Thursday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” Axios CEO Jim VandeHei reacted to Southern states like Florida, Mississippi and Georgia, all led by GOP governors, issuing stay at home orders to fight the spread of the coronavirus later than the majority of other states around the country.
According to the Axios co-founder, the GOP governors are suffering from “information inequality” and “news pollution,” which he said is a result of the governors listening to President Donald Trump, Fox News, conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh and conservatives on social media platforms.
“What you’re seeing here, and this is a bigger problem for society, is information inequality,” VandeHei argued. “Like, why did DeSantis do what he did? Why did Georgia wait so long? It’s because they were listening to President Trump up until the last five or six days. They were watching Fox News, they were listening to Rush Limbaugh, and they were following conservatives on Twitter or social media, all of whom were downplaying this. The information was there. But in that information bubble, they were basically getting a lot of sort of noise and news pollution. And it has huge consequences because all of these steps, which you guys talk about on the show every day, could have been done months ago — certainly could have been done weeks ago. Nothing new. What the governor reacted is not new news, it wasn’t a debatable fact. We’ve all known that anybody who is asymptomatic can pass it on to others, and often pass it on to many others.”
He continued, “And that problem has only been rectified really in the last five or six days. You have seen a different tone from the president, and you have seen a different tone from more people on Fox News. There’s still a lot of garbage out there. You go on Facebook, Twitter, you follow some of these conservatives who have big followings, that may be a lot of people who are watching the show don’t necessarily follow or are aware of. They’re still spreading nonsense. Still a lot of, ah, it’s a big government trying to jam down their dumb rules on us. And that has massive consequences.”
(h/t Newsbusters)
Follow Trent Baker on Twitter @MagnifiTrent
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