Richard Lui

Democratic State Senator Charges Racism at Play in Ohio Early Voting Decision; MSNBC's Lui Fails to Challenge Her
By Ken Shepherd | September 17, 2012 | 12:39 PM EDT

All this week during the 11 a.m. Eastern MSNBC Live program, "we're going to look at the ballot battles that could decide the race for the White House," MSNBC's Richard Lui noted today as he set up a segment with two liberal opponents of voter ID laws -- "wired into the concerns of minority voters" -- Ohio State Senator Nina Turner (D) and Common Cause staff counsel Stephen Spaulding.

Although Lui briefly quoted from two officials for True the Vote, a conservative anti-voter fraud group that supports voter ID laws, he failed to bring on any representatives of the group, even though Turner was there to rail against what she sees as the racist motives behind the Ohio Secretary of State's move to cut back on in-person voting hours.

MSNBC's Lui Allows Guest to Mislead Viewers on Texas Voter ID Law's Implications for Black Students
By Ken Shepherd | July 9, 2012 | 4:59 PM EDT

Update (July 10, 2:57 p.m. EDT): Lui responds via Twitter (see bottom of post for full update).

MSNBC continued this morning to misrepresent the implications of Texas’s voter ID laws, which don’t permit college or university student IDs as valid photo identification for voting in the Lone Star State. During his appearance on MSNBC Live in the 11 a.m. Eastern hour, Ryan Haygood of the NAACP Legal and Educational Fund insisted to substitute host Richard Lui that his organization represents black students “who attend Prairie View A&M and Texas Southern University, who previously used the only form of photo ID that they had, student ID” to vote.

Since those IDs are no longer allowed, “Texas’s laws are discriminatory,” Haygood argued.  For his part, Lui failed to bring on a guest to defend Texas’s law nor did he challenge any of Haygood’s assertions. But a little bit of skepticism and a few minutes of Web searching would have shown Lui that Haygood’s assertion was malarkey, because to get a student ID at the colleges Haygood mentioned, a student needs to have a photo ID in the first place.

MSNBC Touts Sen. McCain's Conceding There's a 'War on Women,' Grants Softball Interview to Activist Hoping to Silence Limbaugh
By Ken Shepherd | March 19, 2012 | 4:15 PM EDT

Republican senator and 2008 GOP presidential nominee John McCain's passing concession yesterday to Meet the Press host David Gregory that there is in fact a "war on women among Republicans" was the perfect springboard for MSNBC's Richard Lui to conduct a softball interview with former Planned Parenthood president Gloria Feldt.  Lui, substitute hosting the March 19 edition of Chris Jansing Reports, introduced the segment with the relevant clip of McCain, noting that the feminist author had gone "toe-to-toe" with McCain on social issues and that "this was a change."

Feldt enthused that she was happy to see the old John McCain back, recalling fondly that the first time she met the senator, his rhetoric was more socially liberal. "His instincts were to say women should have the right to make their own child-bearing decisions." That said, Feldt made sure to denounce McCain for having "a 100 percent anti-choice, anti-family planning voting record."

MSNBC Shows Uncensored Bare-Breasted Women at Occupy Wall Street
By Kyle Drennen | November 17, 2011 | 3:50 PM EST

At the top of the 10 a.m. Eastern hour on MSNBC on Thursday, MSNBC aired uncensored taped footage of two topless women at the Occupy Wall Street protest in lower Manhattan. Fill-in anchor Richard Lui made no mention of the explicit images as he talked to correspondent Mara Schiavocampo about the protest. (h/t TVNewser)

Back in July, NBC's Today did an entire segment on why Americans are obsessed with breasts. Images of breasts were then shown a total of 54 times on the highest rated morning news broadcast.

MSNBC's Tamron Hall, Andrea Mitchell Omit Potential Jobs Lost Thanks to Obama's Oil Pipeline Punt
By Ken Shepherd | November 11, 2011 | 6:10 PM EST

MSNBC daytime host Tamron Hall failed to use the J-word -- jobs -- in alerting MSNBC viewers today of President Obama's decision to delay his decision on authorizing the proposed Keystone oil pipeline.

