Trump's use of "fake news" is influential among authoritarian leaders: report

The Hill

Authoritarian leaders have adopted President Trump’s “fake news” slogan to try and delegitimize the media in their own countries, Politico reported Friday.

Politico found that leaders in countries including Turkey, Syria, Venezuela and the Philippines have used the phrase to fire back at media reports.

Syrian President Bashar Assad used “fake news” to dismiss a report that thousands of people had died at one of his military prisons by saying, “you can forge anything these days, we are living in a fake news era.”

Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte has also called the media “fake news,” as has Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.

Trump began using the phrase during his presidential bid to shoot down news reports about him and his campaign, and has continued using it during his administration.

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told Politico their story is “really ridiculous.”

“The president isn’t against free speech but we do think reporting should be accurate,” she wrote in an email.

Experts told Politico that other world leaders adopting the phrase is a sign that they’re taking their cues from the U.S. and is a way they can “will away” negative stories about their leadership.

The concept in itself isn't even new. Look no further than a certain historic dictator we TRY not to associate with him, otherwise he apparently looks better or something.

Also to Sarah Sanders' "The president isn't against freedom of speech" lie. Look no further than his backing of Ajit Pai's anti-net neutrality and doing screw all on Sinclair and Tribune.

they use it because it works.

people lap that shit up when trump goes on fact-lacking tiraids about the media. it's an easy way to dismiss negative information. if the people fall for it, that's their fault.

Yes, let's just ignore all the awful things Trump is doing and focus on how he attacks the media, because the media is always right, they sure as hell have never published news that turned out to be fake, the media loves us, the media wants what's best for us, the media is our friend, we should always believe in what the media wants us to believe.

Oh come on, Qurothon. The media may have it's problems, but without their criticism of leaders, we'd have Trump TV sooner (which, through Sinclair, is already shaping up to be Chinese and Russian style state TV), which in itself, is STILL a danger to freedom of speech.

attacking the media IS one of the awful things trump is doing.

he's a petty little ----- who can't handle criticism.

Attacking the press is a clear sign of an authoritarian, so this isn't really a surprise.

I wonder if it will ever get so bad that a news outlet ends up suing the president

CNN fired entire journalist team

ABC suspends Brian Ross over misreporting, not allowed to report on trump any more.

CNN Just reported that trump received an email from the russian government to access the data on wiki leaks before it went on wiki leaks... except it may not have been from the russia, and the email was sent 10 days after the data had been leaked. This is a big enough misrepresentation that more people likely to be suspended or fired!

Maybe if the media wasn't consumed with getting trump they'd report the news correctly.

The problem with current media is its a witch hunt / persecution. Facts are picked to fit a narrative, and its already political propaganda disguised as news. Its not about reporting accurately. Which is why people are resonating with trump. We already have HilaryTV it just wasn't obvious.

@waahahah: people may be resonating with Trump, but I’m curious as to whether they realize he’s only attacking the media to lessen his own accountability, and not because he actually cares about them being truthful.

He doesn’t give a single **** about journalistic integrity.

Doesn't mean his attacks aren't justified, sadly its a vicious cycle now. He hits the media and the media falls over trying to hit back. Its not like he has a lot to be accountable for. The russian investigation is more and more turning into a witch hunt and with one agent being fired on the investigation... and no underlying crime has actually been found apart from flynn lying, which is sort of an incredibly benign issue.

I don't get apologists for trump at all...................

Except "HillaryTV" isn't as bad as "TrumpTV" because of one simple thing. Hillary is not the president, and further more, still had her left leaning critics during the election. One of them being John Oliver.

Again, lack of freedom of press means one less aspect of freedom of speech, and it's what allowed Fox News, Breitbart, Infowars, NatEn, and the Sun to write the crap they write. John F. Kennedy and Jimmy Carter, who were disliked by quite a few, even back it:

@toast_burner: That's right. One can argue that it's not a big deal, but they're wrong. This is one of the first (and necessary) steps along the road to the death of a democracy.

@mattbbpl: Kind of sad that people don't see this for what it is. But then I guess in the past the other countries didn't either. Shame we didn't learn from their examples. How do you wrap yourself in the flag and then cheer someone that wants to squelch freedom?

