Numerous staffers at CNN have issued responses to Sean Hannity after the Fox News host lashed out on Twitter over the weekend about the “hacks” at the rival news network and the “arrogance” of personalities like media reporter Brian Stelter.
After Hannity accused the CNN team of being “stenographers” for network head Jeff Zucker, CNN senior media reporter Oliver Darcy responded, “Given the level of stenography you do for the man sitting in the White House, it is quite rich for you to make that accusation against anyone else.”
Others suggested the real source of Hannity’s ire is a forthcoming book about Fox News and its ties to the Trump White House from CNN’s Brian Stelter.
“For my forthcoming book about Fox and Trump, I sent fact-checking Q’s to some of Hannity’s lawyers and confidants today,” Stelter tweeted on Saturday. “A few hours later, Hannity lobbed a bunch of Twitter missiles at me. Complete coincidence!”
Emily Kuhn, the communications director for CNN Digital as well as Stelter’s “Reliable Sources,” referenced the forthcoming book again on Sunday, musing, “Must be an interesting book if someone is reacting like that.”
On Saturday, one day after attorney Michael Avenatti was found guilty on all three charges related to his attempts to extort up to $25 million from Nike, Hannity lashed out at Stelter online, tweeting a link to a piece that reviewed a number of television news hosts speaking to Avenatti before he was charged. Stelter’s face is displayed prominently in the lead image.
Hannity continued his attack again Sunday, after Stelter addressed his own dealings with Avenatti during a segment of his Sunday show. Hannity’s renewed tweet storm came with a pretty self-aware preface: “Alright, I haven’t done this in a while and I’m sure the write-ups will say ‘Hannity rages in a tweet storm against .@brianstelter and CNN.’ But here it goes…”
From there, he used insulting nicknames to describe Stelter and Darcy. He castigated Stelter for “arrogance,” then brought up cable news ratings, where Fox News has continuously outpaced both CNN and MSNBC.
Hannity tweeted another round of insults a few hours after that, calling the others “creepy” and “hacks.”