Kanye's White House fantasy

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Kanye's White House fantasy

This is a rush transcript from "Media Buzz," July 12, 2020. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

HOWARD KURTZ, HOST: This is MediaBuzz. I'm Howard Kurtz. We begin with a story the media have pounced on for the last 36 hours, President Trump commuting the sentence of his long-time pal and informal advisor, Roger Stone, who was to begin serving a prison term of 40 months next week for lying in the Russia probe.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, UNITED STATES PRESIDENT: Roger Stone was treated horribly. Roger Stone was treated very unfairly. Roger Stone was brought into this witch hunt, this whole political witch hunt in the Mueller scam.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is the most corrupt and cronyistic act in, you know, in perhaps all of recent history.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This president continues to use the levers of power and the Justice Department to protect himself and his cronies, punish the people who speak out or try to rein him in.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think the really president felt as though this was not a fair trial in the District of Columbia. You know, frankly, good luck if you're a friend of Donald Trump trying to get a fair trial there.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KURTZ: Joining us now to analyze the coverage, Ben Domenech, founder and publisher of The Federalist, Gillian Turner, a Fox News correspondent here in Washington, and Clarence Page, columnist for the Chicago Tribune. Ben, the White House statement is filled with phrases like Russia hoax. But the media are up in arms over a president keeping out of prison a long-time advisor and self-described dirty trickster whose prosecution Trump's attorney general called righteous.

BEN DOMENECH, THE FEDERALIST: Whatever you think of Roger Stone, you don't have to like him. You can think that he's a wacky (Inaudible) or someone who, you know, is a true dirty trickster. I think that you can say that in this case there's a strong argument to be made for over-prosecution. He also, I think in this context, is an elderly individual who was about to go into prison at the time of the Coronavirus and everything intended with that.

These are the kinds of cases where we've seen leniency. But honestly, I think that the president would be better off focused on the kind of pardons and the kind of commutations that can actually have an impact on society at large as supposed to looking into his friends. He's used that power far less than prior presidents.

In this case, you know, I wish I could have seen this kind of uproar over the President Obama's pardoning, for instance, of unrepentant murderer, Oscar Lopez Rivera and other people who he saw fit to get out of the kind of punishment that its viewed them (ph). In this case, I think though the president was always going to stand by someone who stood by him through thick and thin.

KURTZ: Yeah, loyalty a key factor here. And Clarence, the media's broader argument is the president says he's a law and order president of the United States. But when it comes to his people, Mike Flynn, and in this case, Roger Stone, it's often dirty cops, unfair prosecution here. The Justice Department intervene.

But I have to say this. I doubt most of the public is as concerned as the pundits about a fringe figure like Stone.

CLARENCE PAGE, CHICAGO TRIBUNE SYNDICATED COLUMNIST: I don't think most of the public is as concerned about Stone as the president is. The -- Stone is a long-time friend. The difference between this case and Obama's pardon of Rivera is that Stone is connected for a long time with this president. And this president often personalizes the politics of his office. This is another case of it.

That's why I'm sure he'll get on to more significant pardons for the rest of us. But later on, but right now that's where a big part of the attention coming here, as well as even Robert Mueller and Mitt Romney, other Republicans have expressed some disdain over this particular move.

KURTZ: Certain Republicans have. Gillian, New York Times headline says Trump goes where Nixon did not during Watergate. And look, the president does argue, as Ben alluded to, that Stone who is 67 who did have a Nixon tattoo on his back at one point, you know, could face a medical risk in jail. And in fairness, the president wiped out the sentence but he didn't pardon him, which leaves the legal finding of guilt.

GILLIAN TURNER, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, well, that op-ed you referenced about this being, quote, "worse than Watergate" referred to the fact that Republican lawmakers in particular were standing behind the president's decision, even though they allegedly reportedly know that it's corrupt, according to the wording in the piece.

And during Watergate, Republicans broke from Nixon. So that's the difference here. On Roger Stone though, particularly, I think as much as journalists profess to loathe him and despise him, he's really their ultimate fantasy. And the fact that he's going to stay out of prison for four years is like their wildest dream come true, because he's going to continue talking to them.

Maybe people on the outside don't realize this, but he's in constant contact with journalists. I've probably am not far out when I say that he's on text chains with probably a journalist from every single media outlet in America. If he was in prison, it would be a lot harder to keep that line of communications open.