Freedom of the press has been their shield for constantly shoveling propaganda, fast and loose usage of facts, and being smug and looking down on a very large portion of the population. They deserve being attacked, they constantly push narratives over fact. I do like john oliver he does present a lot of facts accurately but sometimes he doesn't tell you everything. Like I was surprised to see Steven Crowder's rebuttel on corporate consolidation. How air lines make like $1 on average per person. Granted the other oliver rebuttels have been bad, like on nuclear waste they were just trying to point the finger which.. at some point isn't necessary. We got to deal with the waste was the point.

Back on news... they do deserve this. We need news but we need news sources that we can trust.

Regardless of his motivations... if journalist cared about journalistic integrity they wouldn't have this problem right now. He's not baselessly attacking the news media which would be bad... he's attacking them because their bad. Which is the right thing to do even if its motivations are are bad... someones got to slap the media around.

Bull shit. He's attacked the news media when their facts were correct. They just didn't make him look good so he lashed out.

Yeah, I agree with LJ here. This is simply bullshit.

Thats because the media is an anti trump propaganda machine. Even if their facts are correct a lot of times they are cherry picked or pulled out of context to drive a narrative not be informative.

edit: I mean I know it was only like a week ago but CNN not only suspended brian ross and he's not allowed to report on trump any more... and how CNN just came out with a story yesterday that the wal street journal already shot down.

What part of factual don't you understand?

What part of cherry picking propaganda and failing to properly vet 'facts' 100% of the time. Again trump might be in the wrong. But he's not entirely wrong. Because the news media isn't entirely right. Regardless of trump's motivation he has a basis to attack the media who have become extremely petty and integrity and trustworthy aren't in their court any more than trump's.

But this time the mainstream news is fake most of the time.

That includes Fox news as well.

It's not Trump's job, nor concern, what the media reports or how they report it. People are capable of discerning that for themselves, or at least they should be. Trump's only job as president is to make sure the press have rights in the first place and to protect them. You may identify with what Trump states about the media and in this I can agree with you to an extent, and it wouldn't bother me so much if what he was simply a citizen venting grievance, but he is in the position of someone who has sworn to protect the underlying principle that allows these entities to operate, regardless of the integrity of which they do so. To me, what is being reported is largely irrelevant. It is his usage of "FAKE NEWS" that is indicative of a much deeper and troublesome implication: he doesn't give a shit about that principle, the only thing in consideration is how everything reflects upon him.

Yet people adore him for harping on the media without understanding the context of how dangerous it is for a leader to continually make efforts to undermine it, because it's not simply undermining the media but again, what is allowing it to operate. You don't believe Trump would shut down much of the press if he were able? He'd do it in a heartbeat, and what's truly frightening about that is I'm sure there'd be droves who would cheer it on in their myopic hatred of the media without even being able to pull back and view the bigger picture to be cognizant of what they were actually supporting.

The only thing that is protecting us and our country from Trump (and his supporters) are the checks and balances our founding fathers were prescient enough to acknowledge and implement hundreds of years ago. I only hope they're able to endure 4 or 8 years of continual assault by this wanna be authoritarian would couldn't give a single **** about what he's sworn himself to uphold but instead makes every effort to attack when it doesn't suit his best interests.

Yes it is, if a media organization is finding stories and presenting facts as facts but running as an opposing political party there is no difference with him than fighting a political opponent. This isn't about freedom of speech. Its about an entire organization purposely cherry picking facts to fit a narrative, purposely misrepresenting facts, persecuting people they don't like, and not having a good track record of reporting facts correctly or accurately.

Your hiding behind freedom of speech but this has nothing to do with the issue. The fact is there are laws against slandering people and the news organizations aren't being held accountable for stepping over that line time and time again. Brian Ross again just a couple of weeks ago, so quick to dig up dirt on trump not only is he suspended

Yet people adore him for harping on the media without understanding the context of how dangerous it is for a leader to continually make efforts to undermine it, because it's not simply undermining the media but again, what is allowing it to operate. You don't believe Trump would shut down much of the press if he were able? He'd do it in a heartbeat, and I'm sure there'd be many people who would cheer it on in their myopic hatred of the media without even being able to pull back and be cognizant of what they were actually supporting.

Your absolutely wrong. He's not going against free speech, he's against news not being held accountable for basically slandering and targeting people and acting as a political hitman behind free speech. There is an issue with the whole of news media now. Even political fact I've seen fact checks against them. The news is mostly undermining themselves otherwise he'd have no room to attack them. The fact is people don't trust the media and they've been acting as the strong arm / propaganda machine of the democratic party.

