Fox News reporter Peter Doocy called out the double standard on rhetoric in a question to White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre.
During Tuesday’s press briefing, Doocy asked President Joe Biden’s spokesperson about the use of the term “bloodbath” by Biden versus former President Donald Trump, who triggered his critics when he used the word in a rally to describe what’s coming in the auto industry.
“Does the White House believe that there is a bloodbath taking place or a wave of migrant crime?” Doocy asked Jean-Pierre.
The press secretary responded by gushing about how important immigrants are to “the fabric of this country.”
“And we’ve always called out any, if there is any form of violence that could be caused by one person, right, that we may have seen, we call that out as well,” she said. “But in this instance, it is used to — in the way that this violent rhetoric is being used, it is being used to tear our country apart.”
Doocy then asked for a “clarification.”
“So when Donald Trump is talking about a bloodbath, it is violent rhetoric. What was it when Joe Biden said in 2020, what we can’t let happen is let this primary become a negative bloodbath?” he asked.”So I’m going to be really mindful and careful about Donald Trump, but if you read, because he is a candidate, we’re talking about a 2024 election, you should read what he said in its context. So you got to read what he said in context,” Jean-Pierre replied.
“I’m just saying, bloodbath is an ugly word when Trump uses it, what is it when Biden uses it?” Doocy pressed as the press secretary complained about his “disingenuous” query.
“No, no, no. Let’s be very clear. You got to actually ask me the question in context of what it was said, right? And what was said when he said that, right, in his remarks, in his speech, right? And so that’s being disingenuous in your question,” she shot back.
Doocy pointed out he was reading a “direct quote” from Biden as Jean-Pierre continued her verbal gymnastics.
“He was talking about a group of people, a group of people. That’s what he’s talking about. What the president was talking about during the primary was not to allow it to be the words and the primary and that election to become negative, two different things. They’re not the same. They’re not the same and your question is disingenuous,” she repeated.
Jean-Pierre continued by finding a way to tie it all back to Trump and the January 6 events at the Capitol.
“And so look, I’m going to be really mindful here. I’ve got to be really careful. We have to denounce violent rhetoric, which wherever it comes from, a former leader, we have to denounce that because we saw what happened on January 6th,” she said.
“We saw what happened there. When you have a mob of 2,000 people go to the Capitol because they didn’t believe in the free and fair election that just happened months prior, because of violent rhetoric, you got to denounce that,” she concluded.
Trump had called out the media and other critics last month for the way they portrayed his “bloodbath” remark.
“The Fake News Media, and their Democrat Partners in the destruction of our Nation, pretended to be shocked at my use of the word BLOODBATH, even though they fully understood that I was simply referring to imports allowed by Crooked Joe Biden, which are killing the automobile industry,” he wrote on Truth Social.
