The host of Univision’s upcoming city corridor with former President Donald Trump needed to beforehand defend his 2023 interview with the presidential candidate after liberals criticized it for being too “smooth.”
Univision’s Enrique Acevedo is ready to host two city halls, one with Trump on Oct. 8 and the opposite with Vice President Kamala Harris on Oct. 10. Acevedo beforehand interviewed Trump in November 2023 for greater than an hour, asking about 40 questions, however confronted harsh criticism from Democrats and the media for failing to reality test the previous president in what they known as a “softball” interview.
Following the interview, longtime Democrat operative Maria Cardona reacted to the interview, saying the community had labored to “masks the pernicious and harmful politics that Donald Trump goes to implement if he turns into president once more.” Raul A. Reyes, a contributor to NBC Latino and CNN Opinion, argued that the “softball” interview was a betrayal of its Latino viewers. Democratic California State Sen. Susan Rubio told the Los Angeles Instances that she was “appalled” that Acevedo let Trump “proceed to spew lies and go unchecked.”
Amid the backlash, Acevedo wrote an op-ed in The Washington Publish in protection of his interview — which he famous was the primary with a present or former Republican president on the community in 22 years.
“Amid intense partisanship with clearly delineated camps, my interview with Trump wasn’t crafted to persuade Democrats or my colleagues within the press that Trump is an unsuitable selection. As a substitute, its objective was to afford conservative Latinos the chance to listen to immediately from him with out confrontation or hostility,” Acevedo wrote.
Acevedo responded to different critiques relating to his lack of reality checking through the interview.
“Some critics argue that tactic allowed Trump to repeat false claims in regards to the 2020 election, the character of his authorized points and President Biden’s repute. No, I didn’t fact-check statements reside which have already been debunked repeatedly, and have been debunked once more after our dialog aired; what would have been the purpose in blowing up the dialog to take action? I might have turn into a protagonist as a substitute of letting related info serve that function,” he wrote. The Univision host added that he believes confrontation in interviews has its downsides.
Within the 2024 election cycle, Trump and Harris have noticeably completely different media methods. Harris waited till greater than a month into her presidential marketing campaign earlier than she had her first sit-down interview. For her first sit-down, which was with CNN’s Dana Bash, Harris was accompanied by her operating mate, Democratic Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz. (RELATED: Harris Fails To Explain Flip-Flops, Says She Has No Regrets About Biden In First Interview)
Since, the vp has caught to performing some rare native media appearances although doing her first nationwide sit-down interview with MSNBC’s Stephanie Ruhle, who defended Harris’s lack of “clear and direct solutions.” (RELATED: ‘Witness Protection’: Media-Friendly Tim Walz Has Disappeared From Airwaves Since Joining Harris Ticket)
Trump, by comparability, has made a wide range of media appearances, frequently doing podcasts and interviews. Each Harris and Trump sat down for an interview with the Nationwide Affiliation of Black Journalists, however whereas the vp confronted a pleasant crowd of journalists who requested her in regards to the significance of pleasure to her marketing campaign, the previous president walked right into a extra hostile and tense spherical of questioning.
The city halls come as Trump and Harris aren’t anticipated to take the controversy stage once more. The 2 confronted off Sept. 10 on ABC Information, throughout which the moderators solely reality checked Trump and failed to right Harris all through the controversy.
“I consider as journalists, we’re uniquely chargeable for elevating the dialog, reducing by means of the noise and offering a platform for views that query even our preconceptions. That is significantly essential in an period marked by polarization and traditionally diminished public belief within the information media,” Acevedo wrote in 2023 in protection of his interview. “True journalistic integrity lies not in sensationalism, however in fostering an area for numerous views to be explored, providing the viewers a deeper examination of important actors past the confines of public caricature.”
