Fox News Defends CNN: No Journalists Should Be 'Belittled' By A President

Fox News' Shepard Smith

In a bit of surprise, Fox News' Shep Smith issued a statement today on behalf of Fox News defending CNN for the report it posted last night regarding a collection of what appeared to be "opposition ammo" meant to possibly attack Donald Trump during the presidential campaign. The main point being that CNN's reporting was “distinctly different” from BuzzFeed’s which drew Trump's ire.

CNN’s story, unlike Buzzfeed’s, specifically did not include the unedited dossier of unverified allegations made about Trump’s ties to Russia. Nor did CNN include any "details" of the items from the report. Smith added that no journalists should be treated in the way Trump treated CNN’s Jim Acosta, who got into a brief contretemps with Trump today at the president-elect's first press conference since last summer.

Trump refused to take any questions from Acosta today despite continued requests, and Acosta later shared that Trump’s press secretary threatened to have him thrown out of future press events if he continued to press the president-elect.

Here's part of Smith's statement today:

“President-elect Trump today told CNN’s Jim Acosta that his organization amounts to fake news. CNN’s exclusive reporting on the Russian matter was separate and distinctly different from the document dump executed by an online news property.

"Though we at FOX News cannot confirm CNN’s report, it is our observation that its correspondents followed journalistic standards and that neither they nor any other journalists should be subjected to belittling and delegitimizing by the President-elect of the United States.”