As soon as President Joe Biden publicly embraced “Bidenomics,” CNN began doing everything it could to slip the term into the minds of viewers like a Jedi mind trick to blind people to the economic woes his policies have created.
On June 17th, 2023, President Biden used the term “Bidenomics” in a speech at a Philadelphia rally and in his social media posts to describe his policies. Later that month, The Washington Post turned into a public relations firm for Biden when it published a propaganda piece about how the president and his advisers “have long been frustrated that the president is not getting more credit for an economy that by many measures is thriving.”
CNN’s TV coverage answered the call and started plastering the airwaves with positive spin touting the so-called wonders of “Bidenomics.” However, as The Federalist Senior Editor David Harsanyi pointed out Aug. 8, “what ‘Bidenomics’ did help create was the biggest four-year inflationary spike under any president in 40 years.” But viewers won’t really get that message watching CNN.
Under Bidenomics, we're creating union jobs and exporting products abroad. It’s a big deal. pic.twitter.com/ApoCFjBHHF
— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) June 17, 2023
MRC Business reviewed all CNN Nexis transcripts from June 17 to Aug. 7 for any mention of the term “Bidenomics.” The comparison between positive and negative coverage wasn’t even close. Seventy-nine percent of the qualitative comments on “Bidenomics'' were positive, while a mere 21 percent were negative. CNN used propagandistic phrases like “historically low unemployment,” “a lot to be proud of,” and “a very, very strong job market” to make “Bidenomics” out to be anything but the inflation-causing disaster that it’s been.
.@Schneider_DC says that Bidenomics sucks, but Joe Biden has embraced it.
— NewsBusters (@newsbusters) August 10, 2023
Stay tuned for the @tolohan study on Bidenomics, coming out this afternoon! pic.twitter.com/SUB8ijFv6M
The latest inflation data make CNN’s insistence on propping up Biden’s economy even worse in retrospect.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics released data on Aug. 10 showing that inflation is still rising at 3.2 percent year-over-year, which is slightly less than expected but two-tenths of a percentage point higher than the prior month at 3.0 percent. As CNBC On-Air Editor Rick Santelli noted during the Aug. 10 edition of Squawk Box, the July numbers signal inflation is still moving “in the wrong direction.” MacroMavens founder Stephanie Pomboy told Fox Business that “[t]he inflation that we’re seeing is in all the stuff that consumers really have no choice but to buy.” Washington Examiner Commentary Writer Tiana Lowe Doescher was even bleaker in her outlook on Fox Business when she broke down just how much prices have increased since Biden took office:
“Let's just think about the compounding effects of this recent inflation crisis. Prices are up 16% since Joe Biden took office. For food they are up 19%, for used car prices up 30%, electricity prices up 23%.”
Here are just a few of the evaluative claims that MRC Business analyzed of CNN going to bat for “Bidenomics.”
On the July 13 edition of CNN This Morning, the outlet showed a clip of Biden claiming that “Bidenomics is working” and followed up with little criticism. White House Correspondent Phil Mattingly insisted that “now the White House has got some news that could definitely bolster that claim,” that Bidenomics was working, because “the rate of inflation slowed to 3 percent year-over-year in June.” Mattingly not only went on to say that Wall Street was “stoked” about the news, but downplayed bad news as “not-so-bright spots of the current economy.”
The same day that The Post pushed its propaganda piece (June 28) about Biden not getting enough good coverage, CNN repeatedly trumpeted the Bidenomics mantra:the economy is great, but Americans just don’t know it. Anchor Wolf Blitzer took this for granted during a conversation with Democratic strategist James Carville during CNN’s The Situation Room. Blitzer contrasted low poll numbers for Biden’s economy with “economic indicators like the labor market” which Blizter called “strong,” before discussing the “Bidenomics label.”
CNN Anchor Dana Bash made that same case for President Biden on the July 20 edition of Inside Politics. She summarized: “Look at the numbers [and] Bidenomics is working. Look at the polls, and the president is struggling to get voters’ hearts, to listen to the evidence that the economy is strong.”
On the Aug. 5 edition of CNN Newsroom, anchor Fredricka Whitfield followed up a discussion of the White House promotion of “Bidenomics” by asking Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL) about why Biden’s economic policies are so unpopular. “I want to ask you about this new CNN polling that shows half of Americans think the economy is getting worse, despite what the actual numbers show,” she said. “And we have seen the president and the vice president going out to take credit for the improving economy. So why, you know, why is the disconnect there?”
CNN Capitol Hill reporter Alayna Treene carried the narrative directly from the lips of the White House press team to her viewers on the July 16 edition of Inside Politics. “That's the thing that I'm hearing a lot when I talk to Democrats on Capitol Hill, that they're worried about with this, you know, Bidenomics tour and him trying to tout the economy,” Treene fretted. “Even though the economy is getting better, it's stabilized since the pandemic, he's not getting credit for it,” she claimed.
After asking Office of Management and Budget Director Shalanda Young “what is Bidenomics,” on the June 28 edition of CNN This Morning, Mattingly buttered her up with “there are a lot of numbers you can point to that tell a story of success.” He added, “Your unemployment rate is one any President would want to talk about often.”
On the June 29th edition of CNN This Morning, then-Chief Business Correspondent Christine Romans, referred to the “rock and roll job market,” during a discussion about “Bidenomics,” and added, “We've had – we had a very, very strong job market.”
But for all of CNN’s bluster, its propaganda on “Bidenomics” doesn’t appear to be holding much weight with Americans. An Aug. 3 CNN.com headline read as follows: “CNN Poll: Half of Americans think the economy is getting worse, despite months of stronger economic news.”
NewsBusters Media Editor Bill D’Agostino contributed to this report.
Conservatives are under attack! Contact CNN at 404-827-1500 and demand the outlet tell the truth about how terrible Bidenomics has been for the U.S. economy.
