Trump Shares Racist Imagery. Cable News Reveals Its Priorities

"Late Thursday night, Trump reposted a video on Truth Social promoting long-debunked conspiracy theories about the 2020 election. Near the end of the video is an AI-generated image portraying the former president and first lady as apes. The post remains live. There is no evidence Trump created the video, and it yes it is entirely possible he did not carefully review it before sharing, though that doesn't matter What is clear is that a sitting president amplified racist imagery from his official platform and has not acknowledged or corrected it. Full stop."

"Depicting Black public figures as primates is not ambiguous or culturally contested. It is a historically entrenched racist trope, used for generations to demean and dehumanize. That history is well established. When that imagery is shared by a sitting president, responsibility attaches to the office. Vetting is part of the job. So is responding when it fails. Cable news did not respond uniformly, and that's the point. CNN covered the story as straight news. Morning Joe covered it extensively, with Joe Scarborough sharply criticizing Republicans who rushed to defend or minimize Trump's behavior. Whatever one thinks of Scarborough's tone, the segment treated the issue as a standards failure and said so plainly. That matters because it shows this is not a hard story to cover. The tools are there. The language exists. The judgment is not elusive."

Late Thursday night, Trump reposted a video on Truth Social promoting long-debunked conspiracy theories about the 2020 election. Near the end of the video, an AI-generated image portrays Barack and Michelle Obama as apes. The post remains live and there is no evidence Trump created the video. Regardless of authorship, a sitting president amplified racist imagery from an official platform and did not acknowledge or correct it. Depicting Black public figures as primates is a historically entrenched racist trope used to demean and dehumanize. Responsibility attaches to the office, including vetting and responding when failures occur. Cable news coverage varied significantly.

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