Viewers Question Reporter After She Asks If It’s OK for President to Watch Basketball Game

By Kevin Eck 

KATU reporter Anna Canzano stirred up some negative viewer reaction when she used social media to question whether it was appropriate for President Barack Obama to watch a college basketball game with his family.

The reporter for the Portland, OR, ABC affiliate wrote roughly the same question on both the KATU facebook page, her company facebook page and her company twitter feed,

A large majority of the responses were in the president’s favor and many wondered why Canzano was asking the question at all. One responder on twitter asked Canzano, “what is wrong with you?”

Craig Robinson, the Oregon State basketball team’s head coach, is President Obama’s brother-in-law.  The first family watched the game between the Beavers and the Maryland Terrapins at the Comcast Center in College Park, MD on Sunday.

Canzano told Poynter.org, “I was trying to gauge public sentiment about the president — much like I have countless times on Facebook with a variety of topics.”

Poynter did show that Canzano uses her social media accounts to ask similar questions. On Twitter, she’ll leave a link for viewers to comment on her facebook post asking the same question. Two examples: “Gov. Chris Christie’s acceptance speech was more like an announcement speech. Could you see him as president? http://fb.me/3npE35KDE” and “Did you find kids last night grabbing TWO pieces of candy & not saying trick or treat?”

We have asked KATU general manager John Tamerlano for comment and will update when we hear back.

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