Two days ago the Trump Administration demanded the resignations of all remaining Obama-appointed federal prosecutors–including some of those pursuing Wall Street crimes and Russian mobsters–much to the consternation of anti-corruption advocates. Attorney Preet Bharara, who handles financial sector crimes, refused to resign and was fired instead.
Why the sudden demand for all these attorneys to disappear? No one knows for sure, but it’s awfully coincidental that the order came immediately after Fox News host Sean Hannity demanded on his program that the Trump Administration “purge the saboteurs before it’s too late,” referring to Obama appointees. Sean Spicer insisted the next day that the Administration had been planning the purge for a long time, but it stretches belief to say that the two events were not linked.
Meanwhile, yesterday was confirmed that Trump’s explosive claims on Twitter that President Obama personally ordered wiretaps on him were the result of an aide slipping a baseless allegation from a Breitbart article into his reading pile.
Trump has also been tweeting at–and retweeting–Fox and Friends, the notoriously fact-free show that the President apparently watches religiously.
It’s a pattern we’ve seen time and time again from the White House: something happens on cable news or some allegation is made by a disreputable far-right outlet, and the President reacts suddenly and recklessly to it. The government is literally being run by Fox News and Breitbart.
I’ve said it often in the past decade, but it has never been truer than now: Fox News and Breitbart aren’t the media arm of the Republican Party. The Republican Party is the legislative arm of Fox News and Breitbart.