News were apolitical to antifa violence and have been conditioning people to accept the violence... which is similar to how nazi party worked people up to be try to exterminate an entire race?

When the news acts like this... that's something that legislators/president should take note of. We won't be in a functioning society if they keep going down this route.

The only thing that is protecting us and our country from Trump are the checks and balances our founding fathers were prescient enough to acknowledge and implement hundreds of years ago. I only hope it's able to endure 4 or 8 years of continual assault by this wanna be authoritarian would couldn't give one shit about what he's sworn himself to uphold but instead makes every effort to attack when it doesn't suit his best interests.

Checks and balances which has nothing to do with news. Congress/senate/presidency/judicial branch are all designed to balance this out. The freedom of speech was a protection from individuals to protect them from holding particular view points, or holding any kind of opinions about people. The fact is there are laws that prohibit certain types of speech, its not a you can say anything you feel like society. You can't insight violence, you can't spread misinformation about individuals.

The fact that you think he's an authoritarian is comical... and probably a victim of the new's propaganda.

Yes, it's the entirety of the news media that is wrong.... Not him...

Except that most journalists do care about journalistic integrity. Giving a few examples of when journalists have been misleading or reported lies is a tiny tiny tiny drop in the bucket when you see how much reporting is actually done on a daily basis. It is the classic case of taking a handful of examples and repeating them over and over to make something seem more common.

Its not tiny, it really isn't. Most news outlets have become propaganda, they are incredibly quick to paint people they dislike as racist and now that it isn't working any more they just call everyone alt right. They've been in a fever pitch about Russia and the worst thing to come out about that is Flynn misspoke to the FBI doing something perfectly expected as part of the transition. Yet the connection between Mueller, Comey, and the recently fired FBI agent off the special counsel, and Hillary's nuclear deal + emails doesn't have nearly the presence in the media because its not the outrage they want, its not the outcome they'd like to see.

It is really tiny, we can use these things called numbers and facts to prove that. You have no facts or evidence to support your claims at all which is why people have a hard time believing the narrative you're trying to sell them.

Yes it is, if a media organization is finding stories and presenting facts as facts but running as an opposing political party there is no difference with him than fighting a political opponent. This isn't about freedom of speech. Its about an entire organization purposely cherry picking facts to fit a narrative, purposely misrepresenting facts, persecuting people they don't like, and not having a good track record of reporting facts correctly or accurately.

Your hiding behind freedom of speech but this has nothing to do with the issue. The fact is there are laws against slandering people and the news organizations aren't being held accountable for stepping over that line time and time again. Brian Ross again just a couple of weeks ago, so quick to dig up dirt on trump not only is he suspended

So that being said, I assume you apply this same standard to Fox News, or are they completely acceptable in their manner of reporting? You can't speak about this as if culpability only exists on one side or as if Fox News holds integrity and is absolved over the others and is less of a propaganda machine. That is a ludicrous implication. Fox is utterly shameless in their explicitness to make their bias known and pushed. The president supports and praises them yet does not the others, so it is hypocritical of you to praise Trump's condemnation of one side while ignoring that he's not doing the same to another that is doing the EXACT same thing you are complaining about.

You simply cannot make an argument of accountability and maintain a straight face unless you support holding them all accountable. Trump doesn't, so your argument and defense of him in his position towards the press is utterly meaningless and invalidated.

Your absolutely wrong. He's not going against free speech, he's against news not being held accountable for basically slandering and targeting people and acting as a political hitman behind free speech. There is an issue with the whole of news media now. Even political fact I've seen fact checks against them. The news is mostly undermining themselves otherwise he'd have no room to attack them. The fact is people don't trust the media and they've been acting as the strong arm / propaganda machine of the democratic party.

News were apolitical to antifa violence and have been conditioning people to accept the violence... which is similar to how nazi party worked people up to be try to exterminate an entire race?

When the news acts like this... that's something that legislators/president should take note of. We won't be in a functioning society if they keep going down this route.

You're right, presidents should take note of it......in its entirety. Not just those who don't kiss the King's ass at every possible moment.

