CNN's Don Lemon provided another defense from the media for President Joe Biden's withdrawal from Afghanistan, though it was riddled with misinformation, gaslighting, and exaggerations.
NewsBusters' Nicholas Fondacaro highlighted the segment from Wednesday night, which took place in the opening of the show, as a back and forth between Lemon and Chris Cuomo.
As Lemon said:
DON LEMON: I think that, you know, we should be a little bit more level-headed about this. We got out of a war. Many people didn't agree with the way that it ended. Okay. So how do we move forward from here?
I think you have to also look at the number, again, the number of people they got out, and I think obviously the administration – the Trump administration for brokering these deals with the Taliban, and the Biden administration for however you feel about how they got out. But I think you have to give them some credit for what, number one, getting out, and number two, getting as many people out as possible.
And we do have to remember there are people who went there, and we're told they needed to leave, and they didn't leave. We should still help them get out, continue to help them get out.
But, you know, I think people should stop beating up on the administration so much because no matter how it ended, everyone wasn't going to be happy with the way it ended. So, if there's any silver lining in this, it's going to be what happens going forward. You can't change the past. You can't bring those lives back, as awful as that is.
And so, you know, I just think sometimes – I think the administration is getting beaten up on this a little bit too much. Because there's a lot of blame to go around from four different presidents who actually didn't have the guts to get us out of Afghanistan because they were afraid of this moment and what an exit might look like.
Lemon was so off base that even Cuomo had to push back, sort of:
CHRIS CUOMO: I do agree with you, though, looking back is a mistake right now because of the current crisis. I don't care how the Biden administration feels about criticism, but they need to have a plan and an urgency to get people out. I didn't hear it from the state department.
LEMON: Well, that's a whole different thing. It's our job to be critical. I think they're separate things here. We're talking about everything doesn't have to all be lumped in one basket.
CUOMO: Agree.
Not only was Lemon parroting talking points from the White House, he was doing so disingenuously by claiming we don't know if people have been left behind:
LEMON: You can't get them all out in five minutes. You can't get them all out yesterday. So, what happens going forward, if we continue with this effort to get them out and we start getting them out, as many out as possible, then I think we should stop running around like, “on my gosh, I can't believe we left so many people behind.” We don’t know if we left them behind yet. We don’t know that.
Lemon also appeared to dismiss the suffering of those trying to flee the Taliban as "the awful part of war" when further confronted by Cuomo:
CUOMO: I know, but here’s the one thing you’re forgetting. I hear you, but Don. It's easy to be level-headed when nobody's chasing you with a machete.
LEMON: I understand that.
CUOMO: On the ground in Afghanistan, it's a different reality for these people. They're going to be hunted.
LEMON: Yeah.
CUOMO: I've seen it. This is what they do.
LEMON: That's the awful part of war.
CUOMO: So you don't have a lot of time. And there has to be an urgency commensurate with the need.
As was reported earlier, among those left behind in Afghanistan included students and a three year old boy. The White House has taken a guess that the amount left behind are in "the low hundreds," though regardless of the amount, the figure has been downplayed. Lemon may not know the figure, but there's no excuse for the White House to not.
Another talking point Lemon focused on was to fixate on how the American people support the withdrawal from Afghanistan, which they do. That being said, they do not support how Biden handled it; even Democrats aren't as supportive of the president as they normally are.
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