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Fox News labelled US president Joe Biden a “wannabe dictator” who attempted to have “his political rival arrested” during a live broadcast of Donald Trump’s post-arraignment speech.
The network was the only major cable news network to carry Mr Trump’s Tuesday evening speech live, with CNN and MSNBC choosing not to air the address.
Towards the end of the speech, viewers were presented with a split screen carrying a separate speech from Mr Biden at the White House. Below the image, the news caption read: “wannabe dictator speaks at the White House after having his political rival arrested”.
The text remained on screen until Sean Hannity came to air at 9pm.
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During his speech, Mr Trump claimed he was the victim of political “persecution”, baselessly accused Mr Biden of directing efforts to prosecute him and said Mr Biden was “the most corrupt president in the history of the United States”.
Mr Trump has been both impeached and indicted twice, and is currently under investigation for election interference.
In explaining the decision not to broadcast the speech live, CNN news anchor Jake Tapper told viewers, “frankly [Trump] says a lot of things that are not true and sometimes potentially dangerous.”
Similar comments were made by MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow who said “there is a cost to us as a new organisation to knowingly broadcast untrue things.”
“We are here to bring you the news,” Ms Maddow said. “It hurts our ability to do that if we live broadcast what we fully expect in advance to be a litany of lies and false accusations, no matter who says them.”
Earlier Mr Trump attended a courthouse in Florida where he pleaded not guilty to 37 counts of concealing materials containing national secrets, including 31 violations of the Espionage Act.
The former president was released on bond on the condition he would not discuss the case with a list of witness.
These are not his only legal troubles, with a grand jury in Manhattan voting to indict Mr Trump last month over hush many payments made to Stormy Daniels.
Mr Trump and his campaign managers are also being investigated in Fulton county, Georgia, over allegations they illegally meddled in the 2020 elections in the state. – Guardian