Washington Journal weekend host Bill Scanlan was hammered by a listener on his own show after an interview with conservative Matt Schlapp who went off on a rant about the 2020 election being fraudulent. The claim, which has become known as "the big lie," has been proven false by even conservative news outlets.
A woman from Illinois said that she'd been a loyal CSPAN viewer for 20 years and was aghast hearing Scanlan allowing Schlapp "go on, and on, and on. Even though I got into your program late, I didn't even hear a Democrat come on. All I heard were Republicans and Independents and it seems that times when I tune in to listening to your show that a lot of times I hear that mostly Republicans and Republican-leaning Independents that are getting through on your show."
She went on to say that she doesn't understand why Scanlan allowed Schlapp to "sit there and tell all those lies that he did."
This isn't the first time that Bill Scanlan is being questioned about allowing conservatives to rant on his airwaves.
In 2010, The Atlanticreached out to ask why Scanlan allowed "a caller to
launch into a grotesque anti-Semitic rant on Monday, and why he didn't challenge the caller or cut him off." He refused to comment.
By 2020 when another caller went off on a racist rant, Scanlan learned to drop them. That didn't extend to guests spinning falsehoods on air.
