In what was the most infuriating moment for conservatives that occurred during the Tuesday, October 1 VP debate that CBS News hosted, Senator and 2024 Trump running mate JD Vance had to fact-check the fact-checkers and call out co-moderator Margaret Brennan after she fact-checked him, against the rules of the debate, and then the network cut Sen. Vance’s mic.
CBS had announced before the debate that moderators would not fact-check false claims made by either candidate during the debate. Instead, it said it would instead utilize live fact-checking on its website. That didn’t happen. Instead, during the debate, Brennan interrupted Vance to fact-check him, saying, “Just to clarify for our viewers, Springfield, Ohio does have a large number of Haitian migrants who have legal status, temporary protected status.”
Sen. Vance then shot back at Brennan, snapping, “The rules were that you guys weren’t going to fact-check. And since you are fact-checking me, I think it’s important to say what’s actually going on.” Sen. Vance then described the actual legal process for obtaining the legal status Brennan described, connecting it to a Harris-backed immigration policy. Brennan talked over him and snidely said, “Senator, we have so much we have to get to, thank you so much for explaining the legal process.” Then, the network cut off Sen. Vance’s microphone and Brennan, as he tried to explain his position, said, “The audience can’t hear you because your mics are cut.”
As might be expected, that infuriated viewers. One commenter on X (formerly Twitter), for example, wrote that the CBS mic cut was awful, saying, “Gross and off-putting. @CBS behaving like snot nosed toddlers.” That came in response to a post that said, “CBS just cut JD Vance’s mic. After they violated the agreed upon debate rules and “fact checked” Vance to help Walz.”
On much the same note, another commenter praised Sen. Vance for how he responded and called out the moderators, writing, “Nora and Margaret do not play fair. They said that Haitians in Springfield are legal migrants. I’m glad Vance made a move to clarify that. Then they turned off his mike. I’ll wait for them to turn off Walz’ mike.”
Separately, other posters on X called out what happened as well. For example, one commenter, Red State Senior Editor Brandon Morse wrote that the network must have been in a state of panic because of how Sen. Vance was torpedoing Brennan’s talking point. He wrote, “Vance was making them panic because he was torpedoing their BS and they had to cut his mic. CBS is a joke.”
On much the same note, another tweeter argued that the mic cut moment shows what is wrong with the modern iteration of political debates, writing, “JD Vance actually trying to educate the viewing public and getting his mic cut by the moderators is a microcosm of everything wrong with modern debates.”
Commenters on his post said things like, “I thought journalists liked to inform the public. Maybe they aren’t journalists at all,” “The moderator couldn’t control herself. They never can when it comes to Trump,” and “It didn’t into fit the moderators narrative, nor does it actually allow Americans to learn from these debates.”
Watch the debate moment that set people off here:
Featured image credit: screengrab from the embedded video
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