Fox News personality Sean Hannity has repeatedly made a point of saying that he isn't a journalist over the years. But in a profile for the New York Times out Tuesday, he took it back, saying: "I’m a journalist. But I’m an advocacy journalist, or an opinion journalist."
The assertion is in direct contrast to what Hannity has said in the past, even as recently as April, when he claimed on his radio show: "I’m not a journalist, I’m a talk show host."
It became one of his go-to defenses during the 2016 election, as he was an open supporter of Donald Trump, even telling the Times in 2016: "I’m not hiding the fact that I want Donald Trump to be the next president of the United States. I never claimed to be a journalist."
It's unclear what made Hannity recently reassess his role, but he justified his self-description of an "opinion journalist" by saying, "I want to give my audiences the best shows possible."
And his audiences have come to expect bold and extreme opinions from Hannity.
But for some, the issue is that he attempts to use "opinion" and "journalist" in the same sentence, whether he finally admits to being a journalist or not:
Many on Twitter feel like Hannity is only opinions, and not any journalism:
Hannity has a massive following, reaching over 13 million people a day on various media platforms. So his brand of "opinion journalism" has wide-reaching implications. As a "friend" of Trump, Hannity had a huge influence during the 2016 election, and continues to be a major voice controlling the narrative of the far right.
In the end, whatever Hannity calls himself, those on the liberal end of the political spectrum are going to cry foul, considering the right calls out "fake news" for being biased on a constant basis.
And nobody needs a profile in the New York Times to know that.
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