So for a lot of journalists, this is actually a boone to them, the fact that he's going to stay out of prison.

KURTZ: Well, Roger Stone hasn't been texting with me. And it was a New York Times news story, by the way, that I was quoting. Ben, Michael Cohen, who unlike the loyal Stone turned on Trump, was just sent back to prison after a COVID-related home release after refusing to sign an agreement that he wouldn't talk to journalists or publish a book that he's working on.

And the journalists are saying, well, that's an infringement of his rights, because even if he was in jail he would be allowed to publish a book or talk to journalists.

DOMENECH: Well, I think in this case, you know, Cohen was someone who wanted to have the kind of relationship with the media that Gillian attributes to Roger Stone. To Gillian's point, I have to say he actually just showed the other day up on Ryan Long's comedy podcast doing an extensive hour-long interview. So he really is someone who's kind of everywhere.

I think in this case Cohen is someone who mishandled that situation. I think he should have gone into that with an attitude toward negotiation as opposed to refusing the deal the way that it was laid out. But certainly, there's no lack of people who want to strike while the iron is hot. Try to get books out. Try to have some relevance as it relates to the election. I think that's what Michael Cohen was attempting to do.

KURTZ: All right, Clarence, just briefly, because I want to move to some other subjects. The extraordinarily harsh and personal nature of the media criticism of the president in recent months in the COVID era, shall we say. I wonder whether you think in light of the polling and everything that this is because a lot of pundits have concluded that Donald Trump may lose this election, and so it's OK to pile on.

PAGE: Well, the media have a lot of interesting and extraordinary stuff to cover with this president every day. And he's makes a point of making news. Much of it is news he doesn't want to make. But the fact is his polling is down. It's down across the board. He has made some really self-destructive moves, I would say, in regards to COVID.

The whole mask issue, whether or not to invite your supporters out to rallies in hot zones like Tulsa. You know, this kind of situation is -- the president doesn't need to have bad press because just regular press covering his moves is enough.

KURTZ: Right. Sounds like you might miss him if he's not around. All right, Gillian, The Washington Post is quoting unnamed aids and advisors as saying that Trump is doing a woe is me lament in private that he's been unfairly victimized by the virus, the shutdown, the protests, and rallying against journalists by name. Is this news or is it just private venting by the president?

TURNER: Well, it is news in the sense that there's new sources apparently coming forward to report this stuff. But it's not surprising to anybody. The president vents about reporters by name on Twitter every single day, in press conferences. I will also say at this point it's surprising to me that he continues to do it because it's widely acknowledged, you know, in the media.

I can only speak for my colleagues and I. But every time the president does that, he elevates journalists. He gives them more exposure. He gives them, in a sense, more power. Because the second he gets somebody in particular in his crosshairs, everybody pays attention to them. Everybody wants to know who they are, what they think. They want to know who their sources are.

So it's surprising to me that aides haven't really sort of prevailed upon him to stop doing this and singling people out who he doesn't like by name. Because it really only helps them.

KURTZ: Right. I was just making the point that these were private conversations that were leaked. All right, we're short on time. I want to get a quick answer from Ben and Clarence. New tweet by the president, too many universities and school systems are about radical left indoctrination, not education, telling the Treasury Department to re-examine their tax exempt status.

Ben, you might agree about the indictment of the schools. But a lot of journalists see this as a kind of a culture war move to aid his re- election.

DOMENECH: I do think it's a culture war move. I think that the president recognizes that he's in a culture war. He said that this week, in fact, to Phil Wegmann at RealClearPolitics. This is the reality that he's in. And he is right to identify these universities as being the places that have produced the kind of people who are willing to go out as screaming in the faces of cops and pulling down statues.

I do think this is something that is not necessarily the best way to go about attacking those institutions or correcting their ways in lots of different respects. Tax exemptions versus accreditation or something like that.

KURTZ: Right. I mean, Clarence, what if a Biden administration decided to go after the tax status of Liberty University or conservative educational institutions?

PAGE: Howard, this is a manufactured story. The president hasn't said he's going after tax status. He's threatening to go after the tax exempt status. Remember, he signed an executive order last year in regard to free speech on campus. His position is very clear. So why is he rattling his sword again this time? It's politics. He's playing the culture war.

