The pastor giving the invocation at President Donald Trump’s rally Saturday night in Ohio prayed to God to protect Trump from the “jungle journalism.”
“Tonight, I pray that You will protect our President and his family with a shield of faith, Lord, that shield of faith against the fiery darts of the wicked one, Lord, against that jungle journalism (that) extorts the truth and distorts honesty and integrity every single day, gets in his face with lies and mistruths and innuendos,” Gary Click, a pastor and member of the Ohio GOP’s State Central Committee, told the crowd. “Lord, protect him,” he continued.
The invocation, later bolstered by the President’s own comments deriding the news media during the rally, come at a relatively contentious time between the White House and members of the Fourth Estate.
In late July, a CNN reporter was banned from an open press event after she asked the President questions about Trump’s embattled attorney, Michael Cohen, and Russian President Vladimir Putin in the Oval Office, which the White House press team deemed inappropriate. The frequency of White House “daily” press briefings has also diminished substantially. There were only three briefings over the course of the month, and they lasted 58 minutes altogether.
CNN’s Brian Ries contributed to this report.