Washington Post columnist Josh Rogin argued that he could pay a price for criticizing Jeff Bezos, the owner of the D.C. news outlet.
Rogin recently accused “Real Time” host Bill Maher of having played into President Trump’s hands by meeting with him the previous week. “I think you’ve fallen into the trap, and I think I represent 99% of the internet when I say this: you’ve played the game of proximity is principle,” Rogin said. “I’m not questioning your motivation, I’m questioning Trump’s, OK?”
On Monday’s episode of “Piers Morgan Uncensored,” the eponymous host grilled Rogin for criticizing Maher while purportedly being silent about Bezos extending olive branches to Trump.
“You work for The Washington Post. Your owner, Jeff Bezos, has done a lot more than Bill Maher in crossing the divide with Trump. He used to be very critical of Trump. But in the last year and a half or so, or since his shooting actually, he seems to have performed a massive U-turn on Trump,” Morgan said.
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The host recalled numerous ways in which Bezos has warmed up to Trump, from dining with him at his Mar-a-Lago estate in December to pledging a million dollars to his inauguration fund. He then proceeded to ask, “I mean, as The Washington Post senior journalist, how do you feel about all that?”
Rogin denied that he was trying to criticize Maher, saying that “if it came off that way, then maybe I didn’t craft my critique perfectly. I was trying to criticize the idea that, you know, engagement with Trump is some sort of, you know, bridge towards healing the cultural divide, because I just don’t think that’s going to be the result.”
He then argued that business leaders meeting with Trump is an entirely different set of calculations. When it comes to his own experience at the Post, he said, he is neither privy to what goes on at the management level, nor has he even met Bezos in person. Rogin argued this response is “not a duck, it’s just I don’t have any insight into what goes on above me at The Washington Post.”
Morgan used a bit of wordplay in responding to Rogin’s denial that he was trying to “duck” the question.
“Josh, look, if it looks like a duck, and it sounds like a duck, it’s probably a duck,” Morgan said. “I mean, you can appreciate that if you’re Bill Maher watching you refusing to be remotely critical of what your owner has done with Trump in terms of kissing the ring, you could potentially see that he might think there’s a double standard there.”
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“I see what you’re trying to do, Piers, but I’m not in a position to comment on Jeff Bezos, because if I comment on Jeff Bezos, then I could be fired from my job, and you know that, so I’m not going to do that,” Rogin replied. “But at the same time, I want to be honest with you, so I don’t seem to be dodging your question.”
“And my honest answer from my heart is, you know, every person that engages with this administration, including all the people on this panel, including you, including me, has to make that judgment based on their own calculations of their own values and their own interests, and we have to be careful not to judge each other for where we all come down on that. And that’s the best answer I can give you, being honest, without losing my job,” he added.
Rogin argued that he has been consistent in this stance, claiming it was the same one he had when he spoke to Maher, where essentially, “engagement is good and the way that you do it matters, and your expectations of Trump’s response should be very limited.”
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The Washington Post columnist argued that this response was “my effort to answer you honestly, Piers, without getting fired from my job and without — but to try to prove to you that I do have a very consistent philosophy on this, which is not going to please the Trumpsters, and it’s not going to please the liberals, because I’m neither Trumpster nor a liberal.”
