'Collectively, We're All Guilty': Capitol Hill Reporter Admits the 'Kay Granger Story' Fell Through the Cracks

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: MEDIAite

Dec 23rd, 2024, 2:15 pm


At least one Capitol Hill reporter admitted to dropping the ball when it came to alerting constituents that Rep. Kay Granger (R-TX) has been missing in action from the House floor because she’s been dealing with “dementia issues” at an assisted living facility for the past six months.

Hans Nichols, political reporter with Axios, offered up a mea culpa on CNN’s Inside Politics on Monday. “We’re still, as reporters, have limited resources and limited time to report all these stories out. That said, we should have gotten the Kay Granger story. I mean, like, I’ll own part of that, as someone that spends some time on the Hill. You know, collectively we’re all guilty. Like, you know, individually, it’s hard to parse out guilt,” Nichols said.

“Should there be stronger local news in Texas? Yes. Right. Would they have sniffed it out? But there’s no mechanism in our Constitution to really sort of catch this or prevent it from happening. It’s on the press corps and we just have to figure out how to figure it out. And it takes real reporting, right? This is real resources, you have to get the story. Not impossible to do. It’s pretty obvious in retrospect, but none of us had the time or the resources to do it. And, you know, we owe a portion of the blame,” he continued.

In fact, a The Dallas Express’s Carlos Turcios did “sniff out” the story on Dec. 20 with the headline, “Where is Congresswoman Kay Granger?”

Read more: https://www.mediaite.com/politics/collectively-were-all-guilty-capitol-hill-reporter-admits-the-kay-granger-story-fell-through-the-cracks/

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It didn't "fall through the cracks". It was intentionally "buried". Their "ball" was on bashing Biden 24/7 and insinuating "dementia" and all kinds of other "ailments" for him, including having CNN's Sanjay Gupta do a whole thing on that via "armchair medicine" (on behalf of the GOP) while ignoring the actual people likely diagnosed with it.

It wasn't like she was some new member of Congress. She was a veteran in there for decades and Chair of the House Appropriations Committee, one of the most powerful Committees in the House, during the 118th Congress.

[Diamond_Dog]

1. I think MAGA Mike should've been aware of this too

If he was doing his job instead of busy kissing ass.

[riversedge]

8. umm.. I do not assume the speaker did not know--. He had to know she was missing since summer.

[Texin]

41. Exactly. I'm quite sure they all did or most of them anyway.

[Roy Rolling]

50. The Whole GOP Knew

Where’s the house whip whose job it is to count the Republican votes on every issue?

So Steve Scalise didn’t know one of the Republican House members he whipped for a vote was in an “assisted living memory unit”?

Of course he knew, and his job as a Republican ass-kisser is to tell fellow ass-kisser Mike Johnson whether Rep. Kay Gramger plans to vote “yes” or “no” on the legislation up for a vote on the House floor.

Steve Scalise is the chief weasel for the GOP on this. Shame.

[dickthegrouch]

2. If congress doesn't update its spreadsheet if votes daily

It damn well should.
What more resources do reporters need?
BS explanation IMHO.
It should be really easy to query a database of how each elected member of every government voted and to be able to see when they voted.

[LeftInTX]

4. It should be there. I think since there are 535 of them, it might be easy for the media to lose track of one.

There are just some congress critters who just don't draw much attention. I live in SA, but I couldn't tell you who represents the Waco area or the Williamson County area etc. I don't even know who represents that area east of Austin or the northern part of Austin. I know who represents the southern part of Travis County because we share districts with them. The rest is a blur to me.

[BumRushDaShow]

7. But she is Chair of the House Appropriations Committee

I remember when this self-same media obsessed over Fetterman when he was missing votes while going through his depression/counseling and they were literally ticking off how many votes he was "missing" during that time. And this was literally during his first year in office.

Granger has been in the House for 27 years (since 1997).

[orleans]

22. if she is the chair then i'm wondering what has fallen by the wayside since she's been mia. nt

[BumRushDaShow]

23. It looks like once she had announced this past spring that she was not running again

she gave up the position "early" and Tom Cole threw his hat in (and eventually took the position) - https://rollcall.com/2024/03/28/cole-considered-early-favorite-to-win-house-appropriations-gavel/

Here are the members on the Committee - https://appropriations.house.gov/about/membership

[orleans]

31. well, at least that. thanks for letting me know. nt

[BumRushDaShow]

34. I remember Tom Cole's name coming up in the news

this past spring but I was thinking it was for jockeying to take over assuming they kept the House. He had been one of the very vocal fiscal GOPers after the teabaggers came in around 2010 but when the MAGat loons started coming in more recently, he seemed to fade into the background.

