Greg Gianforte, candidate for the empty Montana seat in the House of Representatives, has been charged with assault on the day of the special election. The Guardian reports on the incident, including reactions of Fox News reporters on the scene:
“He took me to the ground,” Jacobs said by phone from the back of an ambulance. “I think he wailed on me once or twice … He got on me and I think he hit me … This is the strangest thing that has ever happened to me in reporting on politics.”
Fox News reporter Alicia Acuna, field producer Faith Mangan and photographer Keith Railey witnessed the incident at Gianforte’s campaign headquarters in Montana, according to an account published on the Fox News website. After Jacobs asked Gianforte his question, Acuna wrote: “Gianforte grabbed Jacobs by the neck with both hands and slammed him into the ground behind him.
“Faith, Keith and I watched in disbelief as Gianforte then began punching the man, as he moved on top the reporter and began yelling something to the effect of ‘I’m sick and tired of this!’ … To be clear, at no point did any of us who witnessed this assault see Jacobs show any form of physical aggression toward Gianforte, who left the area after giving statements to local sheriff’s deputies.”
Jacobs subsequently reported the incident to the police. The Gallatin county sheriff’s office said on Wednesday night it had completed its investigation and that Gianforte had been issued with a charge of misdemeanour assault.
RawStory follows up on Fox News:
On Fox & Friends, however, Mele simply repeated the Gianforte campaign’s talking points by noting that “the candidate says that reporter tried to push a phone in his face before this happened” and that “Gianforte’s campaign says the men both fell.”
The network also ran a chyron that simply read, “Gianforte blames reporter for incident.”
Report AdvertisementLater on Fox & Friends, co-host Brian Kilmeade did reference Acuna’s report on the incident — but he never talked about its contents or the fact that it completely contradicted the Gianforte campaign’s spin.
Their founder may be dead, but his spirit lives on. Mediaite notes the reaction of pundit Joe Scarborough:
“All three papers overnight took their endorsements away from this Republican guy,” said Scarborough. “It’s that incredible. A guy assault a reporter, which I guess shouldn’t be too surprising in an age of Trump where he calls the press ‘enemy of the people.’ These reckless words have consequences.”
“This candidate had also said things sort of Trumpian about the press,” offered Willie Geist for the assist.
Weirdly, I wonder if this will play well with the GOP base. There has been a current of fury in the past campaign season, enough so that the spats of violence reported at some events were not negative, but rather positives for Trump. Given Gianforte is a Trump supporter, it suggests this could even be a planned incident – trade a misdemeanour assault for building street cred with the base. I haven’t paid much attention to the Montana electorate, not living there, so it’s hard to say if they lean that way, or if the endorsements of the major newspapers, snatched away overnight, will have any influence on the election.
This will be a major marker as to whether the American electorate is transmuting from the traditional ways of evaluating candidates – or staying with tried and true values. If the former, GOPer Gianforte wins and we enter a more violent stage of our Republic; if the latter, Democrat Quist wins and we back away from a nasty little precipice.
Stay tuned. Today’s the special election.