Tell me, why is he not so harsh against Fox News as much as he is against CNN, MSNBC, and others? Do you believe that Fox News isn't as guilty as the others and is not to be held accountable as well? If you believe they should be, then how can you support Trump? Bullshit this is an issue with the whole of the news media, it's only an issue with the media Trump detests, and if you have any semblance of honesty inside you, you will not stand with Trump on this because he's nowhere near bipartisan in his condemnation of the press. As such, it's completely irrelevant that you believe the media is an arm of the Left, that doesn't negate the fact it remains hypocritical to support him selectively attacking only the ones he deems suitable and that advocate his interests.

Checks and balances which has nothing to do with news. Congress/senate/presidency/judicial branch are all designed to balance this out. The freedom of speech was a protection from individuals to protect them from holding particular view points, or holding any kind of opinions about people. The fact is there are laws that prohibit certain types of speech, its not a you can say anything you feel like society. You can't insight violence, you can't spread misinformation about individuals.

The fact that you think he's an authoritarian is comical... and probably a victim of the new's propaganda.

Once again, this argument applies to all, and you can't convince me that Fox News and other conservative outlets are any better.

I'm nearly to the point of not even addressing your point on Trump's authoritarian tendencies as anyone with a proper head on their shoulders understands he is, and has been for a while now. Attacking the press? That is out of the textbook of authoritarianism. Continually trying to undermine public trust in the electoral process? Check. Attacking our Judiciary and its members? Check. Attacking our intelligence communities? Check. Stating admiration for other authoritarian regimes? Check. Stating "I alone can fix all the problems"? Check.

What else do you need? It's not comical to believe Trump demonstrates authoritarian tendencies, it's comical not to. The man is a wanna be dictator if I've ever seen it, and you're exceptionally naive if you believe he wouldn't choose to be one if given the opportunity.

And spare me the narrative that Antifa desires to round up millions and shove them into gas chambers, which is exactly the picture Fox News love to paint about these groups. I don't deny that they're fascist in their antics nor do I agree with their tactics, but come the **** on. And you're telling me I'm a victim of the news' propaganda?

Stating facts is NOT propaganda. Yes sometimes the news media gets something wrong. And they issue a retraction and move on. You might have a point if your own examples don't show the media policing themselves.

Propaganda is believing what a figure/group wants you to think. IE trump. He ONLY praises news that kisses his orange ass. That's NOT what a free country should want from their journalists and it's sad that you and others accept that now.

People trust Right leaning media far less than Left leaning media on average.

The reason probably being right leaning media is far more blog/tabloid with not many investigative journalists. And less accurate overall.

Its not being hypocritical. The fact that he's defending himself when the news media is attacking him without being accurate or misleading. If his view is Fox news gives him a fair shake, then why would he attack them? I mean CNN has fired people reporting on trump, ABC suspended someone... They all have issues but the anti trump outlets which are basically everyone but fox has been reacting emotionally and reckless with how they are reporting the news. This includes NYTimes/Washington post which has put out some really stupid shit in past year. Not even stuff including trump, one of the pieces was a black guy talking about how he wouldn't want to let his children play with white kids and admits to being suspicious of groups of white people while suggesting all white people are racist.. I'd have to question if he actually understands what racism is... you know being suspicious of a group of people because of their race is a good example of racism. And they do fling the terms racism and alt right as often as they can... with O'Reilly out of the picture I think fox standards are a little higher now.

So lets say trump does try to push some legislation that raises the standards for news... that goes for all news outlets including fox news.

I've mostly gotten my news either by reading the same event through multiple outlets or through fringe media outlets that put more emphasize on facts being separation from opinion and fact check the news. Or even just Non news outlets to understand things better... like this video on Global Warming. It was one of the first videos I've seen that really presented the facts really well... I saw a video of tucker Carlson talking to bill nye and it was just rubbish. Tucker obviously had a legitimate question and bill couldn't answer it.

And spare me the narrative that Antifa desires to round up millions and shove them into gas chambers, which is exactly the picture Fox News love to paint about these groups. I don't deny that they're fascist in their antics nor do I agree with their tactics, but come the **** on. And you're telling me I'm a victim of the news' propaganda?

Thats not what I said. This has nothing to do with fox news which reported accurately that this group of people were behaving. I drew the parralel to Nazis because through similar means normalized violence.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/made-by-history/wp/2017/08/16/who-are-the-antifa/?utm_term=.ef3c9650d2cb <- downplaying violence

Antifa has since been classified as a domestic terrorist group.

Another good video that... is actual journalism... you'd be hard pressed to find some news media outlet that reported on Charlettesville accurately when it happened. Blame on many sides. Fox news... one of the few news outlets that accepted that violence was on both sides and reported accurately.

