Dan Abrams Calls Out Fox News Hosts For ‘Smear’ of Capitol Police: ‘From Back the Blue to Bash the Blue’

NewsNation host and Mediaite founder Dan Abrams called out Fox News on Wednesday over the network’s top hosts going after the FBI and U.S. Capitol Police.

Abrams introduced the segment by examining a claim from Rep. Troy Nehls (R-TX) that Capitol Police illegally entered his congressional office multiple times in November. Multiple Fox News hosts accused the Capitol Police of “spying” on the congressman.

U.S. Capitol Police Chief Thomas Manger said in a statement that the officer was carrying out a security check on an office that was left open.

“Turn on Fox News these days and you’re likely to see the Capitol Police or the FBI being thoroughly excoriated by the network’s hosts and contributors,” Abrams said Wednesday on Dan Abrams Live. “Yesterday, a claim from a Republican congressman that the Capitol Police spied on him, a claim that was made without any evidence. It gave Fox News personalities a golden opportunity to bash the people who put their lives on the line every day to protect our country’s lawmakers.”

Abrams — the former host of Live PD who hosts a segment on his show each night highlighting the dangers police officers face — aired a montage that included Fox News host Jesse Watters echoing the baseless allegation that “Capitol Hill police officers have been caught illegally spying on members of Congress.”

The montage showed American Greatness senior writer Julie Kelly on The Ingraham Angle on Tuesday accusing Capitol Police of “snooping around Capitol Hill, trying to collect what they think is going to be damaging information against Republicans.”

A soundbite also played of Fox News host Tucker Carlson saying that “Since Jan. 6, the Capitol Hill police force has been subverted by Nancy Pelosi, who oversees it and Joe Biden, the new president, to become a kind of secret police force that acts on behalf of the Democratic Party. Think we’re overstating that? We’re not.”

Abrams noted that such attacks by Fox News hosts mark a shift in how the network has previously covered the police.

“Suddenly Fox is the ACLU,” Abrams said. “All of that police hate was just one day on Fox News. Now they can try to link it to Nancy Pelosi all they want. But what they’re really doing is accusing all of the men and women who serve and protect being part of a ‘secret police force that is engaging in un-American and almost certainly illegal conduct.’ So they’re basically accusing the cops of being dirty, corrupt.”

He called the commentary “a disgusting smear of brave people who put their lives on the line every day.”

Abrams noted that despite such criticism, law enforcement personnel overall lean conservative. He also noted that the criticism of law enforcement from Fox News hosts can be traced by to conservative disdain for the FBI’s investigation of former President Donald Trump’s ties to Russia.

Abrams added that “if seems if they can score some cheap political points, some on Fox News will go from ‘back the blue’ to ‘bash the blue.’”

“I’ll say what I say every time someone — usually on the left — goes after police on the whole,” he concluded. “Yes there are some bad officers and they need to be held accountable. But please do not impugn an entire community. And today I say that to the Fox News hosts and guests who are going after the nation’s cops now.”

Watch above, via NewsNation.