George Stephanopoulos' uncomfortable exchange with Rep. Nancy Mace, R-S.C., is putting a spotlight on ABC News' dramatic shift to the political left in recent years, according to some critics.
Stephanopoulos fueled outrage among conservatives and earned praise from liberals for leveraging Mace's rape survival, something Mace has long been outspoken about, to suggest she's a hypocrite for supporting former President Trump, who was found liable for sexual abuse against accuser E. Jean Carroll by a New York civil jury last year.
On Sunday's installment of "This Week," Stephanopoulos played a past clip of Mace discussing being a victim of rape, then asked her, "How do you square your endorsement of Donald Trump with the testimony we just saw?"
NANCY MACE’S OFFICE CALLS ON ABC, WOMEN’S GROUPS TO ‘DEMAND AN APOLOGY’ FROM GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS
"You've endorsed Donald Trump for president. Judges and two separate juries have found him liable for rape and for defaming the victim of that rape," he said.
"Well, I will tell you, I was raped at the age of 16," Mace said. "Any rape victim will tell you, I've lived for 30 years with an incredible amount of shame for being raped. I didn't come forward because of that judgment and shame that I felt."
"It's a shame that you will never feel, George," she went on to say. "I’m not going to sit here on your show and be asked a question meant to shame me about another potential rape victim. I’m not going to do that."
In addition to the personal questioning, legal experts said Stephanopoulos "crossed the line" during the interview for repeatedly claiming Trump was found "liable for rape," when the jury actually determined him to be liable for "sexual abuse," which has a distinct definition under New York law.
The Disney-owned network stood by the interview, previously telling Fox News Digital, "George did his job by asking meaningful questions that are relevant to our viewers."
Mace is far from the only Republican that Stephanopoulos has clashed with.
Last month, he abruptly ended an interview with Sen. J.D. Vance, R-Ohio, cutting his mic after the two clashed over presidential authority. Last August, he snapped at then-presidential candidate Nikki Haley for predicting that President Biden wouldn't finish his term in office. He even angrily lashed out at a Trump attorney for claiming Biden authorized the DOJ to prosecute his political opponent, calling it a "ridiculous statement."
Cornell Law School professor and media critic William A. Jacobson called Stephanopoulos "the poster-child for politicized news coverage and commentary" and said that stating ABC News adheres to a liberal bias is like saying "water is wet."
"ABC News should just be upfront and open about it, rather than pretending it is neutral," Jacobson told Fox News Digital.
Questions over Stephanopoulos' objectivity have drawn scrutiny in past election cycles. During the 2020 presidential election, he ignored the explosive Hunter Biden laptop revelations during a Biden town hall he moderated just days after the New York Post broke the story. And among the questioners at that town hall were a former Obama speechwriter and the wife of a prominent Democrat.
His deep ties to the Clintons resurfaced following his exchange with Mace. Before joining ABC News, Stephanopoulos famously served as a top aide to President Bill Clinton in the early 1990s and was part of the operation to combat Clinton's sexual misconduct accusers, whom Stephanopoulos referred to at the time as "bimbos."
Stephanopoulos, who also serves as co-host of "Good Morning America," was forced to recuse himself from moderating any debates during the 2016 election cycle when it was revealed that he had donated thousands of dollars to the Clinton Foundation.
"That ABC allows a partisan, political operative such as Stephanopoulos to serve as a news anchor tells us pretty much all we need to know about ABC's leanings when it comes to political news," DePauw University journalism professor Jeffrey McCall told Fox News Digital.
ABC News itself ran cover for the Clintons when the network spiked then-anchor Amy Robach's reporting on the former president's chumminess with deceased convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein in 2016 as Hillary Clinton was running as the Democratic nominee, according to leaked footage of Robach in 2019.
"I've had the story for three years... we would not put it on the air," Robach said on a hot mic. "It was unbelievable what we had, Clinton, we had everything."
Stephanopoulos' Mace interview falls in line with the growing anti-Trump sentiment at the network, which reaches all the way to the top. Last month, ABC News president Kim Godwin sent a memo to staff attacking the presumptive GOP nominee for comments he made suggesting Black voters started to like him more after he was hit with the four indictments.
"No matter one’s politics, the fact that a person running for President of the United States made these remarks period – but also to a public crowd – and with so many Black people present – and that they stand with him – is mind blowing. Shocking. These remarks are as racist as they come," Godwin told her staff.
ABC NEWS PRESIDENT CALLS TRUMP'S MUGSHOT COMMENTS ABOUT BLACK VOTERS 'AS RACIST AS THEY COME'
Godwin's memo caught ABC News employees so completely off guard that one told Puck News, "I hope David [Muir] or George weren’t hoping to get a presidential debate this cycle because that is now impossible."
McCall told Fox News Digital that Godwin's "politically charged statements" were a lapse in judgment by the leader of a major news organization like ABC News.
"Godwin is welcome to her own opinions regarding political figures, but displaying them formally to the staff sends a clear rhetorical signal about how the news agenda should be approached in the ABC News shop," McCall said.
The anti-Trump, pro-Biden sentiment is widespread throughout ABC News. The hosts of its daytime program "The View" constantly bash the former president and Republicans broadly. Even co-host Alyssa Farah Griffin, the former Trump White House official who ostensibly is meant to represent the conservative point of view, routinely attacks her ex-boss.
Last week, ABC News correspondent Jonathan Karl gushed over Biden's State of the Union address, saying, "This was a great night for Joe Biden," adding, "I don't know if it was a home run, but it certainly was a triple."
Meanwhile, Biden has yet to see any bump in the polls following his speech to the nation, suggesting quite the disconnect between ABC News and voters across the country.
"It might not be long before ABC joins the likes of MSNBC, Huffpost and others as a fully left news outlet," McCall warned. "This left-leaning approach of ABC News doesn't necessarily hurt the network with like-minded viewers who are happy to watch imbalanced news coverage on ‘Good Morning America’ or on ‘World News Tonight.’ But it certainly narrows the range of viewers who might watch and it certainly diminishes the standards of professional journalism."
ABC News did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Fox News' Brian Flood contributed to this report.
