Fox News’ late-afternoon opinion roundtable show The Five imploded on Wednesday when liberal co-host Juan Williams pointed out that folks in conservative media, including his colleagues, appeared to be peddling the White House’s talking points on the Ukrainian call memo.
Amid Wednesday’s release of a memo detailing Trump’s now-infamous July 25 call in which Trump asked the Ukrainian president to “do us a favor” and investigate Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, the White House sent out talking points to its allies to combat negative press coverage. Inadvertently, the administration also sent the document to some House Democrats, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
During a panel discussion, the majority of the co-hosts downplayed the revelations that the president did indeed press Ukraine to look into Biden and work with Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani. That prompted Williams to bring up the publication of the White House’s talking points.
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“I think, you know, just listening here, boy, those talking points, they have made the rounds,” the liberal commentator stated. “Because the reality is—”
Immediately, both Jesse Watters and Greg Gutfeld interrupted him, asking Williams what he was implying.
“What does that mean?” Gutfeld shouted. “Are you saying I got talking points?! You got to answer to the accusation!”
Watters added: “Are you telling me I was told what to say?”
The progressive Fox Newser pointed out that he was hearing that “all around,” causing Gutfeld to complain that Williams had already had enough time to talk and it was time to give co-host Katie Pavlich some airtime.
Williams, however, went back to criticizing the president’s actions laid out in the call, leading Gutfeld to grumble and ask his colleague: “Did you get that from Media Matters, Juan?”
Watters and Gutfeld kept badgering Williams over his apparent accusation as he attempted to finish his point about the call. Williams, for his part, struggled on until Gutfeld finally snapped at him.
“Juan, you’ve had two days to talk about it, Katie hasn’t been able to say a word,” Gutfeld, arms crossed, seethed. “You were on this show yesterday and we weren’t. You had your shot!”
As for the White House talking points, it wasn’t just the opinion side that appeared to be embracing them—a number of the network’s “hard news” reporters and anchors also appeared to echo them throughout the day.
