CNN Hires Jeffrey Lord As A Political Commentator

Lord: “Its Official I Am Now A Commentator @CNN.” Lord tweeted on August 6: “Well folks...its official I am now a commentator @CNN ....They've been great.” [Twitter.com, 8/6/15]

CNN Anchor: “Joining Us Is The Newest Member Of Our CNN Family, CNN Political Commentator Jeffrey Lord.” During the August 6 edition of CNN's New Day, co-anchor Alisyn Camerota stated: “Joining us is the newest member of our CNN family, CNN political commentator Jeffrey Lord ... Welcome to the family.” [CNN, New Day, 8/6/15]

Lord: CNN President Hired Me To Present A “Legitimate Conservative View Of The World.” Lord explained his CNN hiring on NewsBusters by writing:

Believe it or not, while he may not agree with Rush on that (I haven't asked), the President of CNN himself - that would be Jeff Zucker - wants me there because he too feels there is a legitimate conservative view of the world and it should be represented on CNN in political discussions. He may not agree with it - but that's not the point. Mr. Zucker is famously seen by conservatives as a man of the left, but he is a television executive and he has made it specifically clear to me in person that he wants my straight-up, unvarnished conservative take on political events.

[...]

With that in mind, there I am now as a CNN commentator, specifically charged by Jeff Zucker to sit on the set of CNN (or Skype in, as is frequently the case, from Central Pennsylvania and the America that is not the intellectually, politically and culturally cloistered world of New York and Washington) and discuss/debate/explain the conservative view of the world. [NewsBusters.org, 8/8/15]

Lord Engaged In “Profoundly Ahistorical” Lynching Denialism

Lord Claimed Former USDA Employee's Relative Wasn't Lynched -- But He Was Wrong. Lord claimed that a statement from former USDA employee Shirley Sherrod -- who was the focus of a 2010 smear campaign by conservatives -- that her relative Bobby Hall was lynched was “factually, provably untrue.” Lord explained that Sherrod engaged in “straight out fabrication” because Hall was beaten to death and not hanged. History experts slammed Lord's claims, calling them “fallacious,” “profoundly ahistorical,” “clearly insensitive,” and “kind of crazy.” [Media Matters, 7/27/10] 

Lord's American Spectator Colleagues “Speechless” At His Lynching Denialism. Lord's American Spectator colleagues slammed his claims about Bobby Hall's lynching. John Tabin wrote: “What on Earth is Jeffrey Lord talking about on the mainpage? ... The fatal beating of Bobby Hall most certainly qualifies.” Philip Klein wrote: “I am rendered speechless by a 4,000-word article that is based around the suggestion that somebody is a liar for saying that a black man was lynched, when he was merely beaten to death by a white sheriff who evidence suggests had previously threatened to 'get him.' ... there are those of us at the Spectator who strongly disagree with Lord's piece.” Another Spectator colleague wrote that by “the standard Jeff is employing here,” people like Emmett Till and James Byrd wouldn't have been considered victims of lynching. [Media Matters, 7/26/10; Media Matters, 7/27/10]

This Is CNN? Lord Practices “Irresponsible Journalism,” Botches Basic Facts

Lord On Trump's Anti-Mexican Immigrant Remarks: “Trump Was Exactly Right If Deeply Politically Incorrect.” Lord wrote on NewsBusters that Trump was “exactly right” to demonize Mexican immigrants as criminals, writing that the people criticizing Trump over his presidential announcement remarks were wrong:

In fact, as these stories demonstrate, Trump was exactly right if deeply politically incorrect. There are indeed illegal immigrants coming across the Mexican border and, once here, committing rape. Smuggling drugs. Committing murder. As the above stories indicate -- and they are far, far from alone -- this is literal, repeatedly documented fact -- that the liberal media avoid. [NewsBusters.org, 6/20/15]

CNN Found Numerous Factual Problems With Trump's Remarks. CNN's Dan Simon reported that Trump's remarks about Mexican immigrants had numerous factual problems including that studies show “there is essentially no correlation between immigrants and violent crime” and “data does not at all support this categorical statement that undocumented immigrants from Mexico are responsible for large numbers of rapes.” [CNN, Anderson Cooper 360 Degrees, 7/2/15]

Lord Botched Reporting About White House Logs To Push Anti-Obama Conspiracy. Lord misrepresented White House visitor logs to suggest that President Obama knew about the alleged IRS targeting of conservative nonprofits because Obama met with the president of a union that represents IRS employees shortly before the agency began its controversial actions. However, the logs didn't state that Obama personally met with the union president, and US News & World Report subsequently reported that the union head never actually directly met with Obama. [Media Matters, 5/21/13]

Lord's “Utterly Ridiculous” Report Suggested Sen. Chris Coons Learned Witchcraft. In 2010, Lord attacked Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE) for having fringe values because Yale Dinivity School, where Coons got a master's degree, has a course on “witchcraft.” ThinkProgress reported that Yale Divinity School Dean Harold Attridge “called Lord's attack 'utterly ridiculous.' 'This was not a class on practical witchcraft,' Attridge said, to suggest otherwise is 'irresponsible journalism -- if that's even what it was.' 'This was a course on American history taught by a seasoned historian'” and was about historical events like the Salem Witch Trials. [ThinkProgress, 9/28/10]

Lord Fell For Fake Seth Rogen Twitter Account. As Mediaite noted, Lord attacked actor Seth Rogen for purported hypocrisy about a mass shooting by pointing to his Twitter account, but the “only problem is that the tweet in question, which compared Romney to the KKK, was actually sent by one of Rogen's many parody Twitter accounts.” [Mediaite.com, 5/31/14]

