NBC's Meet the Press “Regrets” It “Inaccurately” Alleged Flynn Exoneration Was Political

NBC's Meet the Press “Regrets” It “Inaccurately” Alleged Flynn Exoneration Was Political

President Donald Trump blasted NBC’s Chuck Todd of “Meet the Press,” after the show aired a clip on Sunday showing Attorney General Bill Barr apparently painting the exoneration of Rhode Island native General Michael Flynn as political - but failing to show Barr's whole statement, where he stood by what he said was the judicial merit of the decision. 

“President Trump called for Chuck Todd, host of NBC's “Meet the Press,” to be fired after the program issued an apology for “inadvertently and inaccurately” cutting short a clip of remarks made by Attorney General William Barr about former national security adviser Michael Flynn,” reported The Hill.

The clip NBC played showed CBS reporter Catherine Herridge asking Barr how history might view his efforts to dismiss charges against Flynn.

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'Well, history's written by the winners. So it largely depends on who's writing the history,' Barr replied. 

Todd on the show said he was struck by "the cynicism of the answer."

"It's a correct answer. But he's the attorney general. He didn't make the case that he was upholding the rule of law," Todd said. 'He was almost admitting that, yeah, this is a political job."

In an extended clip, shown in full by CBS News, Barr is seen responding with further justification of his actions.

"Well, history is written by the winners. So it largely depends on who's writing the history. But I think a fair history would say that it was a good decision because it upheld the rule of law," said Barr. "It helped, it upheld the standards of the Department of Justice, and it undid what was an injustice."

Trump, DOJ Blast Todd

In a tweet blasting Todd late Sunday, Trump wrote: "Sleepy Eyes Chuck Todd should be FIRED by 'Concast' (NBC) for this fraud.”

"He knew exactly what he was doing. Public Airwaves = Fake News!" Trump added, while also tagging the official Twitter accounts for the Federal Communications Commission and its chairman, Ajit Pai, in the message.

Morever, Trump’s tweet came after the Department of Justice slammed the Sunday morning news program for deceptively editing the clip. 

“Very disappointed by the deceptive editing/commentary by @ChuckTod on @MeetThePress on AG Barr’s CBS interview,” said Barr’s spokesperson Kerri Kupec. 

“Compare the two transcripts below. Not only did the AG make the case in the VERY answer Chuck says he didn’t, he also did so multiple times throughout the interview.”

SEE COMPARISON BELOW

"Meet the Press" later responded with the following Tweet:

"You’re correct. Earlier today, we inadvertently and inaccurately cut short a video clip of an interview with AG Barr before offering commentary and analysis. The remaining clip included important remarks from the attorney general that we missed, and we regret the error.”