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lite.cnn.com - on gopher - inofficial
ARTICLE VIEW:
GOP lawmaker says Trump is wrong to threaten the media in wake of
Kimmel controversy
By Aileen Graef, CNN
Updated:
7:00 AM EDT, Sun September 21, 2025
Source: CNN
Rep. Don Bacon is leaving Congress next year — and offering some of
the sharpest criticism to date of of anyone in his party.
Bacon, a Republican who has represented a Nebraska swing district for
the past eight years, says the GOP has departed from the conservative
ideology that had dominated the party for decades. Instead, under
Trump, he contends that the party has taken an insular turn and an
isolationist approach to the world and protectionist economic policy
— both of which, he warned, make the US less secure.
In a wide-ranging interview with CNN’s Manu Raju, Bacon raised
concerns over Trump and the First Amendment in the wake of controversy
over – going to criticize him directly.
“I think the President doing threats against media is also wrong. We
don’t threaten the media,” Bacon said on “Inside Politics
Sunday.”
He added later: “To threaten media and say you’re going to pull
their license, that’s not what America’s about. We do have a
freedom of speech, freedom of the press. We should, we should defend
that.”
Disney’s ABC Kimmel’s show off the air indefinitely amid
controversy over his recent comments about Charlie Kirk’s suspected
killer.
The move Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr suggested
Kimmel should be suspended and said, “We can do this the easy way or
the hard way.”
“Congratulations to ABC for finally having the courage to do what had
to be done,” Trump wrote in on his Truth Social platform last week.
While Bacon did think that pulling of Kimmel from the air was “by and
large” a business decision by ABC, he called the threats from Carr a
“mistake.”
“There’s a difference between threatening media and saying you’ll
pull their license. That’s not right, it’s wrong to say you’re
going to prosecute that,” he said.
Bacon said Trump should tone down the rhetoric in the wake of the Kirk
assassination rather than blaming “left-wing violence” and lamented
that the president centers on “anger and opposition.” He argued the
president missed the moment to instead unify the country in the days
after.
“He had a chance to be more Ronald Reagan to try to unify on both
sides out of this, it would be one thing if it was more Republicans
being murdered, but it’s not. We see, we see on both sides,” he
said, adding that “this affects everybody.”
‘I don’t think people voted for him for tariffs’
Bacon was one of the Republicans who nearly sank a procedural vote on
the floor last week over a provision that would restrict Congress’
ability to be a check on tariffs enacted by the president.
Bacon, a vocal critic of tariffs, said the use of the tool is “his
position not mine,” referring to Trump, and said, “I think a lot of
my colleagues actually agree that they’re reluctant to go against the
signature policy that he ran on. I don’t think people voted for him
for tariffs.”
When asked if he thought the president was overreaching on tariffs,
Bacon said, “He is by far.”
“But I would, I see damage being done because of tariffs. Iowa and
Nebraska are really struggling right now with our farm economy. We’re
not growing markets for corn or soybeans. The president’s making
trade deals. But not a single country that I could see, has bought more
corn or soybeans,” he said.
What bothers Bacon the most
Another point of divergence between the congressman and the president
is isolationism from allies. Bacon, who has been critical of Trump’s
at times seemingly close relationship with Russian President Vladimir
Putin, said Trump has helped bring Putin in from the “wilderness.”
“He seems to go too far in accommodating Putin and he does very
little to accommodate [Ukrainian President Volodymyr] Zelensky or
Ukraine,” he said.
Bacon, who said the president has lacked “moral clarity” in his
handling of Russia’s war in Ukraine, pointedly refused to say if
Trump has the moral character he wants to see in a president.
“I just think we gotta be careful about that,” Bacon said.
“I don’t see the moral clarity right now out of the White House,
Ronald Reagan had the moral clarity,” he said, saying Trump “sends
out such mixed messages on NATO and totally morally ambiguous messages
about Ukraine and Russia. It really, it’s probably the thing that
bothers me the most.”
The congressman said he hopes the significant changes he has seen to
the Republican Party are not a “permanent remaking.”
Despite his upcoming departure from Congress, Bacon said he will
continue to speak up. And while he is “a little bit” concerned with
Republicans in his party showing a lack of independence, he thinks in
his next act he could “have a good role in supporting traditional
Republicans and try to swing this back to where. … I was very
comfortable with Ronald Reagan.”
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