taking pictures. Anna Morgan-Lloyd, an Indiana grandmother of five, was the first person sentenced for "parading."
“Ray Epps was never seen committing an act of violence that day or entering the Capitol,” CBS correspondent Bill Whitaker said. “Epps told us when he saw the violence, his fervor to enter the building became a desire to play peacemaker.” Pelosi-picked investigator Tom Joscelyn told Whitaker there is “still absolutely zero evidence that Ray Epps was a federal agent.” The narrative was mean Tucker Carlson's reporting on Epps ruined his life, and they had to sell their ranch and travel the country in an RV to avoid violent reprisals.
Justice explained in a Senate Judiciary hearing last week, Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) accused the Justice Department of pursuing charges against individuals who, “in some cases, were merely present on the Capitol grounds.” Epps not only escaped charges after his face appeared on the FBI’s most wanted list, but he received defense from both the FBI and the panel of House lawmakers who investigated the riot.
Surveillance tapes of the Capitol riot made public on Tucker Carlson Tonight contradicted Epps’ testimony before House lawmakers about his whereabouts on that terrible afternoon..
“Epps told the committee that he never entered the Capitol, and therefore never committed a crime,” Carlson said. “Text messages show that at 2:12 p.m., he boasted to his nephew that he had ‘orchestrated the protests at the Capitol.'”
“That is not true,” Carlson said. “The surveillance footage we found shows that in fact, Ray Epps remained at the Capitol for at least another half an hour.”
“What was Epps doing there? We can’t say,” Carlson added. “But we do know that he lied to investigators. The Jan. 6 Committee likely knew this too. Democrats had access to the same tape, yet they defended Ray Epps.”
Despite noting that Carlson has discussed Epps “more than 20 times on his top-rated show” including a “half dozen times so far this year,” Whitaker dismissed the prime-time cable news host as a conspiracy theorist without addressing the Jan. 6 tapes. The “60 Minutes” host failed to ask either Epps, or Thomas Joscelyn, an investigator for the Jan. 6 Committee, about the contradictory timeline.
