Fox Hosts Idealize Bush’s “Precedent” Of Declassifying Intelligence Briefings

Fox News’ Gretchen Carlson urged President Obama to follow “precedent” set by President George W. Bush and release 18 months of daily intelligence briefings to prove what his administration knew about the rise of the Islamic State (ISIS) — despite the fact that Bush released only one intelligence briefing after years of pressure.

Fox has fixated on Obama’s Presidential Daily Briefs (PDB) amid ongoing U.S. air strikes against the Islamic State, reviving long debunked claims that the president skipped his scheduled briefings and thus missed intelligence on the terror group. The October 1 edition of The Real Story With Gretchen Carlson took a similar route, as Carlson and network anchor Bret Baier discussed a recent call by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) for Obama to release 18 months of his PDB in order to prove when he first learned of the Islamic State from the intelligence community. According to Carlson, “President Bush did do it, so there is precedent for this,” and the pair speculated about the chances of Obama doing the same now. Baier predicted that it was “not likely,” adding, “There is a precedent here, in that, the last time we dealt with a big intelligence question prior to 9/11, the 9/11 Commission met with President Bush and President Bush did come forward with the Presidential Daily Briefs.”

Though idealized by Carlson and Baier, Bush’s “precedent” on releasing PDBs is not one of disclosure.

Under pressure from the 9/11 Commission, the Bush administration fought the release of PDBs for two years. Ultimately, they released only one, titled “Bin Laden Determined To Strike in US,” years after the 2001 attack on the World Trade Center.

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