KURTZ: All right. I did want to get to the president telling Sean Hannity that he took a cognitive test at Walter Reed. And he said that the doctors were very surprised. They said that's an unbelievable thing, really. Does anybody do what you just did? But it kind of got drowned out in the news, and we are out of time. So when we come back, the press versus the president in a culture war that includes NASCAR and Confederate flags.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KURTZ: President Trump and the media are fighting an increasingly nasty culture war which flared up when he tweeted about how NASCAR's only full time black driver, Bubba Wallace, should apologize and that the news incident quote, " and flag decision has caused the lowest ratings ever." The flag decision is the league's new ban on Confederate flags at its events, and the topic totally dominated Kayleigh McEnany's press conference.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My question is why does the president so supportive of flying the Confederate flag? Does he think it was a mistake for NASCAR to ban the flag?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The president said he wasn't making a judgment on one way or the other. You're focusing on one word at the very bottom of a tweet. That's completely taken out of context and neglecting the complete rush to judgment.

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Why would the president not praise NASCAR for removing the Confederate flag?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What exactly does the president see as positive for uniting about the Confederate flag?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KURTZ: Gillian Turner, I've rarely seen a press secretary get hammered on one subject the way that Kayleigh McEnany did. And I think it's because she kept insisting the president has no position on the Confederate flag when the tweet would certainly indicate that he was critical of NASCAR.

TURNER: He clearly does have a position on the Confederate flag. And this is not a situation where the press bombarded the press secretary at the briefing because they wanted to. They got dragged into this because President Trump keeps talking about it and keeps tweeting about it. Once he does that, it is their responsibility to bring it up with the press secretary.

So let's get the facts straight about the order of these things. This is an unforced error for President Trump. It's a perfect, perfect opportunity for him to stay out of the fray, not make unforced errors here. He didn't have to wade into these waters, getting embroiled in not only the argument about the Confederate flag.

But the ongoing argument about race, no -- race in sports, which brings us back to Colin Kaepernick, it would've been a lot cleaner for him messaging- wise if he had just stayed out of it. And then Kayleigh wouldn't have been put in that position at the briefing.

KURTZ: Right. And Ben, even some on-air conservatives agreed with the media verdict here, which it made no sense especially after those July 4th speeches that generated so much coverage for the president who suddenly weigh in on NASCAR and Confederate flags.

DOMENECH: Well, first off, I have to say. I think we should all feel good about the Bubba Wallace story since it turned out that this was not something that was clearly intentionally done. Like so many other stories that end up looking -- that like, you know racial incidents at first. There was an explanation for this along the same lines as we've seen in other instances such as those ropes hung from a tree out in California.

And so I think that's actually a good thing that we should take away from it. In this instance, I think the president always tries to fire away at what he views as political correctness and the problems related to it. But I want to circle back to something that Gillian just said there, which I think is incorrect. The president gave a speech at Mount Rushmore.

And the next day, the Washington Post ran a front page article from Bob Costas (ph) and from Phil Rucker that lied that said right off the bat that he had given a speech defending Confederates. And that's something that they didn't correct. They didn't roll back. I think the president is actually engaged in the media on this, because the media continues to try to make this about Confederate statues and Confederate symbols when that's not what's actually being attacked.

They're trying to gaslight the country and to turning this into something that is it isn't, which is -- looking at the Confederacy as opposed to attacking the people that are on Mount Rushmore, attacking Christopher Columbus, attacking the whole of America's heritage. And I think the president's very well aware of that.

KURTZ: Yeah. Well, I will say there was a lot of red meat, as we've discussed last week, for conservatives into those weekend holiday speeches. But Clarence, I want to come back to this. First of all, even many people on the right say Bubba Wallace has nothing to apologize for, although it turned out the noose incident was not a hate crime.

But in her response to reporters, Kayleigh McEnany said why have I not gotten a single question on the weekend surge in murders in New York and Chicago including children. You work for a Chicago newspaper. Isn't that a fair point?

PAGE: I think it is not a fair point, because that's not the real story that the president would be involved with. The president had a burr under his saddle for Chicago crime for a long time. But as I have wrote in my weekend column here, what happened to that expert on Chicago crime who was going to solve the whole problem in a week?

That was what President Trump promised me and other members of the Tribune editorial board, repeated that on the campaign trail, and has yet to come up with this expert of his on Chicago crime. He loves to grandstand about Chicago crime. This is what we're seeing here again as with the Confederate, as with the Bubba Wallace incident.

