CNN and MSNBC provided live gavel-to-gavel coverage of the nearly 10 hours of in-front-of-the-camera debate and behind-closed-door negotiating of the DNC rules committee meeting. Wolf Blitzer and Campbell Brown anchored on CNN while Norah O’Donnell, Andrea Mitchell and later Chris Matthews anchored on MSNBC. Mitchell broke off later in the afternoon to file a report for NBC Nightly News and then returned to wrap up the meeting after 7pmET.
Fox News Channel stuck with their regular programming with reporting from the DNC meeting in Washington, as well as reporting from Major Garrett in San Juan reporting on tomorrow’s primary, and the breaking news that Barack Obama was leaving Trinity church. CNN was first with the Obama news from contributor Roland Martin at 5:46pmET.
One media titan got a mention on a network he doesn’t run. During the committee’s extended lunch, at which point the networks went into extended recap mode, MSNBC’s Norah O’Donnell said, “Even Rupert Murdoch is predicting a democratic landslide and that John McCain has problems,” said O’Donnell. “Murdoch, who of course, is the News Corp. chairman,” she added.
As for the meeting to decide the delegates, it was divisive and raucous and left one committee member “stunned.” Clinton supporter Harold Ickes rhetorically asked “Was the process flawed? You bet your ass it was flawed,” he said. He then said Sen. Clinton authorized him “to take this to the credentials committee.”
In other words, the cable networks just got their wish. This thing may not be over Wednesday morning.