The Daily BS • Bo Snerdley Cuts Through It!
The Daily BS • Bo Snerdley Cuts Through It!

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Jon Karl and Steve Scalise take their TV fight to X — then Karl calls in Grok

by

BS BULLETIN:

  • Steve Scalise and ABC’s Jonathan Karl clashed Sunday over President Trump’s ban on CNN, MS NOW and Politico.
  • Scalise argued that Biden had removed press credentials from more than 400 “agencies”; Karl disputed the comparison.
  • Scalise doubled down on X after the interview — so Karl asked Grok to settle it.

What started as a Sunday-show argument between House Majority Leader Steve Scalise and ABC’s Jonathan Karl somehow ended with Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence being summoned as the referee.

Scalise appeared on ABC’s “This Week” Sunday, where Karl asked whether he supported President Donald Trump’s decision to bar CNN, MS NOW and Politico from the White House. Scalise responded by pointing to Trump’s accessibility to reporters and then turned to the Biden administration.

“Joe Biden removed the press credentials from over 400 different agencies,” Scalise said.

Karl immediately challenged him.

“That’s actually not true about Biden,” Karl said.

The ABC host said the roughly 400 figure referred to individual reporters who did not reapply for permanent credentials after the Biden White House changed its requirements, rather than news organizations being banned.

“There was only one that was actually denied a credential,” Karl said. “And all of those who didn’t reapply were allowed to come in.”

“They were removed,” Scalise replied.

“They were not banned from the White House,” Karl shot back. “That did not happen.”

In 2023, the Biden White House introduced new requirements for permanent “hard passes,” including annual renewal, full-time employment with a news organization, a Washington-area address, and recent access to the White House complex.

The number of hard-pass holders subsequently fell from 1,417 to 975 — a decline of about 442. Reporters without permanent passes could still request temporary day passes. That distinction became the center of the Scalise-Karl fight.

But it didn’t end when the cameras stopped rolling. Scalise took the argument to X.

“This morning, ABC tried to claim the Biden White House didn’t cut off press access for over 400 journalists,” he wrote. “The facts say otherwise…”

Scalise included a Fox News graphic carrying the headline: “More than 440 reporters lose press passes after White House changes requirements.”

Karl responded.

“Hey @grok,” Karl wrote, asking the AI chatbot whether it was accurate to say Biden had removed press credentials from more than 400 different agencies.

Grok sided with Karl’s interpretation.

It said the Biden White House had tightened its hard-pass requirements, resulting in approximately 442 fewer permanent passes, but said most affected reporters had simply not reapplied and that only one application had been denied.

Karl wasn’t finished. He asked Grok a follow-up: Was one denied application really “a lot less than 400,” and could reporters without hard passes still request day passes? Grok answered yes to both.

The original argument came as Republicans faced questions about Trump’s much more recent action against three specific news organizations. Trump announced Friday that CNN, MS NOW and Politico would no longer be allowed into the White House, explicitly citing what he described as their false reporting.

Reporters from the three organizations were subsequently denied entry and had their passes revoked. When Karl repeatedly asked Scalise whether he supported Trump’s decision, the Republican leader stopped short of endorsing the ban itself.

“I don’t know why he did it,” Scalise said. “I don’t know what the background is.”

Karl eventually observed that whatever Trump’s previous willingness to take hostile questions, he presumably won’t be getting them from those three organizations inside the White House anytime soon.

MY QUICK TAKE:

We’ve reached a fascinating point in American politics when two grown men argue on national television, continue fighting on X — and eventually one of them yells, essentially, “Fine. Let’s ask the robot.”

DBS WIRE SOURCES:

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