Now it’s just ‘news we do not like’: CNN panel erupts over what ‘fake news’ actually is

This week Heather Nauert, a former Fox News reporter who now works as a State Department spokesperson, called out some news sites for promoting fake news.

On CNN Friday, former Senator Rick Santorum and political strategist Symone Sanders—as well as CNN hosts Poppy Harlow and Jim Sciutto—clashed over the definition of fake news.

"I think this is dangerous," Sanders said about the Trump administration's attacks on reporters. She pointed out that as a communications specialist, she's often disagreed with reporters' takes, but would not tar different perspectives or honest mistakes as "fake news."

Santorum pushed back, doubling down on the idea that fake news has infected the discourse. Sanders countered by citing Breitbart and other right-wing news sites that skew the news with a conservative perspective.

"Let me finish. I let you talk. Let me finish," Santorum told Sanders, as she tried to point out that most fake news is actually on the right.

"So the idea that because of the technology wave and the rush to get the story right out there the first time, not right, but just to get it out there, we have seen a degradation of the quality of news," Santorum said.

"You see a lot of fake news, opinion leaking into the hard news cycle. That is real. If journalism just wants to say that doesn't happen, there is no such thing as fake news, I'm sorry. The public isn't buying it because it's not true," Santorum continued.

Sanders finished off the segment by pointing out that for many people, "fake news" has come to mean "news we do not like" and that attacking journalists has eroded the public's trust in the media.

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