Trump is trying to exploit the CNN lawsuit by sending out fundraising emailing asking his supporters to send his re-election campaign money.
CNN is SUING President Trump, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, a Secret Service agent, and other White House officials…” the fundraising email states. “…All because they REVOKED Jim Acosta’s press badge after his continuous grandstanding and inappropriate refusal to yield to other reporters.”
President Trump will NOT put up with the media’s liberal bias and utter disrespect for this Administration and the hardworking Americans who stand with us,” the email continued.
To get more stories like this, subscribe to our newsletter The Daily.
It also includes a survey with the question: “Do you think the White House was right to revoke the press badge belonging to CNN’s Jim Acosta?” After the survey is completed, the president’s campaign asks for a donation “to help defend our movement from the outrageous attacks from the media coming our way.”
While the press is standing together and supporting CNN in the lawsuit, Trump is trying to make the media his opponent for reelection. The strategy that Trump is using is shortsighted in many ways, but the most obvious is that it makes no sense for a man who got billions of dollars in free media coverage to now try to make the press his enemy when he needs them to give him airtime in 2020.
Trump has already lost most of his free media platform. The days of the networks and press organizations dropping everything else to provide him wall to wall free airtime coverage are long gone.
The president thinks that he is winning by picking this fight with CNN and then trying to raise money off of it, but the press isn’t giving him what he wants. There has been a noticeable lack of back and forth and breathless coverage.
The press has doubled down on facts and deprived Trump of the ingredients that he needs to get his base ginned up.
Trump may think that he is winning, but the reality is that he has already lost.
For more discussion about this story join our Rachel Maddow and MSNBC group.
Follow Jason Easley on Facebook.
Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.
Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association
