Where’s The Line Between Paraphrasing And “Sanewashing?”

by dap | Sep 7, 2024 | Outside The Beltway, The New York Times, Washington Post

There is no question that Former President and current Republican Presidential Candidate Donald Trump has a “unique” approach to stump speeches and responding Q&A. While Trump likes to claim that English professors think his ability to weave stories together is brilliant , others will agree that it is sometimes hard to figure out what he is saying. His circuitous stylings challenge reporters covering him: how do you take rambling statements and whittle them down to more traditional, brief news quotes?

Increasingly, journalism critics are calling for the press to consider what gets lost in that process. To illustrate this issue, let’s work backward from reporting to what was actually said. Last night, the former President was the guest at the Economic Club of New York meeting. During his time, he answered questions from the club. Here’s the reporting on one of his answers:

Note that New York Times Reporter Michael Gold extracts two quotes from Trump response: “Take care” and “As much as child care is talked about as being expensive, it’s, relatively speaking, not very expensive compared to the kind of numbers we’ll be taking in.” The second quote is a little ambiguous. For example, what does “the kind of numbers we’ll be taking in” mean, and how does it relate to getting child care costs taken care of? That said, the reporting makes what said feel (at least kind of) normal.

Let’s take a look at what Trump actually said. First, here is the question he was responding to:

Reshma Saujani, founder of the nonprofit organization Girls Who Code, prefaced her question by noting that childcare outpaces inflation and costs the economy more than $122 billion annually.

“If you win in November,” she wondered, “can you commit to prioritizing legislation to make childcare affordable, and, if so, what specific piece of legislation will you advance?” [source ]

And here is Trump’s response:

Well, I would do that…We had Sen. Marco Rubio, and my daughter Ivanka was so impactful on that issue. it’s a very important issue. But I think when you talk about the kind of numbers that I’m talking about …child care is child care. You have to have it — in this country you have to have it.

But when you talk about those numbers compared to the kind of numbers that I’m talking about by taxing foreign nations at levels that they’re not used to — but they’ll get used to it very quickly — and it’s not going to stop them from doing business with us, but they’ll have a very substantial tax when they send product into our country. Those numbers are so much bigger than any numbers that we’re talking about, including child care, that it’s going to take care.

I look forward to having no deficits within a fairly short period of time, coupled with the reductions that I told you about on waste and fraud and all of the other things that are going on in our country, because I have to stay with child care. I want to stay with child care, but those numbers are small relative to the kind of economic numbers that I’m talking about, including growth, but growth also headed up by what the plan is that I just told you about.

We’re going to be taking in trillions of dollars, and as much as child care is talked about as being expensive, it’s, relatively speaking, not very expensive compared to the kind of numbers we’ll be taking in. We’re going to make this into an incredible [country that can] afford to take care of its people, and then we’ll worry about the rest of the world. Let’s help other people, but we’re going to take care of our country first. This is about America first. It’s about Make America Great Again, we have to do it because right now we’re a failing nation, so we’ll take care of it.

Gold’s calling this 330+ word response “jumbled” suddenly feels like an understatement. I’m going to skip the question of what trade tarriffs have to do with the cost of child care (the sane answer is nothing). I’ll also skip the former President’s gross mischaracterization that foreign countries are the ones who pay for tarriffs (the is no credible ecomonist, regardless of political orientation, that agrees with that statement ). I’ll also skip over the claim that Trump will get the country to no deficit (trade? budget? who knows) in a “short period of time” (something he spectacularly failed to do the last time he was in office). Instead I want to focus on Gold’s paraphrase of Trump:

“As much as child care is talked about as being expensive, it’s, relatively speaking, not very expensive compared to the kind of numbers we’ll be taking in.”

As close as I can tell, it’s a paraphrase of this small portion of the answer:

“I want to stay with child care, but those numbers are small relative to the kind of economic numbers that I’m talking about, including growth, but growth also headed up by what the plan is that I just told you about.”

Isolating this quote one can see how much work Gold did to make that excerpt parsible. He also dropped the entire second half of the quote, which made it clear that Trump thinks that tariffs will somehow pay for child care.

In an essay in the New Republic from earlier this week , Parker Molloy refers to what Gold and other Reporters do with Trump as “sanewashing:”

This “sanewashing” of Trump’s statements isn’t just poor journalism; it’s a form of misinformation that poses a threat to democracy. By continually reframing Trump’s incoherent and often dangerous rhetoric as conventional political discourse, major news outlets are failing in their duty to inform the public and are instead providing cover for increasingly erratic behavior from a former—and potentially future—president.

The consequences of this journalistic malpractice extend far beyond misleading headlines. By laundering Trump’s words in this fashion, the media is actively participating in the erosion of our shared reality. When major news outlets consistently present a polished version of Trump’s statements, they create an alternate narrative that exists alongside the unfiltered truth available on social media and in unedited footage.

