President Donald Trump abruptly ended a taped interview with CBS' weekly editorial show '60 Minutes' and host Lesley Stahl on Tuesday afternoon. Trump sat down for about 45 minutes before he told the network he believed they had enough material to use, according to sources.
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The President's reason for walking out of the interview was due to frustration with Stahl's line of Coronavirus questioning. While Trump lies more often than not, he's definitely being honest about this one. And I don't blame him one bit for walking away from the '60 Minutes' cameras
I had an encounter with Stahl and her deception once in my career. Back in 2014 as Governor of North Carolina, '60 Minutes' requested me for an interview to talk about Duke Energy and the coal ash spills in the Dan River. I came into the face-to-face meeting with an open mind, but quickly saw how they edit videos to fit a certain narrative driven by Stahl's questions. The producers of the show want her to ask the same questions several times for the sake of multiple takes. Stahl then make her own storyline to fit the agenda and that fixed production hits the air every Sunday night.
There was one instance during my interview I remember being asked a question by Stahl and my answer was edited out-of-context. I was asked a yes-or-no question and said "yes, but..." with further details on how the previous administration made the deal with Duke Energy. '60 Minutes' edited out my response with those details and that's how the interview ended.
I raised the issue right after the Interview by telling WFMY, "The fine that Leslie Stahl was talking about was a fine that I think was from the first two months of my administration for a totally different spill but the editing did not clarify that to the national or North Carolina audience."
Listen to my entire thoughts on '60 Minutes' and Lesley Stahl below.