© Reuters / Brendan McDermid / Gretchen Ertl
The candidates got an unwitting makeover during the network's Squawk Box program on Monday, as the show was covering fourth-quarter fundraising totals. Yang's face was replaced with a similarly-named Asian businessman, founding partner of Redpoint Ventures Geoff Yang. Gabbard was replaced, even more confusingly, by New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand - once a primary candidate herself, until she dropped out of the race in August.
One could chalk both up to chance mistakes - Geoff and Andrew Yang have the same last name, so perhaps their headshots are sequential in the network's files? Gabbard and Gillibrand were sequential in the alphabetical list of candidates, perhaps they forgot to remove the blonde, decidedly un-Gabbard-like congresswoman when she called it quits six months ago? But the fact that both candidates, each with a decidedly anti-establishment bent, have been noticeably shafted by mainstream media in the past led their supporters to cry foul.
Hardly anyone believed the "innocent mistake" hypothesis. "This has to be intentional malice," one user observed.
"They're so used to not covering them. Maybe none of their staff knew what they look like," deadpanned one user.
Some called the switcheroo racist. "Imagine if it had been [Cory] Booker's face with another black man. The left would be enraged."
Others took matters into their own hands.
Between the #YangMediaBlackout - the outsider candidate has been repeatedly left off graphics, poll results, and other visual aids even when polling significantly higher than others shown - and the Groundhog Day-like attacks on Gabbard for meeting with Syrian President Bashar Assad in 2017, it's easy to see how both candidates' supporters might accuse mainstream media of wearing its bias on its sleeve.
The network eventually apologized for the mistake and quickly fixed the graphic, but not before several people had suggested the Yang campaign take legal action against them.
Reader Comments