A former reporter for the Irish Echo has prompted a furious response from White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt after asking questions about the death of Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis.
Niall Stanage, who is from Belfast, currently works for the newspaper The Hill in Washington, D.C. The paper focuses in large part on political affairs. Stanage is also a published author.
Leavitt accused Stanage, who worked as a staff reporter the Echo for several years pre 2010, of being a “left-wing activist,” this during a heated confrontation on Thursday in the White House Press Room.
According to a report in The Guardian, Stanage began his question during a press briefing by referring to the Trump administration’s staunch defence of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and the assertion by the Homeland Security secretary, Kristi Noem, that ICE are “doing everything correctly."
Stanage pointed to statistics showing that last year 32 people died in ICE custody and 170 US citizens were detained by ICE before noting that Ms. Good was “shot in the head and killed by an ICE agent."
Stanage asked Leavitt: “How does that equate to them doing everything correctly?”.
The report of the exchange, which has spread to an array of media outlets, continued: “Why was Renee Good unfortunately and tragically killed?” Ms. Leavitt asked.
Mr. Stanage asked whether Ms. Leavitt was asking him his opinion, to which she said: “Yeah.”
“Because an Ice agent acted recklessly and killed her unjustifiably,” Mr. Stanage replied.
Ms. Leavitt shot back: “Okay, so you’re a biased reporter with a left-wing opinion ... Because you’re a left-wing hack. You’re not a reporter, you’re posing in this room as a journalist. And it’s so clear by the premise of your question. And you and the people of the media who have such biases but fake like you’re a journalist, you shouldn’t even be sitting in that seat.”
She went on: “But you’re pretending like you’re a journalist, but you’re a left-wing activist. And the question that you just raised and your answer proves you’re biased. You should be reporting on the facts. You should be reporting on the cases.”
Leavitt told Stanage he should be more focused on how many American citizens were killed by “illegal” immigrants.
“I bet you didn’t even read up on those stories,” she said.
“I bet you never even read about Laken Riley or Jocelyn Nungaray or all of the innocent Americans who were killed at the hand of illegal aliens in this country and the brave men and women of Ice are doing everything in their power to remove those heinous individuals and make our communities safer. And shame on people like you in the media who have a crooked view and have a biased view and pretend like you’re a real, honest journalist.”
