Jon Stewart reported on his November 11, 2009, broadcast of The Daily Show that Fox News pundit Sean Hannity misrepresented video footage purportedly showing large crowds on a health-care protest orchestrated by Rep. Michele Bachmann. Stewart showed inconsistencies in alternating shots according to the color of the sky and tree leaves, showing that footage from Glenn Beck's much larger 9/12 rally, which had occurred two months earlier, and been spliced in with the other shots. Hannity estimated 20,000 protesters were in attendance, the Washington Post estimated 10,000, and Luke Russert reported that three Capitol Hill police officers guessed "about 4,000."[110][111] Sean Hannity apologized to his viewers for the error during his November 11, 2009 broadcast.[112] Stewart periodically accused Fox of playing video footage out of context, such as when Hannity played footage of Obama stating the DREAM Act could not be passed by executive order to make the president seem hypocritical although when the footage is continued Obama goes on to clarify that the president does have the authority to halt deportations.[113]
On November 18, 2009, Fox News anchor Gregg Jarrett told viewers that a Sarah Palin book signing in Grand Rapids, Michigan, had a massive turnout while showing footage of Palin with a large crowd. Jarrett noted that the former Republican vice-presidential candidate is "continuing to draw huge crowds while she's promoting her brand-new book", adding that the images being shown were "some of the pictures just coming in to us ... The lines earlier had formed this morning."[114] The video was actually taken from a 2008 McCain/Palin campaign rally. Fox senior vice-president of news Michael Clemente issued an initial statement saying, "This was a production error in which the copy editor changed a script and didn't alert the control room to update the video."[114] Fox offered an on-air apology the following day during the same "Happening Now" segment citing regrets for what they described as a "video error" with no intent to mislead.[115]
In September 2010, Fox News anchor Sean Hannity was criticized notably by Stewart and CNN anchor Howard Kurtz, for selectively editing a video of an Obama speech on his program. Before playing the clip, Hannity remarked that there was a "rare moment of honesty" in Obama's speech, playing a video of Obama saying:
Taxes are scheduled to go up substantially next year, for everybody.
It quickly cuts back to Hannity, with Hannity saying, "I know the anointed one will make sure that happens."[116] But upon further inspection, what President Obama fully said was:
Under the tax plan passed by the last administration, taxes are scheduled to go up substantially next year, for everybody.
On September 18, 2009, Fox News Channel took out full-page ads in The Washington Post, the New York Post, and The Wall Street Journal with a prominent caption reading, "How did ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, and CNN miss this story?" with pictures of a Tea Party movement protest on the United States Capitol lawn. A still picture in the ad was in fact taken from a CNN broadcast covering the event. The veracity of this ad was called into question on the air by then-CNN commentator Rick Sanchez, along with others pointing to various coverage of the event.[96][97][98] CNN, NBC, CBS, MSNBC, and CBS Radio News provided various forms of live coverage of the rally in Washington throughout the day on Saturday, including the lead story on CBS Evening News.[96][98][99][100]