[mgardener]

13. Don't you think

The people who sat on either side of Congress not8ced?

It was the responsiblity of the Speaker to know this. No one noticed tat a person was gone for months?

Republicans knew. Her staff knew.
Her family knew.

And they did nothing.
This was a coverup.

[LeftInTX]

14. Yeah, but the media didn't notice.

[BumRushDaShow]

6. The Clerk of the House publishes the Roll Call votes online

It may take a little time but they try to get it up there within an hour or two of the final vote - https://clerk.house.gov/Votes

[dickthegrouch]

12. Exactly my point. Thank you /nt

[Historic NY]

3. With the amount of did not votes...

one has to wonder who orchestrated the votes she did make

[LeftInTX]

5. She hasn't voted since July.

[Historic NY]

9. Even before intermittent

[Srkdqltr]

10. Why didn't her family or her secretary say something? Or was she just an old woman who was never missed?

How sad.

[underpants]

33. I'd think they knew. Someone got her admitted

Signed all the agreements. Filed with the insurance company.

[mpcamb]

44. Dementia is don't distinguish her from much of the R cohort.

[brer cat]

11. Hans Nichols should be ashamed to call himself a journalist.

I mean, like, you know....

[YodaMom2]

40. I had the same thought.

As a journalist, this man is - by definition - a writer. One would assume that he would be able to speak in complete sentences without sounding like an 80’s Valley Girl. I mean, like, you know, like, right?

[Paladin]

15. The media wouldn't have missed covering an absent Democratic representative.

This past election is ample proof of that.

[Renew Deal]

16. It was also unethical of her office to keep the ruse going

[3Hotdogs]

17. Her staff and her family, but But BUt BUT as long as the gub'mint checks kept coming....

If anyone said anything, staff would be out of a job and family would be paying for "memory care" out of savings.

I do feel sorry for the woman. It's a shit way to go.

[idahoblue]

18. So she was re-elected while in a nursing home?

Did she run unopposed? Who campaigned for her? Are her constituents really that stupid?

[orleans]

21. i am wondering those same things

what a scam!

[Srkdqltr]

27. She was not reelected, she did not run again.

[jimfields33]

35. No!!!!!!!

She didn’t run for reelection. It’s in the article.

[Hassler]

19. News flash for our Press Corpse, this is

Only the easiest case of failing us. I guess it's a start.

[PortTack]

20. They are f..king guilty of a missing a lot of very important stories. Probably more like purposely buried them

[perdita9]

24. More evidence that the media is failing the American people

If it had been a Democrat they would have reported on it. Republicans always get a pass.

[Prairie Gates]

25. "It's like, I mean, you know, like..."

I mean, like, I’ll own part of that, as someone that spends some time on the Hill. You know, collectively we’re all guilty. Like, you know, individually,...

What in the world? OK, two things

1. It has long been journalistic standard to edit out filler words from quotations. Everybody uses them to some extent, and they don't read well. There have been good studies on this. It used to be that editors would leave filler words in a quotation when they wanted the quoted person to sound provincial or stupid. So, yes, it often had a racial component, and very often had a gendered component. However...

2. This is a lot of filler words to content for a professional journalist, even in ordinary speech. Good Lord!

[BumRushDaShow]

26. I remember back in high school

when teachers excoriated anyone who was stumbling around with "You know... like" and "Like it was...like...".

[biophile]

28. But it's like, you know, just like normalized now, you know?

😏🙄

[BumRushDaShow]

32. It's been normalized for a LONG time!

I remember being part of my office's "Toastmasters" club for a year or so and it was definitely instructive on that "problem".

[flamingdem]

29. SORT OF

I can't stand that interjection.

You know was my generation. At least I tried not to say it!

[Wonder Why]

30. When people use "we" When apologizing, they are trying to minimize their

responsibility by spreading out the blame like the Nazi generals who said "We were just following orders", the CEOs that say "We made mistakes" or those who said "We didn't treat Vietnam veterans very well when they came back".

