Filling in for Geoffrey Dickens this week, I’m here to reveal the winner of the Worst Media Quote of the Week. As a refresher, this interactive series is where you – our loyal NewsBusters readers and MRC supporters – have a say as to which elite liberal journalist or deranged celebrity had the hottest take – otherwise known as the worst media quote of the week.
Thank you to all who voted last week via NewsBusters and the MRC’s various social media sites (Facebook, Instagram, X, and Truth Social).
Without any further ado, the results have been tabulated and the winner for the Worst Media Quote of Week is…
Jim Acosta!
The former CNN host-turned-Substacker eeked out a win by only ten points with a declaration on MS NOW that Trump wants to use his remaining years in the White House to jail reporters.
Behind Acosta, Daily Show host Jon Stewart was in second place for his take whining about Trump’s White House Correspondents Dinner performance, and Washington Post writer Phillip Kennicott finished in third place for a story grousing about the Trump administration being akin to other “authoritarian-minded regimes” from history.
Check out the following clip (via the MRC Video team) to see the nominees:
TWEET: https://x.com/theMRC/status/2082893897374552565
WINNER (44 percent of the vote)
Jim Acosta Claims Trump Wants ‘More Reporters In Jail’
“I think they do want to put reporters, more reporters in jail, and they want to make it very difficult for news organizations to tell the truth in this country. I experienced that firsthand. But there’s something sadistic about it - there’s a sadism in this and, that Donald Trump seems, and his people seem to really get off on grinding down the free press in this country. “
— Former CNN anchor Jim Acosta on MS NOW’s The 11th Hour with Ali Velshi, July 23
SECOND PLACE (34 percent of the vote)
Jon Stewart Claims Trump Is Media’s ‘Opponent In That Fight’ For The First Amendment
“I don’t need to see the cops and robbers getting along at a banquet honoring our penal code. You can celebrate the First Amendment without asking your opponent in that fight what he thinks. You already know what he thinks”
— Jon Stewart on Comedy Central’s The Daily Show, July 27
THIRD PLACE (22 percent of the vote)
WashPost’s Phillip Kennicott Compares Trump Administration To “Authoritarian-Minded Regimes”
“Well, I think it’s about controlling how we tell history, whether that’s at the material level of a building or when it comes to the narratives that are intertwined and unfolded in a place like the Smithsonian. Authoritarian-minded regimes have always understood that there is both an material and an intellectual aspect of history. And if you can erase history in the material world, in the built world, you assert great power to actually erase narratives in places like the Smithsonian. And if you have that power, then, of course, you can control the present and the future.”
— Washington Post Culture Critic Phillip Kennicott on PBS News Hour, July 28
