CNN host says Trump loyalist owes broadcaster an apology over video played at Barr hearing

CNN host Jake Tapper has demanded that Republican congressman Jim Jordan apologise for playing an edited video that misleadingly showed reporters describe the George Floyd protests as “peaceful”.

On Tuesday, attorney general William Barr took part in his first congressional hearing since he took the role, and faced questions on topics including his response to the protests and the subsequent deployment of federal law enforcement agents to cities such as Portland, Oregon.

During his opening statement at the hearing in his role as ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, Mr Jordan played a clip that juxtaposed reporters calling the protests “peaceful” with violence at some demonstrations.

The Ohio representative, a vocal supporter of president Donald Trump, thanked Mr Barr for “standing up for the rule of law” with his deployment of the federal agents.

Two of the reporters included in the montage were CNN correspondents Josh Campbell and Dianne Gallagher, whose lengthy reports were edited down to only show them describe the demonstrations as “peaceful protests”.

Speaking at the beginning of his show, State of the Union, on Tuesday, Tapper criticised Mr Jordan and said: “The motive was clearly to show members of the media, including many of my CNN colleagues, calling violent protests ‘peaceful.’

“Congressman Jordan neglected to give the full context of these comments. So my team and I did it for him.”

Tapper then played the two full clips of the correspondents reporting from the scene of the protests, which showed them describe a more balanced version of events.

“This has been the epicentre where there have been largely peaceful protests during the day. At night, sometimes turning violent with these confrontations between protesters and police,” Mr Campbell is heard reporting.

While reporting from the scene of a burnt down building in Minneapolis, Ms Gallagher says: “This is something that we have been seeing here on the streets of Atlanta, mostly peaceful protests since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis.

“And when it was one of their own, that anger, that frustration, that pain simply exploded. And we saw the result of that overnight and into this morning in those protests.”

She adds: “Again, for the most part throughout the day on Saturday, the protests after Rayshard Brooks’ death were peaceful and as it began to get dark, things began to change.”

Protests that broke out last month in Minneapolis quickly spread to the every state across the US following Mr Floyd’s death on 25 May while in the custody of a then Minneapolis police officer.

Demonstrators clashed with police during the protests in opposition to police brutality against African Americans and several cars were damaged and set alight at night, while multiple officers were filmed using excessive force.

Following the clips, Tapper took aim at the representative for Ohio’s 4th Congressional District for failing to show members of the House Judiciary Committee the full context of the reporting.

“So do you understand what congressman Jordan and his team did there?” Tapper said. “Our reporters, Dianne Gallagher and Josh Campbell, as you saw, accurately described the protests as peaceful and then often exploding into something else, including violence at night.

“But congressman Jordan, you just quoted the part of what they said that said ‘peaceful protests’ when that wasn’t the full context. That’s not what they said. They weren’t calling violent protests ‘peaceful.’”

Tapper then directly asked Mr Jordan to apologise, and said: “Congressman Jordan, you did a disservice to them, and more importantly, you did a disservice to the American people and you did a disservice to the truth.

“Congressman Jordan, you owe them and anyone else’s comments you completely misrepresented today on Capitol Hill, you own them an apology. Any person of honour, any person who cares about the truth would do that. I guess we’ll see what you’re gonna do.”

Asked about Tapper’s comments while on Fox News, Mr Jordan defended his actions, saying: “The video speaks for itself.

“You had two reporters in that video saying these are peaceful protests while there’s a building burning in the background, for goodness sake. So we just presented the truth.”

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