Ben is right. Bubba Wallace's story is a good news story. President Trump has just lost the narrative here. And going back to how he began his campaign back in Mobile, Alabama, four years ago. And this is his base, and he -- and NASCAR, the mostly white male and southern oriented constituency of NASCAR, if you will, that's Trump's base. He feels like he owns it. How dare somebody tell my friends they can't have the rebel flag flying?

KURTZ: Well, I was just making the point that this surge in violence had a lot of big cities doesn't get a whole lot of coverage, maybe because it's considered something that's been ongoing for years. Gillian, final question, quick point --

(CROSSTALK)

KURTZ: All right. I was talking about nationwide media coverage. Gillian, when the president tweets about not just NASCAR, but -- OK. Gillian, when the president tweets not just about NASCAR, but he's against the Washington Redskins or the Cleveland Indians changing their name, a lot of people say that's a distraction from COVID and the economy and all of that.

But I think many in the media don't really understand how these issues resonate with a good chunk of the country out there, quick thought.

TURNER: And they do resonate with a good chunk of the country. But that doesn't mean these are waters for the president, not just President Trump but any president to wade into. It's private sector business. I don't think that there is really a place for any American president to weigh in on what he thinks about the name change of a sports team, same like NASCAR, perfect opportunity for President Trump to stay out of the fray, to stay above the chaos, missed opportunity.

KURTZ: Right. Well, this president weighs in on just about everything. Gillian, we'll see you a little later. Ben Domenech, Clarence Page, thanks very much for joining us. Coming up, why liberals are celebrating the high court rulings on Donald Trump's tax returns without really getting much at all.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KURTZ: Many liberal commentators are rejoicing over a pair of Supreme Court rulings on President Trump's tax returns. And the president vented his anger on Twitter, even though the 7-2 decisions don't require him to turn anything over right now. The court said Manhattan DA's Cyrus Vance has a right to go after Trump's financial records in a grand jury probe.

And then House Democrats potentially have the right to subpoena his returns, while kicking both cases back to the lower courts.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Not only will I tell you during the campaign I could stand on Fifth Avenue and shoot someone and it wouldn't hurt me at all. He had a lawyer go into court and say that in his behalf too. The Supreme Court unanimously says to that no.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And the media was downright giddy about the Supreme Court's ruling on Trump's tax returns. But they were wrong. The truth is that one of the rulings today completely destroyed Congress' gross unconstitutional overstep in trying to obtain Trump's tax returns.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KURTZ: Ben, sorry for thanking you guys prematurely. Fascinating to watch the media praising the Supreme Court for declaring independence from President Trump in saying he doesn't have total immunity against subpoenas. And yet, even those are procedural rulings that kick this whole thing well past the election and beyond.

DOMENECH: As a political matter, this is a win for President Trump. It's something that means that they're not going to be able to pour over his tax returns in the context of an election year. He has enough challenges as it is when it comes to this election. But in terms of the nuance here, I think this is another example where the rush to report about Supreme Court rulings ends up missing a lot of what's going on there procedurally.

And I think in this instance, a lot of people saw this as -- were on the left saw this as a win for them and then came to realize that at least in the short political measure, it's not.

KURTZ: Yeah. In political terms, I think you're right because it freezes the action. Clarence, the president was not pleased, as I mentioned, tweeting this as all political prosecution. I won the Mueller witch hunt. Courts in the past have given broad deference, but not me, and then goes into his accusations that Obama and Biden spied on him, your thoughts.

PAGE: There's the self-prosecution syndrome of President Trump. Everything is about him and everything is some effort to get after him. Look, I'm not so partisan that I feel that this is a partisan victory for the right or the left. I'm happy that it's a victory you for the Constitution. It's a victory for the presidential accountability to Congress and the other branches.

Not just as a partisan victory or loss, this won't have much effect before the election. But that's not the purpose of the Supreme Court. They're supposed to protect the Constitution. And I'm glad somebody is.

KURTZ: What's also striking is that Trump's appointees, Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch joined John Roberts and the liberal ring in reaching this decision about immunity, even though it's sort of theoretical for the moment. And I think the media, the disappointment is not so much about the legal principles here, but this has been this great hunger since the 2016 campaign to find out if there's anything damaging in the president's tax returns.

Obviously, we'll not find out for sometime if we ever do. Ben Domenech and Clarence Page, this time, I will wish you a great Sunday. Thanks very much for joining us.

DOMENECH: Thank you.

PAGE: Thank you, Howie.

