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ON SEPTEMBER 18, a tragedy took place in North Dakota: a 41-year-old man named Shannon Brandt, according to various press reports, admitted to having run over and killed an 18-year-old conservative, Cayler Ellingson, for allegedly belonging to a “Republican extremist” group.
According to an affidavit released by Fox News, Brandt ran over Ellingson because he felt “threatened” after an alleged political argument between the two. After the argument, Brandt saw Ellingson in the street. Before Brandt ran over Ellingson, the victim managed to alert his mother that he was being chased. By the time the mother arrived, it was too late.
Brandt admitted that when he saw the 18-year-old making a phone call, he felt threatened and ran him over. Brandt confessed to a state radio station that he killed Ellingson because, according to him, “he was part of a Republican extremist group.” The defendant is now free on $50,000 bail.
The allegation is extremely serious, not only because of the loss of an 18-year-old, but because the person accused, himself, admitted that his apparent crime was carried out because of political leanings. Many conservative commentators have linked the crime to Joe Biden’s speech in Philadelphia a few days ago, where he accused Donald Trump’s supporters of being “semi-fascists” and “enemies” of the United States.
At the time of publishing this article, almost all left-liberal media — such as The New York Times, CNN or The Washington Post — have ignored this event that has shocked the country. Instead, they covered the story, but omitted important details.
Among the media which have a national audience, only the conservative media—such as Fox News, the Daily Wire, Newsmax or the New York Post– have been covering the story in detail.
If one does a quick review of the major Twitter accounts of the NYT, CNN or the WaPo, one will notice that they have not mentioned Shannon Brandt’s name as, at the very least, alleged perpetrator of the Cayler Ellingson hit-and-run. Much less have they reported the details of the matter. Likewise, if one searches for the event as more general news, using North Dakota as a reference, one will also not find a full report of this news story that is being the focus of debate in the conservative world.
The New York Times has so far ignored the murder of a young conservative by a left-wing extremist in North Dakota. Three days have already passed. (Screenshot)
The websites of the NYT or CNN, at least at the time of publishing this article, still remain empty. Without any allusion to the murder of this 18-year-old conservative.
CNN ignores the murder of an 18-year-old conservative (Screenshot).
What two liberal media outlets — The Washington Post and ABC News — have just published on their websites, between 4:00 and 5:00 pm on September 21, is the news wire distributed by the AP agency, which does not even mention the real motive for the crime. This is even more controversial than the mere fact of not covering the report for three days.
This is how the WaPo and ABC present the news: “ND driver claims political argument preceded teen’s death.”
ABC refuses to say that the alleged perpetrator said he ran over the young man because he was a “Republican extremist.” (Screenshot)
This reads from the report published by the WaPo: “A driver charged with fatally striking a teenager in North Dakota allegedly told investigators he purposely hit the teen with his SUV after they had a political argument, according to court documents.”
There is no trace of the words “Republican” or “extremist group” in this news wire which is, so far, the main motive revealed by the defendant himself to carry out the outrage.
According to a report published by the Media Research Center group, the major liberal television networks have not paid attention to this event either, ignoring it almost completely.
“A review of news coverage on leftwing broadcast (ABC, CBS, and NBC) and cable (CNN and MSNBC) outlets revealed that none of these networks have given the attack even one second of airtime. Both Fox News and Newsmax covered the incident on Tuesday evening during the 7 p.m. Eastern hour,” the article reads.
Not mention of the incident in North Dakota for not following the narrative?
While the murder of a young man — a terrible event — is not comparable in magnitude to a massacre or mass shooting, the narrative and the differences in how the media covers the story are huge.
For example, when the mass shooting in Buffalo took place, the liberal media quickly took it upon themselves to politicize the tragedy by arguing that the shooter was a “mainstream Republican” despite the fact that he himself, in his wild and incoherent manifesto, declared himself as being part of an “authoritarian left.”
In this case, the alleged killer himself said he committed the hit-and-run after consuming alcohol, following a political argument and because he thought the younger Ellingson was a Republican extremist. All of this, weeks after Joe Biden brandished his most incendiary and divisive speech of his term, where he called Trump supporters – meaning Republicans and conservatives in the country – “semi-fascists” and “extremists.”
However, for the liberal media, this case is apparently not news and they decide to remove it from their news agenda.
Emmanuel Alejandro Rondón is a journalist at El American specializing in the areas of American politics and media analysis // Emmanuel Alejandro Rondón es periodista de El American especializado en las áreas de política americana y análisis de medios de comunicación.
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