CNN and MSNBC promoted they would be covering the Presidential Medal of Freedom ceremony from the White House this afternoon, but coverage from the grand jury Missouri changed those plans. “You’re going to want to see this Presidential Medal of Freedom ceremony,” Wolf Blitzer, who was to anchor CNN coverage, teased around 1:20pmET. Even MSNBC, which had one of its own inducted — NBC Newsman Tom Brokaw — passed on taking the ceremony on the cable channel. FNC’s Gretchen Carlson dipped into coverage and mentioned it was livestreaming on FoxNews.com. Here’s how Pres. Obama introduced Brokaw at the ceremony:
At pivotal moments, Tom got it. He reported on Watergate, snuck a camera into Tiananmen Square, sat down for the first one-on-one with Mikhail Gorbachev by an American TV reporter, covered every presidential election since 1968. We have welcomed him into our homes at dinnertime and Sunday mornings. We’ve trusted him to tell us what we needed to know and to ask questions that needed to be asked. I know because I have been on the receiving end of some of those questions.
Other honorees including Ethel Kennedy, Marlo Thomas, Meryl Streep, Stephen Sondheim and the late Alvin Ailey.