KURTZ: ESPN has suspended basketball reporter Adrian Wojnarowski without pay for sending an e-mail to Senator Josh Hawley after the Republican lawmaker had criticized the NBA's relationship with China that said F you. Woj has apologized for being disrespectful and making a regrettable mistake. Fox News has quickly pointed company with a top writer for Tucker Carlson Tonight in the wake of extremely serious disclosures.

In a memo to the staff yesterday, Fox News' CEO Suzanne Scott and president and executive editor Jay Wallace minced no words about what happened. On Friday, they said we learned that now former employee Blake Neff, a writer on Tucker Carlson Tonight, made horrendous and deeply offensive racist, sexist, and homophobic comments under a pseudonym on the form AutoAdmit.

We want to make it abundantly that Fox News Media strongly condemns this horrific racist, misogynistic, and homophobic behavior. Neff's abhorrent conduct on this forum was never divulged in the show or the network until Friday, at which point we swiftly accepted the resignation. Make no mistake. Actions such as his cannot and will not be tolerated at any time in any part of our workforce.

The disclosures were reported by CNN. What Neff posted anonymously over five years is very ugly stuff, such as racist jokes including the N word, derogatory slurs for gays and lesbians, denigrating the Mormon religion, and mocking a woman's dating life. A Fox executive says Tucker Carlson will address the situation on Monday night's show.

Next on MediaBuzz, the media uproar over President Trump vowing to pressure the governors into reopening the schools this fall with parents caught in the middle.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KURTZ: President Trump told Greta Van Susteren the other day that we are in a good place with the coronavirus. Such comments sparking media uproar as the COVID-19 surged at seven records in 11 days, reaching over 66,000 cases on Friday alone.

Now, the media spotlight has shifted to whether and how the nation's schools can reopen in September. The president is criticizing the CDC guidelines which are being tinkered with and the president tweeting that he would cut off federal funding to schools whose buildings stay closed.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I think it's going to be good for them politically so they keep the schools closed. No way. So we're very much going to put pressure on governors and everybody else to open the schools.  NICOLLE WALLACE, MSNBC HOST: It is ghoulish for Donald Trump to inject his broken, corrupt, incompetent political approach to the global pandemic into what is a life and death, painful, lose-lose decision for most parents.  RUSH LIMBAUGH, TALK SHOW HOST AND CONSERVATIVE POLITICAL COMMENTATOR:  The president is out there demanding that the schools open and for the sake of the economy, for the sake of the divorce rate, for the sake of sanity among parents, they need to open, and for the sake of the children not starving.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KURTZ: Joining us now to analyze the coverage, Gayle Trotter, commentator who hosts "Right in DC" podcast, and Mara Liasson, NPR's national political reporter and a Fox News contributor.

Gayle, the media have slammed the president, as you know, for saying he will pressure the governors and potentially cut off funding to get the schools reopen. Doesn't that contradict the conservative idea of federalism, which is that the president doesn't have absolute power and that local officials control such things as local schools?  GAYLE TROTTER, COMMENTATOR, HOST OF "RIGHT IN DC" PODCAST: I'm glad you brought that up, Howie, because our attorney general, Bill Barr, said the same thing that it's surprising in terms of federalism that governors are going against their constitutions and using their emergency powers to do so many things that a limited government conservative would not be in favor of.

And we're seeing the media criticizing President Trump for encouraging Americans to go back to work, for children to go back to school. And we've seen organizations like the American Academy of Pediatrics urging children to be physically present in schools in the fall.

And yet the media are aligned with the Biden campaign and the talking points of the teachers union who want to keep the schools closed this fall. And that goes against what a lot of American parents want, to have the schools --

KURTZ: Right.

TROTTER: -- reopened safely and with health as a primary concern.

KURTZ: Well, I think parents are divided. Journalists are also parents. I would love to have my kids back in school, Mara. But the media tends to focus on whether it's safe, not just for the kids themselves but for teachers and staff.

And so they are largely casting this as the president is trying to score a political victory by forcing the schools to open while the president says he thinks it's the Democrats who think they will benefit if the buildings remain closed.  MARA LIASSON, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR, NATIONAL POLITICAL REPORTER FOR NATIONAL PUBLIC RADIO: Yeah. I think that this is one of those cases where the media isn't one monolithic thing. First of all, parents desperately, me included, want their kids back in school and we desperately want our kids safely back in school.

