As disgraced firebrand anti-Trump attorney Michael Avenatti was sentenced to 30 months in prison for a multi-million-dollar scheme to extort Nike, Fox News correspondent-at-large Geraldo Rivera said that he has hurt the credibility of his longtime admirers in the mainstream media.
“I don’t like to kick a guy when he is down, but this is a truly loathsome creature,” Rivera remarked Thursday after New York District Judge Paul Gardephe sentenced Avenatti as the convict openly wept in a Lower Manhattan courtroom.
Rivera called Avenatti, 50, a “former media darling” against a montage of mainstream figures gushing over the fiery lawyer, who most notably represented porn actress Stormy Daniels in her case against former President Donald Trump.
Former Jeb Bush adviser Ana Navarro, a frequent guest host on “The View”, called Avenatti “like the Holy Spirit” when he appeared on the ABC talk show.
“[You’re] all places at all times,” Navarro said of the Sacramento, Calif., native during an August 2018 episode.
CNN’s media pundit Brian Stelter told Avenatti during a 2018 interview that he is “taking [him] seriously as a contender” in the 2020 election in part because of Avenatti’s omnipresence on cable news, while now-former MSNBC host Chris Matthews declared that Avenatti was “doing a hell of a job” and definitely not pursuing Trump “for the money.”
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On “The Five,” Rivera’s co-host Greg Gutfeld noted that it will be interesting to see how CNN covers Avenatti’s conviction, given their dozens of interviews with him as he appeared often on the network as a foil to the former president.
“Michael Avenatti, this lawyer we just heard about today – we did not party with him and there are no pictures of us with Don Lemon in The Hamptons – but he just went to jail and we are so happy he went to jail,” Gutfeld said, imitating such potential coverage.
“They pushed this guy on America and … they were deluded by their delusional loathing of Donald Trump.”
Rivera agreed, adding that when people talk about media bias, Avenatti is a prime example because he was a “guy embraced in a way that was really obscene and so gushy – and it turns out he is just a lowlife.”
Avenatti was convicted on charges of trying to extort up to $25 million from the Beaverton, Ore.-based sportswear giant when he represented a Southern California youth basketball league organizer against Nike.
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In court, Gardephe further called Avenatti’s conduct “outrageous.”
