Instead of backing Trump or avoiding the matter, such as Stephanopoulos did himself during his Sunday hosting of This Week, the hosts of MSNBC’s The Weekend on Sunday decried ABC’s payment. They also dismissed the lie told during a March interview with Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) that Trump was found liable for rape.

“The media now is sort of falling into that ‘oh, we want to play nice’ mode,” Michael Steele said.

Symone Sanders said, “This feels like it has a really chilling effect” on media coverage of Trump.

Trump today said he is targeting other media that lied about him during the campaign and his first administration.

From MSNBC’s The Weekend on Sunday morning:

MICHAEL STEELE: I’ve been, on this program and elsewhere, complaining, because it is a complaint, about how the legal system itself has been so easily manipulated. The media now is sort of falling into that “Oh, we want to play nice.” What’s your assessment of how this affects the way the country governs itself when both the judicial and the media space seem so willing to blow past the obvious problems with this incoming administration?

SYMONE SANDERS: This feels like it has a really chilling effect, like, shout out to the standards department, okay, standards is always making sure that we keep the bar high and substantive and accurate. But what George Stephanopoulos said in that interview, I mean, it seems to hold up with what the judge said after the fact and now these news organization, and himself, George Stephanopoulos himself, is paying a million dollars of his own money to the lawyers, and ABC, $15 million dollars, it’s insane….

The parsing of this, the judge said that George Stephanopoulos was right essentially. But Donald Trump sued anyway for defamation. And ABC made the calculated decision that, you know what, we’re just going to pay. George Stephanopoulos also has to pay. He’s on the hook for a million dollars of his own money. And that leaves the rest of us with what? We want to be accurate, right? We have a standards department. We are all endeavoring to keep the bar high and substantive and not engage in interviews and conversation where people just lie about conspiracy theories and they themselves aren’t accurate. But this seems quite targeted and I don’t think George Stephanopoulos was wrong. I’m sorry.

Now you all got nothing to say because none of you want a lawsuit. See, this is the chilling effect! My mom is about to text me: shut up, because what are you doing?

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Brent Baker, the Steven P.J. Wood senior fellow and vice president for research and publications at the Media Research Center, explained our pick: “Stephanopoulos was caught red-handed making a defamatory statement, repeatedly, about President-elect Trump and ABC was concerned enough about their liability to settle. Yet the MSNBC hosts have learned nothing, with Steele worrying about the media being too nice to Trump and Sanders, incredibly, doubling down on the false allegation. Instead of worrying about ‘chilling effects,’ maybe journalists should consider not smearing Trump, or anyone, with false characterizations.”

Rating: FOUR out of FIVE Screams.