“A spokesman for Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) has announced that the governor will be ‘boycotting’ NBC and MSNBC, over remarks that Andrea Mitchell made about his education policy during an interview with Vice President Kamala Harris,” Raw Story said on Wednesday, February 22, 2023, based on a story in Daily Beast (here).
DeSantis didn’t like how Mitchell characterized his efforts to censor black history in Florida’s public schools (see details here). You wouldn’t expect him to. It’s not journalists’ job to appease politicians.
This will backfire on him. It’s standard journalistic practice, when reporting about a politician, to ask his office for comment. If he refuses to respond to reporters’ inquiries, NBC News won’t stop covering him, they simply won’t be able to report his side of the story. The network’s millions of viewers will only get the other side.
This time, he’s censoring himself.