Vinay Menon: CNN giving Donald Trump a town hall is a nightmare for journalism

CNN can’t quit Donald Trump.

It’s an abusive relationship. The former president has ridiculed the network as “fake news” more times than Paris Hilton has purred, “That’s hot.” Trump once retweeted a meme in which “CNN” appeared in blood on the sole of his shoe. He shared a video in which he body slams “CNN” outside a wrestling ring.

This liar honestly hates CNN. Yet, CNN longs for his love.

On Wednesday, the network will pretend all past black eyes came from walking into a door. Trump will make his first appearance since 2016. He will field queries from Republican primary voters in New Hampshire. The “town hall,” moderated by Kaitlan Collins, is CNN’s latest gambit to reverse a ratings free fall.

If that’s the only impetus, give CNN points for offering Trump, as he wrote Tuesday on Truth Social, “a deal I couldn’t refuse!!!” Details were not disclosed. But don’t be stunned if Wolf Blitzer is ordered to don a red cap and moonlight this summer as Trump’s caddy: “Mr. President, shall I kiss your putter for good luck?”

Speaking of red, CNN also smells blood in the cable waters. The sudden and still unexplained firing of Tucker Carlson by Fox News has given CNN something it has not felt in years: hope. Conservatives are boycotting Fox. The network is now in a race with Bud Light to see who can lose the most customers the fastest.

Fox is feeling something it has not felt in years: vulnerable.

But if ratings are not the only consideration, CNN’s decision to air a town hall with Donald Trump amounts to journalistic amnesia. CNN? Based on your past coverage, I thought Trump was a pathological liar, charlatan, criminal conspiracist and existential threat to democracy. What’s next? A CNN town hall with Vladimir Putin?

This is not a shot at Ms. Collins. She is a mere 31 in human years but about 150 in political savvy. She is as sharp as a Ginsu. She has perfect recall. She knows the file, as we say in this business. But not even GPT-4 could moderate this debate in real time.

Trump breathes in oxygen and exhales lies. He cuts off people more than a drunk driver in Belarus. He lives in a fantasyland where his ego writes the laws while the rocks in his head rewrite history.

He is an unreliable narrator saddled with disfiguring narcissism.

That may make for good TV. But, unchecked, it is a nightmare for journalism.

CNN will argue this “event” is newsworthy since Trump is the Republican presidential front-runner. A Washington Post-ABC News poll this week found Trump would trounce Joe Biden by seven points in a hypothetical 2024 rematch. While political polling is not exactly an exact science, Trump is defying the odds by grabbing the GOP by the p-y.

The man is a force of nature. An evil force, in my opinion. But his fans do not care about his actions. Rape allegations, criminal indictments, impeachment, more looming charges, the red hats are unbothered. This lunatic broke the most sacred covenant of American democracy — the peaceful transfer of power. But the red hats lapped up his Big Lie and now many are in jail for insurrecting. He spent his presidency watching cable news under a spray-tan nozzle, mean tweeting and then hitting the links. His daily briefings were pictures because he has the attention span of a fruit fly. But the red hats love that he’s not a snooty elite into book learnin’ or actual governance. Trump could auction off America’s nuclear codes and the red hats would blame Hunter Biden’s laptop. Trump makes libs cry and that makes them laugh.

The red hats are in a doomsday cult. They can’t be helped.

But CNN should know better. There is a difference between covering Trump and giving him cover. Unless fact-checker Daniel Dale is onstage Wednesday at Saint Anselm College and ready to bang a gong every time Trump lets fly with a whopper, this town hall is a slap in the face to every CNN journalist who documented the ex-president’s grifts, incompetence, malevolence, mendacity and violation of all norms and decency.

CNN spent years telling viewers Trump was unfit to lead a Shake Shack, let alone the free world. But that grim proclamation is now null and void if he can get them boffo ratings? Give your head a shake, CNN. You argued Trump tried to steal the 2020 election. Now you are offering him a showcase in advance of the 2024 election?

Isn’t that like giving an arsonist a flame-thrower?

On Tuesday, Trump did something once unimaginable: he urged supporters to watch CNN. It was like seeing Wendel Clark in a Panthers jersey. As Trump wrote: “Could be the beginning of a New & Vibrant CNN, with no more Fake News, or it could turn into a disaster for all, including me. Let’s see what happens? Wednesday Night at 8:00!!!”

The pressure is now on Kaitlan Collins to save CNN from itself.

She needs to provide shelter for the monsoon of lies. She needs to keep the trains from derailing, a bleak assignment when the conductor is Agent Orange. That she must do this in an auditorium full of red hats only complicates the high-wire act.

On Tuesday afternoon, in breaking news on CNN, a Manhattan jury sided with E. Jean Carroll in her defamation suit against Trump for allegedly raping her and lying about it. She was awarded $5 million for sexual battery and defamation.

Now, CNN is back in bed with an abusive Donald Trump.

CNN, desperate for ratings, is courting disaster.

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