Voters who rely solely on traditional news sources are presented with a version of Trump that bears little resemblance to reality. They see a former president who, while controversial, appears to operate within the bounds of normal political discourse—or at worst, is breaking with it in some kind of refreshing manner. You can see this folie à deux at work in a recent Times piece occasioned by Trump’s amplification of social media posts alleging that Harris owed her career to the provision of “blowjobs”: “Though he has a history of making crass insults about his opponents, the reposts signal Mr. Trump’s willingness to continue to shatter longstanding norms of political speech.” Meanwhile, those who seek out primary sources encounter a starkly different figure—one prone to conspiracy theories, personal attacks, and extreme rhetoric. …

By framing Trump’s incoherent ramblings as some form of avant-garde oratory, the Times isn’t just failing to accurately report—it’s actively warping reality to its readers.

The consequences of this extend beyond misleading headlines or sanitized quotes. It’s creating a dangerous disconnect between reality and reported news, fostering an environment where extreme rhetoric becomes normalized and conspiracy theories gain unwarranted legitimacy. [source ]

Unsurprisingly, like most of the OTB readership who comment, I strongly agree with Molloy’s argument. Other media critics have made similar points about the reporting of Trump. The question is: “why does the press do this?”

One reason is that Trump’s quotes often defy summation. In a case of the medium being the message, traditional news reporting at the Washington Post and the New York Times are still tied to the physical dimensions of paper, making reproducing a 338-word answer verbatim essentially impossible. For example, the body of the in-depth Washington Post article covering that speech (and other related topics) is approximately 1400 words. For those at home keeping score, Trump’s answer to that single question represents 23% of the word count of that article. So a semi-coherent quote is sanewashed down to the following 94 words:

When asked about how he’d make child care more affordable, Trump suggested that he would help pay for it by placing taxes on foreign governments. “We’re going to be taking in trillions of dollars, and as much as child care is talked about as being expensive, it’s relatively speaking not very expensive compared to the kinds of numbers we’re going to be taking in,” he said. He did not provide details or specifics about how this would work; experts have warned imposing tariffs on such a scale would risk triggering an international trade war. [source ]

The Washington Post didn’t even describe the answer with the relatively neutral descriptor “jumbled.” Perhaps, from a jaded reporter’s perspective, they think that “jumbled” is already baked in, so it’s better to finish the section with the (correct) opposing viewpoint that “experts have warned imposing tariffs on such a scale would risk triggering an international trade war.” That’s the type of “one side says ‘X’, the other side says ‘Y’” neutrality that journalists have been taught to do to ensure that their stories are “balanced” (or even worse “objective”). Returning to Molloy’s point, this reporting doesn’t capture all aspects of Trump’s message and delivery. It leaves out important information to help voters vet candidates (like the former President’s increasing incoherence).

At the same time, I suspect that some of our Trump-supporting readers bristled at Gold’s use of “jumbled” from the start of this article. “How dare a reported call that response ‘jumbled’?! His meaning (as with so many other Trump utterances) is completely apparent! ‘Jumbled’,’ and this essay, are just another example of the bias of liberal media and Trump Deragement Syndrome.” This has been the drumbeat of conservatives popularized by Rush Limbaugh and carried forward by folks like Tucker Carlson (who, allegedly, was unwittingly funded in part by RT to advance that message ) and other current right and alt-right commenters (at least some of whom, were, not unwittingly funded in part by RT to advance that message ).

To be clear, their working the refs (combined with diminishing news profits and reporters and editors taking the wrong lessons from J-school) has worked; hence the sanewashing.

The irony, of course, is that just a few days ago, I was told with a lot of assurance that isn’t what the radical-free-thinking-free-speech crowd (which many Trump supports see themselves) as want :

Why does every interviewer have to be an advocate or an activist? Can’t you make up you own mind about who is right or wrong?

(or are you [Matt] another one who thinks that we simply *should not be allowed* to see or read any objectionable material because the Great Unwashed are just like children and people like you are the annointed Arbiters Of All That Is True And Good?)

I have to wonder what Robert Jones would think if the media starter to publish Trump quotes unedited. Perhaps he would advocate that is what journalists should do for us to make up our minds about “who is right or wrong.” I also wonder if he, or those like him, think that applying the accurate discriptor of “jumbled” to that statement makes a journalist an “advocate or activist.” I suspect that if Gold had taken it a step further and used discriptors like “confusing” or “semi-coherent” it definitely would cross that line.

That said, to Molloy’s point, what they are reporting (which I suspect Trump supporters already think is deeply biased), thanks to sanewashing, is already misrepresnting the reality of Trump’s media answers. Which is equally a dangerous form of bias. But I’m not sure Trump supporters are ready for that.

(Countdown to a whataboutism response in the comments commencing… In 3, 2, …)

Addendum: One theme that has emerged in the comments is that the quote wasn’t Trump at his worst. In my opinion, that emphasizes the broader point about sanewashing. The fact that even involved followers of politics think this is “normal” for Trump helps us understand why the press ultimately chooses to cover him in the way that it does. And it presents the issue with how low our expectations for him have become (not to mention the role that sanewashing has played in lowering those standards).