Fox News host Sean Hannity has said that he will address charges tonight on his self-titled primetime show that a recent segment used misleading video footage to inflate the attendance of a recent anti-Obama rally in Washington.
The decision comes after a Nov. 10 segment on Comedy Central’s The Daily Show With Jon Stewart presented apparent evidence that Hannity’s Nov. 5 report on an anti-health-care-reform rally used crowd footage from a more heavily attended 9/12 tea party protest. (Watch the clip below.)
The Hannity segment featured Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) discussing her anti-health-care-reform rally on the steps of the Capitol, a rally Bachmann estimated attracted as many as 45,000 people. The Daily Show’s Stewart pointed out that the Washington Post put attendance at 10,000.
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He also noted that video from the rally shows a sunny day and autumn colors while footage of much bigger crowds of sign wavers was shot on an overcast day when the leaves on the trees were still green.
A Fox News spokesperson directed all inquiries to tonight’s Hannity.
UPDATE: Hannity said on his program Nov. 11: “Although it pains me to say this, Jon Stewart, Comedy Central, he was right.”
Hannity called the footage snafu ”an inadvertent mistake, but a mistake nonetheless.”
“We apologize,” he said, and thanked Stewart and the Daily Show staff for being loyal viewers: “But by the way, I want to thank you and all your writers for watching.”
