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The media mogul working for Clinton World

Published: October 18, 2016, 9:48 am

    The Spanish-language Univision television network began attacking Donald Trump only days after his announcement on June 16, 2015, that he was seeking the Republican nomination.

    Univision abruptly canceled its telecast of the Miss USA pageant, which the Trump Organization owned jointly with NBCUniversal, to distance themselves from Trump calling illegal Mexican immigrants “rapists and drug dealers”.

    Now leaked emails from the Democratic National Committee published by WikiLeaks, show that within days of Trump’s announcement of his candidacy, Univision’s chairman, Haim Saban, was instructing the Clinton camp to take down Trump’s anti-immigrant agenda.

    “Haim thinks we are underreacting to Trump/Hispanics. Thinks we can get something by standing up for Latinos or attacking R’s (Republicans) for not condemning,” Clinton campaign Chairman John Podesta wrote to Clinton staffers on July 3, 2015.

    Jennifer Palmieri, a former White House spokeswoman who is communications director for the Clinton camp, immediately jumped in: “Haim is right – we should be jamming this all the time.”

    Trump responded with a $500 million lawsuit against the network for breach of contract.

    Univision’s anchor, Jorge Ramos, has since lead the charge, denouncing Trump as “a hater” reponsible for a “poisonous political climate where insults, bullying and racism have become commonplace.” The irony of Ramos’s acrimonious rant was lost on him.

    A spokeswoman for Saban, Stephanie Pillersdorf, denied that the media tycoon’s support for Clinton’s presidential bid had influenced Univision’s news coverage. “Not even one iota. Zero, zero, zero,” Pillersdorf retorted. “He [Saban] has been a supporter of Hillary separate and way before his involvement with Univision,” Pillersdorf said. But the WikiLeaks dump tell a different story.

    Ramos did not respond to email and messages on Twitter seeking comment on whether Saban has influenced his coverage.

    The Clinton campaign and the Democratic Party have focused instead on Russia’s unconfirmed complicity in hacking their mails. Clinton however vouched for their authenticity of the communication when she recalled details of a speech among the emails during a presidential debate.

    Saban’s media involvement has always been a headache for conservative commentators. His Wikipedia profile describes him as President Bill Clinton’s best friend who frequently stayed at the White House.

    The media mogul Saban, who holds both American and Israeli citizenship, also weighed in with the Clinton campaign on matters related to Israel. “She [Hillary] needs to differentiate herself from Obama on Israel,” Saban wrote to top campaign officials on June 20, 2015.

    Saban emailed Podesta on another occasion to complain about an Israeli television channel that had interviewed him and inaccurately portrayed his view of Clinton’s position on the nuclear deal with Iran, which Israel opposed.

    “No big deal and not even a small deal. I’m sure it was great in Hebrew,” Podesta responded. And Saban replied: “Lol. . . . Hebrew lessons bro.”

    Saban’s worries about the Palestinian-led Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions movement, which seeks international pressure on Israel to withdraw Jewish settlements in the West Bank, also featured.

    karin@praag.org

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