Noting the story on the 2 p.m. Eastern NewsNation program, Hall described the "massive oil pipeline" project as "controversial" because it would run through "an environmentally-sensitive area in Nebraska." As such, Hall added, President Obama wants to explore "other possible routes." Meanwhile "digging is on hold, likely until after the presidential election."

Four hours earlier on Chris Jansing Reports, substitute host Richard Lui very briefly noted that "critics claim the delay will cost the U.S. some 20,000 new jobs." There was no reference to the fact that many of those critics are Democrat-friendly labor unions.

MSNBC's Religious Expert Excoriates 'Radical,' 'Theocratic' Christians Like Bachmann Who 'Hate' America
By Scott Whitlock | July 6, 2011 | 4:48 PM EDT

In a segment on the religiosity of Michele Bachmann and Rick Perry, MSNBC's Richard Lui on Wednesday looked to an author who has smeared conservative Christians as "radical," weird individuals who "hate" America.

The guest host for Martin Bashir interviewed Frank Schaeffer, a blogger on the liberal Huffington Post website and also a constant critic of the religious right. Schaeffer, the son of a conservative theologian, excoriated conservatives: "But, I came to understand that these people actually hate the United States as it is."

Guest Sees 'Civil War' Over Abortion and Pro-Lifers Akin to Tiller Killer, MSNBC's Lui Silent
By Alex Fitzsimmons | April 12, 2011 | 5:41 PM EDT

Robert Redford’s period piece on the assassination of Abraham Lincoln hits theaters Friday, but one author who was featured on MSNBC thinks America is embroiled in a modern day “civil war” over abortion.

On the April 12 edition of “Martin Bashir,” fill-in anchor Richard Lui failed to challenge Stephen Singular, author of “The Wichita Divide,” on the illogical connection he drew between the man who killed Dr. George Tiller, who was known for providing late-term abortions, and pro-life advocates who are pushing to de-fund Planned Parenthood.

MSNBC Passes Off Environmental Alarmist, Anti-Nuclear Activist As Expert on Food Safety, Radiation
By Ken Shepherd | March 31, 2011 | 4:23 PM EDT

Filling in for Martin Bashir on his eponymous program on Thursday, MSNBC's Richard Lui treated viewers to an alarmist environmentalist's take on news of trace amounts of radioactive iodine being detected in milk from cows in two West Coast states. It's believed the radiation is linked to the failed Fukushima Daiichi plant in Japan.

After noting that the Environmental Protection Agency has said the levels are "far below an amount that would be considered dangerous," Lui introduced Damon Moglen of Friends of the Earth (FOE), asking him "What do you think of what we're hearing right now with milk being affected?"

The FOE climate and energy project director jumped straight in with his talking points:

MSNBC Anchor Paddles Catholic School Over Corporal Punishment
By Matt Hadro | February 28, 2011 | 5:59 PM EST

MSNBC's Richard Lui questioned and generally disagreed with a St. Augustine High School alum who supported the school's 60 year tradition of corporal punishment – paddling – in a story MSNBC apparently thinks merits national attention.

CNN Portray Their 'Gary and Tony' as Homosexual 'Role Models'
By Matthew Balan | June 21, 2010 | 6:29 PM EDT
CNN conducted two softball interviews with the subjects of their upcoming slanted documentary, "Gary and Tony Have a Baby," on Sunday and Monday. The network sympathized with the same-sex couple, hinting they were "role models" for the homosexual community, and made little effort to hide that they were advancing the agenda of homosexual activists.

Anchor Don Lemon interviewed the two just before the bottom of the 7 pm Eastern hour on Sunday's Newsroom program. Before turning to his guests, Lemon played a three-minute clip from the documentary about "how one couple tries to redefine what it means to be a family" and what CNN billed as a "new American family" (see video at right), focusing on the young woman who donated 14 of her eggs so the couple could have one child via in-vitro fertilization and a surrogate mother. Near the end of clip, the "Tony" of the documentary, Tony Brown, spoke emotionally of how the egg donor, named Holly, "gets that she's giving us this incredible gift, and it's pretty amazing." The CNN anchor replied in agreement: "pretty amazing and very emotional."