Lord: KKK And Nazis Are Liberal, Obama Should Be Impeached

Lord: The Ku Klux Klan Is A “Leftist Group.” Lord wrote of the alleged targeting of conservative groups by the IRS: “One can spend endless hours recalling the bloody tyrannies of the French Revolution, or Communism or the Nazis (aka the National Socialists) or, in America, the violence visited by leftist groups from the Ku Klux Klan to this or that labor union to all those 60s radicals who raced around the country in a murderous rage with bombs and bullets. But what the massive abuse of the IRS illustrates is a tyranny of a different sort. A bloodless yet still quite decided tyranny.” [Spectator.org, 5/28/13] 

Lord: Marriage Equality Would Lead To The Loss Of “The Survival And Vitality Of American Society.” Lord wrote that while he is “blessed with beloved relatives and friends -- some of whom happen to be gay,” he believed marriage equality would lead to the death of “American society as expressed through the stability and values.” He wrote:

But this conversation should be between and about those of us who have genuine concern for the survival and vitality of American society as expressed through the stability and values transmitted in the age old institution of marriage between a man and a woman.

And in that regard -- attention you 100-plus Republicans who are asking the Court to shut the rest of us up -- these proponents of gay marriage do their cause an enormous disservice by ignoring the central issue that so many of us see as at the core of this debate.

Which is?

Which is that to accede to gay marriage is inevitably going to wind up ending the institution of marriage itself. Making marriage worthless, useless, and eventually a goner. A societal version of the Dodo bird. As in: extinct.

That extinction doing to the entire nation what the lack of a stable man-woman relationship has visited in horrifying fashion upon America's black community.

[...]

This dissolution of family is precisely the concern of many of those who see gay marriage as the harbinger of a future in which the American “fabric of conventional social relationships” (to use Moynihan's phrase) will, as with that of black America, disintegrate.

He later connected marriage equality to polygamy and pedophilia. [Spectator.org, 2/28/13]

Lord Compared Anti-Islam Blogger To Selma Civil Rights Marchers And Founding Fathers. In response to criticism of conservative blogger Pamela Geller's anti-Islam protests, Lord wrote: “What Pam Geller is doing is bravely standing where so many Americans celebrated today once stood. She is following in the steps of those Sons of Liberty in the Boston Tea Party of 1773 or the signers of the Declaration in 1776 Philadelphia or the civil rights marchers on that Edmund Pettus Bridge or Viola Liuzzo in 1965. ... The time to rally to Geller's support -- to rally to freedom -- is now.” [Spectator.org, 5/7/15]

Lord: Obama Should Be Impeached. Lord wrote in 2014 that Obama is “systematically violating the Constitution” and Congress should vote to impeach him:

Like President Richard Nixon, like President Bill Clinton, President Barack Obama is defying the law. There may well be no will political or otherwise to impeach this president. But however it is done, Congress -- that specifically means the purse-controlling House -- cannot just sit there and do nothing.

The sauce for Nixon and Clinton's law-defying geese must in some fashion be sauce for Obama's law-defying gander.

Impeach the President?

The votes aren't there.

But let the President get away with The Obama Precedent? Systematically violating the Constitution?

If the votes in the purse-controlling Boehner House aren't there to do something about that -- then why are they there? [Spectator.org, 2/13/14]

Lord “Lectured” CNN Colleague Over Not Being A Real Hispanic. During a debate over Donald Trump and immigration, Lord told CNN commentator Ana Navarro: “I don't think you're Latino, Ana. I think you're an American.” Navarro replied: “Now that you've lectured me about what I am, do you have an actual point?” [CNN, At This Hour, 7/13/15]

Lord: “The Nation Owes Ann Coulter A Debt Of Gratitude” For Anti-Immigrant Book. Lord praised Ann Coulter's recent anti-immigrant book, writing:

In fact, it is no exaggeration to say the nation owes Ann Coulter a debt of gratitude for spending the massive amounts of time to do the nitty-gritty research into all the endless material that, when examined in detail and put in one place, presents a thorough - and thoroughly disturbing - portrait of the complete collapse of the American immigration system. And aside from being a tour de force on immigration? It is a reminder that recent events - the death of Kate Steinle tragically first among them - have vindicated Coulter's relentless attention to the issue.

It will gall her critics to say it - so they never will. But I'll say it: Ann Coulter was right. [Conservative Review, 7/10/15]

Lord Compared Critics Of Trump's Comments About Megyn Kelly To Nazis. After Donald Trump received criticism for his remarks that Fox News debate moderator Megyn Kelly had “blood coming out of her wherever,” Lord accused critics of being like Hitler's Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels:

What has followed has been 48-hours of the most disgusting pieces of political analyses I have ever heard in my life. A plu-perfect example of the insight of Hitler's Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels: “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it.” There was not a word said, not a hint, not a suggestion, that Donald Trump ever said Megyn Kelly asked her lead question of him because she was menstruating. Say again... not... a... word. Not one. This is -- there is no other word for it -- a Goebbels-esque lie. [Spectator.org, 8/10/15, via Media Matters]

Lord: “Nazis Were Leftists.” Lord wrote on NewsBusters: “yes, contrary to liberal myth, the Nazis were leftists.” [NewsBusters.org, 5/31/14]

Lord: Obama's “Forward” Slogan Was “Lifted From Chairman Mao.” During the 2012 campaign, Lord accused the Obama campaign of having “lifted” its slogan from Communist Party of China leader Chairman Mao:

The Obama campaign has picked a portion of one of the most infamous socialist slogans of 20th century history to use as its own new campaign slogan.

“Forward” is the new Obama slogan, Team Obama borrowing boldly from none other than the late Communist Party of China leader Chairman Mao.

Mao's slogan? “The Great Leap Forward.” [Spectator.org, 5/3/12]