I guess you don't understand how misrepresenting facts isn't just stating facts and how it can be used as propaganda. The problem is they aren't JUST STATING FACTS, and they aren't always accurate or omitting facts that don't push a narrative.

Ok then use them, I used more facts than you pointing out CNN fired and entire journalist team for misreporting, ABC's brian ross...

@waahahah: You know what I think...........your fell for trump's propaganda hook, line, and sinker. Sad!

Your assuming that my decision was based off of what trump has said... considering I posted a video about how fucked up the reporting on Charlettesville detailing how the media jumped on what trump said and how it misrepresented many of the facts. Like Deandre one of the 'counter protesters' that was beaten by 'white supremacists'. What they didn't show you was Deandre marching towards the group of people with friends all holding clubs and them attacking. What they didn't show you was Deandre on top of someone before he was pulled off and attacked.

The news portrayed this as one group being a peaceful counter protest, and the other group being a violent white supremacist group that attacked. They used facts in this instance but completely misrepresented them omitting the violent/racist black lives matter / antifa counter protest or that one group showed up with shields for protection and the counter protest showed up with clubs to try to beat people with. Labeled the entire rally as white supremacist without actually trying to understand who made up the rally. Or the cops did nothing and let the counter protest group attack until it escalated and someone was killed. The news persecuted trump because when he was willing to condemn the violence on both side after condemning white supremacy and using the misrepresentation of the facts used that as a way to criticize trump.

Can anyone point to an example where Trump has used his official power(s) as president to try to stop any media outlet from printing, publishing or broadcasting any story? Examples similar to these?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/under-sweeping-subpoenas-justice-department-obtained-ap-phone-records-in-leak-investigation/2013/05/13/11d1bb82-bc11-11e2-89c9-3be8095fe767_story.html?utm_term=.068fbcf36102

https://www.yahoo.com/news/blogs/ticket/obama-admin-spied-fox-news-reporter-james-rosen-134204299.html

If they didn't show it.....then where did you see it?

Are you being stupid or something since I already posted a video of it... that points out the news poor misrepresentation of the facts or even falsely reporting.

@waahahah: See the problem is that your facts actually show journalistic integrity because those people were fired or suspended and they made it clear to the public that they were wrong. Lets say your links actually did show what you want them to show, it still wouldn't be evidence because those were just a few cases when there are thousands of reporters all around the country. That is how the system is supposed to work and how it does work and how its always worked lol. You have no actual evidence of your false narrative that it's all propaganda, not one single shred of it. You make these long posts full of your ideals that may sound convincing, but you have absolutely nothing to back it up. You're not fooling anyone.

Anyone surprised Erdogan copied Trump on this one?

@waahahah: No but you're being stupid. I'm not looking for your past threads. If you can't show it....and apparently you can't.....then man up.

That doesn't show journalistic integrity, managers and higher ups aren't journalist and when their reporting staff gets caught they have to fire them. If the journalist / reporters had integrity they wouldn't be fired. Because NOW there is pressure on them they have to act because... again if there wasn't some legitimacy to Trump's claims the news would be completely in the right here. And they aren't. Even last week there was another false report.

We are talking about main stream media which doesn't include thousands of reporters. I already posted a video of how the main stream media grossly misrepresented facts in Charlottesville. If it wasn't for something like youtube and the internet you wouldn't see the issue with current mainstream media. But the example given you'd be really hard pressed to find ANY news organization reporting accurately on it. I found a random video online detailing specifics along with pointing out that it wasn't just a white supremacists rally. How many news outlets actually gave took the time to understand the groups that were involved, what they stood for, what happens, why the cops stood down or let kids fight in the street.

Already told him that.........he's not dealing with reality though so it's pointless. Nothing but talking points. Maybe Russia has invaded this sight with their bots. I hope so. I can't believe any intelligent human believes trump at this point in time.

Its not in another thread. Its in this thread. So if your not even taking the time to read my responses... alright I see what the problem is, you have no counter evidence so you just want to scream no evidence while providing none to prove me wrong.

You gave me no link. Period. I want to see who your source is. Put up........or shut up. It's that simple.

There's a link but I'm not helping you overcome blatant stupidity, that your gonna have to do your self.

No see how this works is if you make a statement YOU need to support it. You don't have a link......you're trolling. Simple.