The surreal media campaign against the reporter who broke the Donald Trump 'rape' story

Donald Trump
(Image credit: Scott Olson/Getty Images)

The one criticism you can make of The Daily Beast's big story this week about Donald Trump — in which the site reported that Trump's ex-wife, Ivana, once accused The Donald of "rape" in a legal deposition — is that it takes Trump's candidacy too seriously, putting him in a category of candidates who actually have to be vetted. But there's no denying the fact that he's leading the GOP primary polls, which means his past life is fair game.

So it has been downright bizarre to see the story dismissed in some very high-profile quarters of the media, with outlets as diverse as Fox News and MSNBC expressing deep skepticism about whether the substance of the story is even relevant. Megyn Kelly at Fox News, for example, grilled reporter Tim Mak on just that question, noting that the story, which she said read like a "hit piece," is decades old. She also asserted that "divorce proceedings are notoriously ugly."

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Ryu Spaeth

Ryu Spaeth is deputy editor at TheWeek.com. Follow him on Twitter.