Ted Koppel tells Sean Hannity he's bad for America

Veteran journalist Ted Koppel didn’t mince words when interviewing Fox News host Sean Hannity for a segment on Sunday’s CBS Sunday Morning broadcast, telling Hannity he’s bad for America.

Koppel’s piece, called “A polarized America,” investigated the deep political divide in the country, one that has seemingly grown larger with the election of Donald Trump to the presidency last year. As part of the segment, Koppel interviewed Hannity, whom he noted “promoted Donald Trump and a highly partisan agenda” on Fox News.

“I think liberalism must be defeated. Socialism must be defeated in a political sense. We don’t want a revolution in this country,” Hannity said to Koppel, before adding that while Republicans currently have control of the White House, Congress, and Senate, “we have angry snowflakes, and then we’ve got a Democratic establishment. I say the press in this country is out to destroy the president.”

Later in the piece, Hannity defended his show appearing alongside news broadcasts. “We have to give some credit to the American people that they’re somewhat intelligent and that they know the difference between an opinion show and a news show,” Hannity said. Koppel wasn’t convinced.

“You think I’m bad for America,” Hannity said.

“Yeah,” Koppel replied. “In the long haul, I think you and all these opinion shows ... you know why? Because you’re very good at what you do and because you have attracted a significantly more influential ... you have attracted people who are determined that ideology is more important than facts.”

The clip above quickly went viral on Sunday, drawing numerous responses - including from Hannity himself.

“Fake edited’ news. I did about a 45 minute interview with CBS. They ran less than 2. Why did Ted cut out my many examples of media bias?” Hannity wrote on Twitter. “I gave a example after example of why I say journalism is dead.’ I also gave many examples of how liberalism has failed.” He also pleaded with CBS to “release the Unedited 45 minute interview so people can see the BS games you play in the edit room. I dare you!”

Following the broadcast on Sunday, CBS did release a web extra of the Hannity interview, which included the “journalism is dead” interaction.

“I say this with all due respect and a compliment to you and your work during the Iranian hostage crisis. I don’t think it can be,” Hannity told Koppel in response to a question about whether journalism, in his mind, can be revived.

Watch above.

This article was originally published on ew.com