Fox News went into open war mode against Joy Reid after the MSNBC anchor suggested that the deadly MS-13 gang was not a real threat to United States and principally existed in the minds of Fox News hosts.
“He makes it sound like the biggest issue in the United States, the biggest threat is MS-13, a gang nobody that doesn’t watch Fox News has ever heard of,” Reid said on-air during MSNBC’s analysis of the State of the Union Address Tuesday evening.
Things promptly exploded from there.
First up, Fox News reporter Brian Flood laced into Reid in a piece on FoxNews.com on Wednesday.
“Often-misinformed MSNBC star Joy Reid is under the impression that international criminal gang MS-13 isn’t a major issue and the only people that have even heard of the thugs are regular viewers of Fox News,” wrote Flood.
“News organizations, including the Washington Post, HuffPost, The New Yorker, The Hill, New York Post, PBS, New York Daily News, Los Angeles Times, Daily Mail, Time and Slate have all covered the dangerous gang.”
From there the conversation migrated to “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” where the eponymous host dug into the matter with The Hill’s Joe Concha.
“So MS-13 is merely something that Fox News created to demonize immigrants? Presumably those would be the same immigrants that the gang routinely kills because they only kill immigrants,” said Tucker dismissively. “We don’t want to think the left really believes any of this, but we’re starting to suspect they really do.”
The assault continued into Thursday morning with “Fox & Friends.” In a segment involving the parent of someone killed by the gang member, the Fox News morning show all but dared President Trump to tweet about it.
“Many MS-13 gang members are also illegal immigrants,” said host Ainsley Earhardt.
A spokesperson for Fox News did not immediate respond to request for comment from the network.