FILE – This Jan. 17, 2001 file photo shows pedestrians entering CNN Center, the headquarters for CNN, in downtown Atlanta. (AP Photo/Ric Feld, File)

Of all the cable news networks and national mainstream media outlets out there, President Trump has the most disdain for the cast of characters at CNN, which is understandable when you consider Brian Stelter and Oliver Darcy are their top two media correspondents, and showman journalist Jim Acosta is their chief White House correspondent.

Trump’s frustration with the network was especially obvious when he took to the Twitter machine Saturday to take a dig at CNN, calling them “Fake News” and a “JOKE”:

.@CNN is Fake News. They will take a good story and make it as bad as is humanly possible. They are a JOKE! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 4, 2020

It’s unclear what the story in question was, but Darcy made an attempt to counter Trump’s remarks by tweeting back to him that CNN “has accurately reported on the virus” and claiming Fox News “for weeks misled its viewers about the seriousness of it.”

That Darcy actually believes either claim is comical, but the good news is that reality soon inconveniently intruded:

“The flu is far deadlier than the coronavirus” – @andersoncooper CNN March 7 https://t.co/eEcGNPIV1a — johnny dollar (@johnnydollar01) April 4, 2020

“The risk is low. The risk, however, for the flu is through the roof!” CNN, February 15 https://t.co/eEcGNPIV1a — johnny dollar (@johnnydollar01) April 4, 2020

“The flu is more deadly” – Alisyn Camerota

“This is a good opportunity to remind people of that” – @drsanjaygupta

CNN, January 31 https://t.co/eEcGNPIV1a — johnny dollar (@johnnydollar01) April 4, 2020

"But the threat to the general population is still low.” @drsanjaygupta

"I would certainly agree with Sanjay that this is a low-risk situation in the United States.” – Dr Wm Schaffner

CNN, January 31 https://t.co/eEcGNPIV1a — johnny dollar (@johnnydollar01) April 4, 2020

This video below from Free Beacon’s David Rutz is especially damning, not just of CNN, but for most broadcast media outlets who repeatedly downplayed the threat from the Wuhan coronavirus as late as early March:

It’s pretty clear that there is a concerted effort by outlets like CNN to bury their erroneous reporting and downplaying of the Wuhan coronavirus threat by deflecting to Fox News, but the evidence shows CNN was among the worst offfenders.

Beyond that, CNN has also been a willing participant in the Chinese government’s propaganda war against the United States, slammed Fox News for covering New York’s response failures – even though CNN’s Jake Tapper covered them the very next day, has purposely and deceptively used the “per capita” label on a selective basis when reporting on US cases in a way that paints the U.S. in an unflattering light, and ran with the absurd “man dies from swallowing fish tank cleaner” story as a way to falsely blame Trump.

There’s much more where that came from, but I think you get the picture. Darcy and the rest of the leftist hacks at CNN can try to cover themselves in glory all they want to for their slanted coverage of the Wuhan coronavirus, but the reality of it is that their reporting has been some of the worst from both a factual perspective and a journalistic perspective.

(Hat tip: Twitchy)