Fox Hosts Give CNN’s Whitfield Benefit of the Doubt on ‘Dumb Mistake’

CNN anchor Fredricka Whitfield now-infamously referred to the actions of the Dallas police HQ gunman as “courageous and brave.” She made an on-air clarification yesterday and apologized today, and on Fox News’ The Five, the hosts largely gave her the benefit of the doubt.

Geraldo Rivera called it a “dumb mistake” that only feeds into certain anti-police narratives, while Eric Bolling suspected a “pattern” of this kind of rhetoric on CNN.

But aside from that, the hosts eased up on her. Kimberly Guilfoyle shot down the suggestion of a pattern, and Dana Perino said sometimes things happen on live TV and it was just “an error in judgment.”

Tom Shillue pointed out that it’s not like she was entirely off-base, arguing she was trying to put those words in a negative context and it just didn’t come out very well.

Watch the video below, via Fox News:

[image via screengrab]

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Follow Josh Feldman on Twitter: @feldmaniac

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