Breitbart Barely Objects to Its Reporter Michelle Fields Getting Manhandled by Trump Campaign Manager

by Dave Blount | March 10, 2016 2:30 pm

Would one their own reporters being assaulted by Trump’s campaign manager be enough to wake up the Trump enablers at Breitbart to the alarmingly thuggish nature of his movement? Apparently not.

Michelle Fields explains what happened to her:

On Tuesday night, I went to cover Donald Trump’s press conference at the Trump National Golf Club in Jupiter, Florida. …

I wasn’t called upon to ask a question during the televised press conference, but afterwards Trump wandered around, stopping at every reporter to take their questions. When he approached me, I asked him about his view on an aspect of affirmative action.

Trump acknowledged the question, but before he could answer I was jolted backwards. Someone had grabbed me tightly by the arm and yanked me down. I almost fell to the ground, but was able to maintain my balance. Nonetheless, I was shaken.

The Washington Post’s Ben Terris immediately remarked that it was Trump’s campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, who aggressively tried to pull me to the ground. I quickly turned around and saw Lewandowski and Trump exiting the building together. No apology. No explanation for why he did this.

Even if Trump was done taking questions, Lewandowski would be out of line. Campaign managers aren’t supposed to try to forcefully throw reporters to the ground, no matter the circumstance. But what made this especially jarring is that there was no hint Trump was done taking questions. No one was pushing him to get away. He seemed to have been happily answering queries from my fellow reporters just a moment before.

Trump has denounced Antonin Scalia for opposing Affirmative Action. Evidently this is a sensitive topic, probably because some of Trump’s most ardent supporters have been tricked into believing that he will defend the interests of whites.

As noted at Patterico’s Pontifications,

Lewandowski is no stranger to hostile behavior on the campaign trail, and Trump is no stranger to condoning it. And it’s not like Fields was a protester that Trump’s plainclothes private intelligence officers had ferreted out and sought to expel from the event.

A witness described the incident as Lewandowski “yanking her down toward the ground like a ragdoll.” Fields was left with a purple bruise the next day.

If an Obama campaign manager had manhandled Fields during the 2012 election, Breitbart would have gone ballistic, and with good reason. Let’s see how they react when the ruffian is a consigliere for the Donald:

The reality television billionaire might also be laying the groundwork for a not-so-brave new world in which a campaign manager can assault a female journalist, while her news organization—in this case the famously Trump-friendly Breitbart News—responds with a mild rebuke in a vague statement perceived by some to be designed to protect the perpetrator. …

“It’s obviously unacceptable that someone crossed a line and made physical contact with our reporter,” said the Breitbart statement, issued under the name of Larry Solov, the outlet’s CEO and president. “What Michelle has told us directly is that someone ‘grabbed her arm’ and while she did not see who it was, Ben Terris of The Washington Post told her that it was Corey Lewandowski. If that’s the case, Corey owes Michelle an immediate apology.”

The statement was issued in the wee hours of Wednesday morning but remains Breitbart’s official comment on the matter, hours after sources said Lewandowski acknowledged to Breitbart’s Washington political editor, Matthew Boyle, that he did manhandle Fields.

Lewandowski’s explanation to Boyle, said these sources, was that he and Fields had never met before and that he didn’t recognize her as a Breitbart reporter, instead mistaking her for an adversarial member of the mainstream media.

Oh, Lewandowski thought she was a mainstream journalist. That’s okay then. Lucky thing for Fields he didn’t use brass knuckles.

The Breitbart statement struck sources within Breitbart and outside the company as strangely inadequate, given that it blames an unidentified “someone,” uses the conditional phrase “if that’s the case,” and leaves open the possibility that Lewandowski didn’t lay hands on Fields.

Apparently Breitbart tipped off the Trump campaign as to the identity of the WaPo reporter, who was scheduled to meet with Lewandowski Wednesday and planned to confront him about the attack. Needless to say, the meeting was canceled.

Breitbart is positioning itself to become for Trump what MSNBC has been for Obama.

Michelle-Fields
Michelle Fields: Left bruised by the Donald’s top goon.

On tips from Torcer. Cross-posted at Moonbattery.

Source URL: https://rightwingnews.com/donald-trump/breitbart-barely-objects-reporter-michelle-fields-getting-manhandled-trump-campaign-manager/