A top Walt Disney Company executive is refusing to answer if her close friendship with Kamala Harris affected last week’s ABC News presidential debate during which moderators David Muir and Linsey Davis showed clear and frequent bias in favor of Harris.
Dana Walden, who oversees ABC News and would have been in a position to dictate how the debate was run, was on the red carpet at Sunday’s Emmy Awards in Los Angeles when she was asked by Variety if she had anything to say about the controversy, which the outlet disingenuously framed as a “far-right” talking point.
“You know I really don’t want to dignify it with much of a response,” Walden said.
“I have the highest regard for everyone at ABC News. It’s the most professional organization, the most top-notch journalists,” she added. “It doesn’t really dignify much of a response.”
Walden’s refusal to answer comes after ABC News’ Linsey Davis recently admitted that the news organization deliberately planned to target former President Donald Trump with live, on-air fact checking — while not applying the same standard to Kamala Harris.
During last week’s debate, the ABC News moderators repeatedly interrupted Trump with fact checks, but failed to fact-check Harris a single time, even though she spouted a number of easily disprovable lies, including a shockingly false claim about military service members serving in war zones.
The clear bias against Trump has led to accusations that Dana Walden put her thumb on the scale to help her friend Kamala Harris.
The vice president has even called herself “extraordinary friends” with the Waldens.
Dana Walden serves as co-chairman of Disney Entertainment where she oversees numerous TV divisions, including ABC News and ABC Entertainment. Over the years, she has donated numerous times to Kamala Harris’ various political campaigns, including her 2020 presidential bid that fizzled out early in the primaries, according to a recent New York Times report.
She has hosted Harris fundraisers at her home in Los Angeles. Last year, she reportedly donated $20,000 to support President Joe Biden and the Democratic Party.
More disturbingly, Walden reportedly remains close friends with Kamala Harris and her husband, entertainment lawyer Doug Emhoff. Harris once credited Dana Walden and her husband, Matt, for her marriage during a 2022 fundraiser.
Following last week’s debate, Walden has been thrust into the spotlight as questions keep emerging about how the news network could have allowed the moderators to be so blatantly biased in favor of Kamala Harris.
So obvious was the bias that a former Bill and Hillary Clinton advisor has publicly blasted ABC News.
In a Wall Street Journal op-ed, former Clinton advisor Mark Penn wrote (along with Andrew Stein) that ABC’s bias deprived voters of a fair debate and that the moderators should have fact-checked both candidates or neither.
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