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Fired Fox News political editor calls out 'hype men in the media' who
helped Trump attempt to 'steal an election'
By Oliver Darcy, CNN Business
Updated 12:02 PM ET, Thu January 28, 2021

New York (CNN) — A longtime Fox News politics editor, who was fired by the network earlier this month after angering
former President Donald Trump, rebuked the current state of American media and skewered right-wing
propagandists in a candid opinion piece published Thursday.

Chris Stirewalt, who drew scorn from Trump and his supporters after calling the state of Arizona early on election
night for now-President Joe Biden, did not name Fox News while leveling criticism against the media in his Los
Angeles Times piece. But it was clear that he was referring to the right-wing cable channel throughout his critique.

Stirewalt said the "rebellion on the populist right against the

results of the 2020 election" was a result in part of Trump's
"hype men in the media" who helped him try to "steal an
election or at least get rich trying."

Fox News, which did not respond to a request for comment

on Stirewalt's piece, employs several propagandists in the
roles of hosts or on-air contributors who pushed erroneous
claims of election fraud in the aftermath of the 2020 election.

Star hosts with large platforms and massive viewership, such

Related Article: James Murdoch criticizes
'media property owners' who have 'unleashed
insidious' forces with election denialism
claims
as Sean Hannity, for weeks pushed the belief that the election
had been stolen from Trump.
What's become known as "The Big Lie" culminated in the
January 6 terror attack in which a pro-Trump mob stormed
the Capitol building in an attempted insurrection that turned
deadly.

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Stirewalt wrote that the refusal to believe the election results among many Trump supporters was a "tragic
consequence of the informational malnourishment so badly a icting the nation." LIVE TV

"When I defended the call for Biden in the Arizona election, I became a target of murderous rage from consumers
who were furious at not having their views confirmed," Stirewalt added. "Having been cosseted by self-validating
coverage for so long, many Americans now consider any news that might suggest that they are in error or that their
side has been defeated as an attack on them personally."

In his piece, Stirewalt described the US "as a nation of news consumers both overfed and malnourished."

"Americans gorge themselves daily on empty informational calories, indulging their sugar fixes of self-a rming
half-truths and even outright lies," he wrote.

The Fox News decision desk's call of Arizona came early on election night, generating controversy and infuriating
Trump and his team who attempted to have it reversed.

Jared Kushner, the son-in-law of Trump and a former senior White House o cial, even got in touch with Rupert
Murdoch, the billionaire owner of the network, in an attempt to get Fox News to take back its call.

But the network stood by it, and Stirewalt aggressively defended it on the network's air during election week. The
call, which was questioned by some data wonks for having been made so early, ultimately proved to be correct.
However, earlier this month, Stirewalt was let go from the network he had called home for more than a decade.

Fox News framed firing Stirewalt as part of a larger organizational restructuring. But people familiar with the matter
told The Washington Post that it was due in part to Murdoch believing the network had mishandled its Arizona call.

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