The Don-ning of a new age of deception
Call them what you will — whoppers, untruths, lies — but casual falsehoods have been the hallmark of President Trump’s young political career. The latest example came Saturday when White House press secretary Sean Spicer berated journalists for “deliberately false reporting” on the underwhelming attendance for Trump’s inauguration. Spicer’s error-ridden diatribe — on his first day in the taxpayer-funded job — came after hundreds of thousands of demonstrators took to the streets in Washington, New York and elsewhere to protest Trump.
Such bald-faced deception is the new reality under the Trump administration. Whereas every President for the past century has attempted to mold public opinion by spinning information, taking messages directly to voters and selectively curtailing press access, Trump obstructs a fact-based debate like none of his predecessors. With seemingly shameless fibs, big and small, the President and his aides have served to cast doubt on the very notion of objective truth.
Take Trump’s years of lies about former President Barack Obama’s birthplace. Or his repeated assertions that he initially opposed the Iraq War. Or his claims of widespread voter fraud. The list goes on; the press corps’ fact-checkers continue working overtime.
Spicer’s easily disprovable statement Saturday was a minor fabrication, but such behavior is more ominous now that Trump is in power. The public needs accurate information to make informed political decisions. The new government, meanwhile, is already showing a willingness to make that task more difficult.
Kellyanne Conway, Trump’s campaign strategistturned-TV-spin doctor, explained Sunday on “Meet the Press” that Spicer was merely offering “alternative facts” about the inaugural turnout. The phrasing carries more than a whiff of propaganda.
Trump’s seeming imperviousness to being caught in a lie stems largely from a fragmented and increasingly partisan media environment. Though newspapers and networks often call out his falsehoods, the reality TV star can tweet directly to his huge social media audience and let right-wing media mouthpieces do the rest of the work. Digital filter bubbles and the press’ historically low levels of public trust work in tandem to further buffer Trumpworld from true facts.
The new administration has every right to contest incorrect or unfair coverage. But Trump and his staff have gone a step beyond, using their bully pulpit to paint a monolithic “crooked media” as an oppositional force.
Increasing partisanship makes such attacks particularly effective. The new dynamic fomented seemingly endless handwringing by the mainstream media during the campaign. Now, they must ready themselves and the public for four years of such misinformation, not only by calling out falsehoods early and often in individual stories, but also contextualizing them within Trump’s long history of actively distorting facts.
This weekend’s episode is no doubt the first of many such collision points between a diminished news media and the President it’s tasked with holding to account. While it’s in Trump’s interest to delegitimize the press, however, it’s in the public’s to fight against efforts to delegitimize the truth.