[Linda ladeewolf]

36. I wish

George Soros would buy a paper for the democrats or that one of these other wealthy democrats would do that. They’d find plenty of reputable, out of work , journalists to staff it.

[Ray Bruns]

37. "We're still, as reporters, have limited resources and limited time to report all these stories out"

I guess that’s true when you’re on your knees sucking Donald Trump’s dick 24/7

[Kid Berwyn]

39. Political Malpractice. Journalistic Malpractice.

President Musk can primary the pols and buy the Big Six media companies and fire the lot of the ink-stained wretches the same day with his pocket change.

[DeeDeeNY]

42. The Slobfather also has "dementia issues" not mentioned by the media

[IronLionZion]

43. I guess her constituents didn't notice they weren't being represented

in case they needed anything from her office

[tonekat]

45. They always get a pass

Heck, wait until the GQP makes it OK for them to devote 90% of their time to pursuing insider trading, selling their vote, etc..

[onenote]

46. Its not that surprising that it wasn't noticed until recently

Maybe September at earliest. But she wasn’t missing for six months. Her last four votes were cast on the morning of July 24. She missed 9 votes held between 9 and 10 pm that night, but so did between 16 and 29 other members. There was only one vote on July 25, also missed by over a dozen other members. Congress then was on recess with no votes for the next 7+ weeks before coming back back for votes on 12 days between September 9 and 25 after which they were out of session again with no votes during October and the first11 days of November. So while her absence definitely should have been noticed after the election it’s also the case that she wasn’t the only lame duck not showing up.

[BumRushDaShow]

47. The bigger "issue"

is that the media spent an excessive amount of time obsessing over Democrats and their medical issues - most recently John Fetterman when he was at Walter Reed getting clinical depression treatments for several months during his first year in office where he was not voting, and where they made sure to find every which way to underscore "the ramifications". E.g., https://www.wgal.com/article/ramifications-of-us-sen-john-fettermans-absence/43131411

And then add to that their fixation on Dianne Feinstein and her ailments at around the same time and her missed votes - https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/3894571-feinstein-fetterman-absences-leave-democrats-with-fragile-majority/

Where in this case, it was intentionally ignored.

[Captain Zero]

48. Crux of the matter right up there

[JI7]

49. Just admit you all are whores for the right wing

[Lovie777]

51. GQP knew...............

[JustAnotherGen]

52. Truth BRDS!

It didn't "fall through the cracks". It was intentionally "buried". Their "ball" was on bashing Biden 24/7 and insinuating "dementia" and all kinds of other "ailments" for him, including having CNN's Sanjay Gupta do a whole thing on that via "armchair medicine" (on behalf of the GOP) while ignoring the actual people likely diagnosed with it.

It wasn't like she was some new member of Congress. She was a veteran in there for decades and Chair of the House Appropriations Committee, one of the most powerful Committees in the House, during the 118th Congress.

[no_hypocrisy]

53. In July, the Media was on top of my Rep,

Bill Pascrell, Jr. (NJ CD-9), who was sick and dying. Just about the same time Kay Granger disappeared.

Journalistic negligence or malfeasance.

[BumRushDaShow]

54. Exactly!

And that firebrand Pascrell will be sorely missed!! He was instrumental in getting Ghouliani disbarred.

[travelingthrulife]

55. Perhaps if they would remove their noses from Trump/Elon's backside

they would see what's around them.

[usonian]

56. MEDIA: We were too busy reading the tabloids and focusing on Hannibal Lecter to notice.

[BumRushDaShow]

58. Alternately

MEDIA: We were too busy reading the tabloids and focusing on Hannibal Lecter Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce to notice.

[BobTheSubgenius]

57. 6 months is MORE than enough time for her absence to be not just noticed, but glaring.

Up till then, though, it would probably have been difficult to notice her symptoms as anything other than normal GOP SOP.

[usonian]

59. K&R a thousand times if I could

Inscribe these words in stone

It didn't "fall through the cracks". It was intentionally "buried". Their "ball" was on bashing Biden 24/7 and insinuating "dementia" and all kinds of other "ailments" for him, including having CNN's Sanjay Gupta do a whole thing on that via "armchair medicine" (on behalf of the GOP) while ignoring the actual people likely diagnosed with it.

It wasn't like she was some new member of Congress. She was a veteran in there for decades and Chair of the House Appropriations Committee, one of the most powerful Committees in the House, during the 118th Congress.