CBS News has pushed back against former President Trump’s claim that “60 Minutes” fraudulently edited his interview with Vice President Kamala Harris, dismissing the claim as “false” in a statement released Sunday.
After weeks of staying mum despite growing backlash over the interview, CBS released a statement Sunday night addressing the furor that followed after airing two different answers to the same question in a “60 Minutes” interview earlier this month with the Democratic nominee.
“Former President Donald Trump is accusing 60 Minutes of fraudulently editing our October 7 interview with Vice President Kamala Harris. This is false,” the statement began.
“60 Minutes provided an excerpt of our interview to ‘Face the Nation’ that used a longer portion of her response than she did on 60 Minutes. Same question. Same answer. But another part of the answer. When editing any interview, be it a politician, athlete or movie star, we strive to be clear, precise and accurate. Her response portion on 60 Minutes was more concise, allowing time for other subjects in an expansive 21-minute segment.
The statement then reminds readers that former President Trump “withdrew from his interview with ’60 Minutes,’ and the vice president attended.” The Trump campaign denied ever formally accepting the interview invitation.
“Our longstanding invitation to former President Trump remains open,” the statement continued. “If he would like to discuss the issues facing the nation and the Harris interview, we would be happy to have him on 60 Minutes.”
CBS News has not yet released an unedited video or full transcript of the interview.
The Trump campaign responded to CBS News’ statement, continuing its call for the network to release the transcript.
“60 Minutes just admitted they did exactly what President Trump accused them of doing. They edited in a different answer – from another part of her answer – to make Kamala Harris sound less incoherent than she actually was. “Their statement is not a denial, it’s an admission that they did exactly what they were accused of,” the Trump campaign said. “This is another reminder of how hopelessly biased 60 Minutes is and how right President Trump was to decline their invitation to submit to fake news hacking. Release the transcript!”
The statement comes hours after Trump called for the interview to be taken off the air during a heated interview with Fox News’ Howard Kurtz.
“I have never seen anything like this. She gave a terrible, incompetent answer on a news program … and so she gives an answer that shows she’s dumb or incompetent or something is wrong with her,” Trump said earlier Sunday. “It’s so bad that the people at CBS are saying we’re going to do a little edit… They take the whole funny answer, and it was a long answer, and replace it with a much shorter answer that you had to do with a completely different subject’s answer, which also didn’t make sense, but wasn’t quite as incompetent.”
CBS News has come under fire in recent days for airing two different answers to the same question in its “60 Minutes” interview earlier this month with Harris.
Harris was mocked by conservatives when footage of her offering a lengthy “word salad” aired on CBS’ “Face the Nation” to promote the “60 Minutes” sit-down, when Bill Whitaker asked why she looked like Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. was not listening to the US.
However, the vice president’s lengthy response did not make the version that aired Monday night on “60 Minutes,” and Harris’ shorter response to the same question appeared instead.
The Center for American Rights, also known as CAR, argued that the discrepancies “amount to intentional distortion of the news — a violation of FCC rules governing broadcasters’ public interest obligations” and formally complained to the FCC.
Former President Trump called for CBS to lose its broadcast license last week, writing in Social Truth, “A giant fake news scam by CBS & 60 Minutes.
“Her real answer was crazy, OR dumb, so they actually replaced it with another answer in order to save her or at least make it look better. A FAKE NEWS FAKE, which is completely illegal,” he charged.
“CBS LICENSED,” he continued. “Interference in elections. She is a moron and the fake news media wants to hide that fact. An unprecedented scandal!!! The Dems forced them to do this and should they be forced to accept the election? WOW!”
Trump further attacked the liberal network during a speech at the Economic Club of Detroit.
“The next big news is the fraud perpetrated by ’60 Minutes’ and CBS along with the Democratic Party, working with them, that will go down as the single biggest scandal in the history of broadcasting, I predict,” Trump said. .
Fox News’ Brian Flood, Joseph A. Wulfsohn and Taylor Penley contributed to this report.
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