Washington Free Beacon reporter Elizabeth Harrington appeared Wednesday on Fox Business, where she said President Donald Trump attacks the media because they are "thin-skinned" and overreact in their coverage of his administration.
Host Neil Cavuto of "Cavuto: Coast to Coast" asked Harrington what she thought about Trump's Twitter reaction to NBC's "Today" co-host Matt Lauer being fired earlier in the day for "inappropriate sexual behavior."
"So now that Matt Lauer is gone when will the Fake News practitioners at NBC be terminating the contract of Phil Griffin? And will they terminate low ratings Joe Scarborough based on the "unsolved mystery" that took place in Florida years ago? Investigate!" Trump tweeted.
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/935874566701842434
Harrington said she believes Trump went after NBC because he saw an opportunity to attack one of his "favorite targets," a network she said has been very critical of his administration.
"When they are having a bad news day, I think he takes the opportunity to beat them up over their coverage of him. But, I think this story for NBC is particularly bad when you think about NBC and Andy Lack over there. They were the ones that killed the Ronan Farrow [story] that he eventually took to New Yorker on Harvey Weinstein to begin with," Harrington said, referring to the chairman of NBC News and the fact that the network decided not to run Farrow's story.
She went on to say Trump took a great opportunity to go after the news network based on the way they handled their leadership and various allegations.
Later in the interview, Cavuto asked Harrington whether she thought Trump's reactions on twitter would affect whether the tax cuts get passed this year.
"I don't think so," Harrington said. " I don't think it affects tax cuts at all. I think Trump attacks the media because it's an easy target and any time he does this, the media always overreaches in their reaction."
Cavuto jokingly asked Harrington whether she was referring to the media on Fox Business in her assessment, asking if they were "thin skinned."
"Maybe not so much on this network, but flip around the channels, it's pretty thin skinned," Harrington said. "Just look the other day, Trump makes a throw away joke about [Sen.] Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.) lying about being Native American and then for 24 hours on all the other cable networks, it's all this coverage about his motives and 'oh, all Republicans are racist' because of this."
"It's a throwaway line, a joke that he made, and their 'Trump derangement syndrome'–they always go overboard. So I think Trump attacking the media is an easy target and an easy win for him," Harrington added.