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For years, ABC News was one of the most trusted names in news. Every day, millions of people tuned in and trusted anchors like Peter Jennings, Diane Sawyer, Bob Woodruff, and David Muir tell them the top stories of the day in an unbiased and factual manner. Unfortunately, as the country continued to become more and more politically divided, some people’s trust in ABC News went down.
Despite the struggles that the mainstream media is facing, especially with the current administration, Good Morning America and its anchors — Robin Roberts, George Stephanopoulos, Michael Strahan, and Lara Spencer — continue to be one of the top and most trusted morning news shows.
Credit: Video Screenshot, ‘Good Morning America’, ABC
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In March 2024, George Stephanopoulos interviewed South Carolina Congresswoman Nancy Mace. During the interview, Mr. Stephanopoulos said that Trump had been found “liable for rape” by a jury. However, the jury had actually found Mr. Trump liable for sexual abuse — and the two are not always considered the same in the eyes of the law, depending on the state.
Donald Trump was enraged by what Mr. Stephanopoulos said and filed a defamation lawsuit against The Walt Disney Company and ABC News. Many experts felt that ABC News had a strong case and would likely win the lawsuit. But in a stunning last-minute decision, Disney CEO Bob Iger decided to settle the lawsuit before it went to court.
Disney and ABC ended up agreeing to pay $15 million toward Donald Trump’s Presidential fund and $1 million in legal fees. The $15 million is expected to go towards Trump’s Presidential Library.
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Mr. Stephanopoulos never appeared publicly concerned about the lawsuit or the subsequent settlement, even though his contract at ABC was on the line. Shortly after the lawsuit was settled, ABC renewed his contract, cementing their belief that, despite the trouble, Mr. Stephanopoulos was one of the most important anchors they had.
Mr. Stephanopoulos was reportedly “blind sided” by Iger’s decision to settle the lawsuit. But that did not stop him from signing the new contract and sticking with the network. Details about the contract were not shared publicly, so we do not know the length of the contract extension or how much Mr. Stephanopoulos will be getting paid.
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If Mr. Stephanopoulos didn’t seem bothered when the lawsuit was settled, he seems even less bothered now. And he is back on the air, calling out Donald Trump and his administration for its sketchy business dealings.
On his show, This Week With George Stephanopoulos, the anchor took the administration to task for using its political leverage — like pardons and fundraisers — to make the Trump family millions of dollars.
“The scale is staggering. Donald Trump and his family are making hundreds of millions, potentially billions of dollars, as Trump and his administration are taking official actions that benefit contributors and investors. Just this week, we learned of pardons to tax cheats, including a man whose mother was pardoned just weeks after she attended a million-dollar-a-head fundraiser for the president, the Trump media and technology group, raising $2.5 billion dollars from 50 institutional investors whose identities have not been disclosed.”
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He also noted that lawsuits filed by Mr. Trump and investigations were ended when the companies gave Mr. Trump or his political allies things that they wanted. Stephanopoulos pointed specifically to a lawsuit that was dropped by the SEC against the cryptocurrency firm Binance. The lawsuit was dropped just days after the firm began selling currency from World Liberty Financial — a company started by the Trump family.
Mr. Stephanopoulos cited an article from political commentator David Frum and said:
“‘Nothing like this has been attempted or even imagined in the history of the American presidency,’ he writes. ‘Throw away the history books, discard feeble comparisons to scandals of the past … The brazenness resembles nothing seen in any earlier White House. This is American corruption on the scale of a post-Soviet republic or a post-colonial African dictatorship.’ That’s where we begin this week.”
Credit: Video Screenshot, ‘Good Morning America’, ABC
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Trump has not yet commented on what Mr. Stephanopoulos said, but with the long-standing animosity between the two, it wouldn’t be surprising to see him voice his displeasure on his social media platform.
Mr. Trump has no qualms about attacking the media and its legitimacy and filing lawsuits when they do things that he does not like.
Do you think that the media needs to continue to call out the sketchy (and possibly illegal) behavior happening in the Trump administration? Is it crucial for the media to hold the administration to task, especially in this day and age? Let us know your thoughts in the comments!
Yes he needs to be called out an held accountable if O’bama or Biden did even one of the things he has done there would have been overwhelming outrage! Something has to be done to stop this nightmare.
It would have been really nice if good old Georgie had called out a corrupt Biden administration… how many illegals do we have running around in our country right now? Give me a break, Stephanopolos got caught with his pants down ( no proof) and Iger had to bail him out! I love it!