But the media has also pointed out correctly that 90 percent of school funding comes from local governments and states. The president only, I think, has control of about 10 percent of it. So he doesn't have a lot of leverage. He does have a bully pulpit.

The problem is that he also urged states to open up economies which people wanted, and in a lot of places, that didn't work out so well. So it's a cautionary tale for every school district that is struggling with where they're going to find the money to do the extra sanitation, the plexiglass, the masks, the extra classrooms if you have to spread kids out.

I mean, this is a huge problem and instead of trading blame about who wants to keep schools shut, who wants to keep them open, maybe the federal government and the states could work together on a plan for how to open schools safely.

KURTZ: Well, speaking of working together, the president and vice president have been at odds with the Centers for Disease Control over the guidelines that could help schools make these decisions. CDC Chief Robert Redfield was on "Good Morning, America." Let's take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS, ANCHOR, ABC NEWS: Should the doctors and scientists with the CDC be taking that kind of political direction from the president?

ROBERT REDFIELD, CHIEF, CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION: I think it's important, George, to realize -- you used the word "guidelines." That's what the CDC has done, they provide guidance. They're not requirements.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KURTZ: So Gayle, the CDC is now getting a lot of media criticism for being under -- perhaps bending to political pressure from the White House.

TROTTER: Expert opinions are very important but experts in any field are not accountable to the American people. We don't have a government of the experts, by the experts, and for the experts. Instead, we have democratic accountability and that's why we choose leaders to make these hard decisions for us.

And if you look at the track record of the experts, they're continually changing their advice. In March, we saw Dr. Fauci, the WHO, the U.S. surgeon general, the CDC, all argue against masks. And then when new information arose, they changed their recommendations. So it's not a monolithic thing. But that is why --

KURTZ: Right.

TROTTER: -- we have democratic accountability for leaders.

KURTZ: Right. Now, speaking of Anthony Fauci, Mara, he hasn't spoken to the president in over a month.

LIASSON: Right.

KURTZ: He has had to cancel TV interviews. The president told Sean Hannity that Dr. Fauci is a nice man but he has made a lot of mistakes, picking up on Gayle's point. Here's what Anthony Fauci told the Financial Times, if we can put it up.

"I have a reputation, as you probably figured out, of speaking the truth at all times and not sugar-coating things. That may be one of the reasons why I haven't been on television very much lately."

So you have this partisan debate over whether the president is side-lining people like Fauci.  LIASSON: Well, there's no doubt that the White House has chosen not to put Fauci on television as much as they did in the beginning when he was kind of a good housekeeping seal of approval for the president. He was the scientist who was going to tell everybody what to do and how to stay safe, et cetera.

And as the president has wanted to open up faster than maybe Dr. Fauci thinks that we should open, he has been pushed to the side a bit. But Dr. Fauci has also come to the president's rescue a couple times, trying to explain why the president said 99 percent of the cases are harmless. He said maybe he misinterpreted data about one percent mortality rate. But there's no doubt that Dr. Fauci is less useful to the White House right now.

KURTZ: All right. I need a brief answer from each of you. First, you, Gayle, you have six children. I know you would like to see them back in school. Many schools, including New York City and elsewhere, are planning to have a couple days on, a couple days off, a couple weeks on, couple weeks off, in order to keep the crowding down in the classrooms.

Very little press attention to how that would put pressure on working parents, what to do when the kids are home doing the online learning thing.  TROTTER: That's right. Americans want their kids back in school. They want to get back to work and they want it to be done safely and responsibly. And the CDC has released very extensive guidelines on how to do that. There's a lot of different information about young children and the distances you need.

So that is something that should not be political. It should be somewhere where we all join together in the American spirit of back to work and stick-to-itiveness.

KURTZ: Right. And Mara, the president also slammed Harvard University which plans to go all online for the next academic year, saying they should be ashamed of themselves and it is the easy way out. Other university systems are also planning that. Are the media buying into that criticism?  LIASSON: I don't know. Look, college is a different situation. Harvard, by the way, is having people come back to campus and go to school online. So it's not like they're keeping everybody out of school. Each school has to make these decisions for themselves. This is a tough, complicated problem. This is what Gayle said, we got to figure out how to open up safely.

