There were few flubs in the TV news organizations’ coverage of the Supreme Court’s decisions on the Defense of Marriage Act and California’s anti-gay marriage Proposition 8. Broadcast networks broke into regular morning programming a few minutes after 10 a.m. ET when High Court handed down its first decision declaring DOMA unconstitutional in a 5-4 opinion.
CBS had correspondent Jan Crawford in front of the Supreme Court in Washington while CBS This Morning anchors Charlie Rose and Norah O’Donnell were in the New York studio. George Stephanopoulos anchored ABC’s coverage from the Good Morning America studio in Times Square with Dan Abrams on hand and Terry Moran at the Court. And NBC News had justice correspondent Pete Williams in front of the Court. Williams, who distinguished himself during the network's coverage of the Boston Marathon bombings, reported the Court’s first decision for NBC and MSNBC at 10:02 a.m. followed a few second later by Moran who said on ABC: “There is ringing language in here affirming the rights of gay couples.” CBS News broke in at 10:04 a.m. with Crawford.
Cable news was wall-to-wall from the Court all morning. Fox News, which was also covering the arrest in Massachusetts this morning of Aaron Hernandez, reported the DOMA decision at 10:04 a.m. CNN, which along with Fox News flubbed the High Court's Affordable Care Act decision, reported at 10 a.m. that a decision in DOMA had come down and eight minutes later reported the details of that decision with Jake Tapper and Jeffrey Toobin in front of the Supreme Court and Wolf Blitzer and John King in the Washington studio.
The Court’s second decision on California’s Proposition 8 – that supporters of the state’s ban on same-sex marriage did not have the legal standing to appeal a lower courts ruling that overturned the proposition – was reported at 10:26 a.m. on NBC and ABC and one minute later on Fox News. Meanwhile CNN waited ten minutes, until 10:37 a.m., to fully articulate the ruling.