KURTZ: Tough and complicated, absolutely. Gayle Trotter, Mara Liasson, great to see you this Sunday. After the break, why the media are going haywire over the book by President Trump's niece and is that fair? And later, are Kanye's White House ambitions fake news?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KURTZ: I had sort of hoped to avoid talking about this new book by Mary Trump, the president's niece, but leaked copies are drawing enormous coverage in The New York Times, The Washington Post, and the other cable news channels.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)  JOY REID, MSNBC NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Perhaps one of the reasons the family has fought so hard to keep the book under wraps has to do with the fear that Mary Trump, as the best expert you can get on Donald Trump, his own relative, could tear down the false image that Trump has created.  RACHEL MADDOW, MSNBC HOST: One of family member in question here is now the president of the United States. A family portrait of him and how he became who he is and who he has long been, it can send a chill down your spine.

KELLYANNE CONWAY, SENIOR COUNSEL TO THE PRESIDENT: We imbue instant credibility unto anybody, especially those not under oath and writing works of fiction perhaps or fiction within work of fiction, as long as they're out there to get the president. I think reporters ought to focus on getting the story and not getting the president.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KURTZ: Joining us now from New York, Kat Timpf of Fox's "Greg Gutfeld Show" and the host of Fox Nation's "Sincerely, Kath." Now, Mary Trump despises her uncle has been in litigation of her being cut out of the will after her father Fred Jr. died an alcoholic and hasn't had much contract with the president for many years. Why is this book getting such a huge media ride?

KAT TIMPF, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: This happens when every one of these books come out. This is obviously the first one by a relative, but there is a whole genre of books at this point of people who have been (INAUDIBLE), the behind the scenes, salacious type of thing.

And I think it's the same thing every time where Trump's detractors really love to sink their teeth into it and say, wow, look at this, this guy is crazy. But I don't think it really changes the level of support among his supporters whatsoever.

I think people just kind of brush it off entirely and don't even consider what's in it. So, I don't understand, these keep getting written. It's almost like a TMZ-esque genre really more than any actual sort of anything else.

KURTZ: Interesting analogy. The president tried to stop publication of this book, which is too much and never enough. The book -- Mary Trump writes in this book that Donald Trump paid a guy named Joe Shapiro to take the SAT for him. That helped him get into the University of Pennsylvania.

Well, The Washington Post to its credit tracked down the sister of Shapiro, who is now deceased, and she said this can't be true because Joe didn't meet Donald until they were both students at Pen. So that kind of fell apart.

TIMPF: Yeah, that one fell apart. And again, whenever you're reading something like this, you do have to take it with a grain of salt. Sure, some of it is probably true, looks like some of it isn't. But again, the way that it's covered too is quite interesting. A lot of it is a little overblown in the way it's been covered.

For example, I saw a piece in the LA Times and the headline was that horror clouds every page, right? OK, like really, like the part about how when he was a kid, he hid his brother's trucks, like not a nice thing to do, but I wouldn't call it horror, right?

KURTZ: It's like one of the blurbs from a movie, horror clouds every page.

TIMPF: Yeah.

KURTZ: Mary Trump is a clinical psychologist with a PHD. She writes Donald's pathologies are complex and his behavious are often inexplicable, he's a narcissist, and she blames this on the stern treatment of his father, Fred Sr.

But I question whether her personal animus undercuts the book. I believe that if some relative of Barack Obama had published a book trashing the 44th president, there would be great debate in the media, should we really cover this, but there's no hesitation here to cover all of the dirty family laundry.

TIMPF: Right, absolutely. It's so interesting because you do have to acknowledge that obviously they don't get along. It's a spat over money, essentially, at the end of the day, that they haven't really spoken or anything like that.

You do have to keep in mind who is the narrator of this. There are people who know me, who don't like me, and I wouldn't want -- wouldn't like to read their book. They probably have horrible things to say. You have to keep that in mind.

But again, it's salacious, it is fun for people to read and kind of tease the president if they don't like him, but I truly don't think anyone else really actually cares or I don't see how you could.

KURTZ: Right. Well, a lot of copies have been printed. Before we go --

TIMPF: Yeah.

KURTZ: -- yesterday, President Trump visited Walter Reed, and for the first time in front of the cameras, he was seen wearing a mask, actually a black mask with the presidential seal. Do you think that he -- he said that, you know, well, it's a hospital, it's appropriate. Do you think he wanted to finally put an end to all the media criticism, why aren't you wearing a mask?  TIMPF: Yeah, I think he -- I think he certainly did. He obviously -- I think that it's bad that it has become a sort of political thing. If you're a mask wearing person, you're liberal, and if not, you're conservative. It shouldn't have anything to do with it. So I was glad to see him wearing the mask and especially if you're in a situation like a hospital. And also --

KURTZ: Yeah, I do think --

TIMPF: -- he's constantly getting tested and that sort of stuff, too. So - -

KURTZ: Yeah, right, but --

TIMPF: -- someone like me, I'm not getting tested for COVID every day.

KURTZ: I do think it sets a good example.

TIMPF: Yes.

KURTZ: Kat Timpf, great to see you as always. Still to come, the kind of bogus story that's generating a whole lot of buzz. Kanye claims he's running for president.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KURTZ: I'm not really buying this story but it sure generating plenty of us. Kanye West says he is running for president right now supposedly. You would recall that Kanye praised President Trump a couple of years back in a rambling Oval Office visit.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KANYE WEST: They tried to scare me to not wear this hat. But his hat, it gives me -- it gives me power in a way.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KURTZ: The rapper now tells Forbes Magazine, I'm taking the red hat off with this interview, that he had the coronavirus, he's never voted in his life, and he's OK drawing black support from Joe Biden because to say that the black vote is democratic is a form of racism and white supremacy.

We're back with Gillian Turner. This seems pretty bogus to me. Kanye hasn't made a move to get on a single state ballot. He's had mental health issues in the past. Why so much coverage for Kanye?  GILLIAN TURNER, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Register with the FEC, which would be the first step he would take -- this campaign would take to show that they're serious about it. But any journalist in America who tells you they know whether he's serious or not is lying, because his own wife, Kim Kardashian, reportedly doesn't know whether he's serious.

Her friends and family members have been telling People magazine, I was just reading about this, that it's unclear to her whether he's serious at all or whether he's completely unserious. So she doesn't know. We definitely don't know.

KURTZ: All right. So first he's got to win the Kardashian primary. Now, on a more serious note, Ghislaine Maxwell was tracked down and arrested, charged with helping the monstrous sexual predator Jeffrey Epstein with at least three girls who were abused by the late predator.

She's on an intensified suicide watch, wearing paper clothes after Epstein's jail house death. I know this is an important story. But it seems to me there is some X factor here that is really driving the coverage into the stratosphere.

TURNER: Well, one thing that's amazing about this story is that as horrible as it is, it's like the one story so far in 2020 that everybody agrees on. There's no partisan split here. Republicans or conservatives think one thing and Democrats or liberals think another.

Everybody is in perfect agreement on the fact that he was a monster. Most people think, you know, it's a good thing that he's no longer walking freely on the face of the earth being a predator. So, it is interesting that the Ghislaine Maxwell storyline is following the same trend here. Mostly bipartisan support --

KURTZ: Right. I think --

TURNER: -- she is a bad lady.

KURTZ: Yeah. Well, speaking of bipartisanship, I mean, Epstein was friends with a lot of people in both parties, the elites. And also, she is sort of this mystery woman --

TURNER: Good point.

KURTZ: -- and of course the suicide and the conspiracy theories about Epstein also factor in. Finally, the Central Park dog walker, Amy Cooper, was actually charged this week of filing a false police report in that incident in New York where she lied about an African American man, a bird watcher, who said -- she said he was threatening her. Why are the media still milking this story?  TURNER: Because it picks up on the racial -- the struggle for racial justice that's going on right now. But I like that the media is so woke that even her dog is now going to get justice. People jumped all over the fact that she was choking him inadvertently while she was yelling at this guy. Now, the dog has been taken away from her, getting put up for adoption.

KURTZ: I didn't have the canine angle. I like the fact that the black bird watcher, Christian Cooper, says, you know what, she lost her job, I'm not going to pile on, and he is not cooperating with the prosecution. Gillian, great to see you, have a great Sunday.  TURNER: You, too.

KURTZ: And that's it for this edition of "Media Buzz." I'm Howard Kurtz. We hope you will like our Facebook page. You can read my daily columns there. We can continue the conversation on Twitter at Howard Kurtz. I'm sure some of you have already weighed in.

Check out my podcast, "Media Buzzmeter." We deal with the buzziest stories every day. You can subscribe at Apple iTunes or on your Amazon device. Lot to cover every week, I think it's going to be like this, with COVID, the campaign, the economy, now schools.

We try to stay on top of the media coverage for you. We'll see you here next Sunday at 11:00 Eastern with the latest buzz.

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