Rule 1 in both cross-examination and in news interviews: Never ask a question for which you don't know the answer. In fact, after watching Gayle King crash and burn in this attempt to blame Donald Trump for a Delta crash-landing in Toronto (!), perhaps the first rule should be: Don't ask the questions at all if you don't understand Rule 1.

The CBS news anchor apparently hoped that Ed Bastian would be motivated to shift the blame for the accident, which miraculously resulted in no deaths. Instead, Bastian refuted the entire idea that the new Trump administration was cutting safety corners at the FAA -- let alone the fact that the FAA has nothing to do with landing decisions in Canada:

Gayle King tried to bait the Delta Air Lines CEO into blaming Trump for the recent crashes.

It did not go as she planned. pic.twitter.com/3wTcXPgNpM

— Bonchie (@bonchieredstate) February 20, 2025

The Delta flight involved a landing in another country under adverse wind and ground conditions, in which landing gear collapsed on impact with the runway. That has very little to do with the relatively small number of FAA personnel who have left their jobs in the US, none of which worked in air traffic control. In fact, Delta has been rather remarkable in taking responsibility thus far; they offered each of the Toronto passengers $30,000 to compensate for the experience with no strings attached. They can still accept the money and sue Delta, although they're clearly hoping that the generous gesture will convince them otherwise.

As a number of people have pointed out on Twttter/X, the entire premise of the question is based on a lie. The number of air accidents has not risen over the historic norm since Trump's inauguration. In fact, thus far they are somewhat lower than the past few years, as the NTSB data show, although the number of fatalities is up after the mid-air collision outside of Reagan International (via Twitchy):

The difference between the numbers is likely statistically insignificant. Still, the last two months have seen a lower accident rate than the same months in the past several years, contradicting King's suggestion that air safety is being put at risk. 

So why would King suggest the opposite of what the actual data shows on a news program? Perhaps CBS News doesn't know how to access the NTSB data, although it's certainly public and (fairly) easy to find. It took me all of five minutes this morning to navigate their website and find the Monthly Aviation Dashboard, where this official data set gets published and updated daily. I wouldn't call it the most intuitive portal in the world, but it's hardly the worst. 

If I can do that research on my own, why can't the vaunted news division at CBS? 

The reason is that they don't want to find the actual data, nor report the truth. They want to air propaganda that might damage L'Homme Orange Mal and don't much care who else it might damage -- like Bastian's airline and all the other airlines that provide an extraordinarily safe method of mass transportation to Americans. CBS News was so anxious to push that narrative that they didn't even bother to check with Bastian first before putting him on the air to advance it, which demonstrates that King and her team are as incompetent as they are biased.

Newsweek actually did a better job of putting the data in context, although it took them a while. They also did a decent job of getting to the source of the hysteria, but didn't connect the final dots:

Throughout the year [2024 -- Ed], 1,415 aviation accidents were reported, including 257 fatal incidents. Of the 179 fatal incidents that Newsweek obtained records of, there were 306 reported deaths. The deadliest incident was a Pilatus aircraft crash in Recluse, Wyoming, which killed six of the seven people on board, including the pilot.

The increased number of reported crashes involving larger aircraft likely contributes to the perception that there are more accidents this year.

Additionally, videos and photos of crashes and collisions circulating on social media might be amplifying these concerns.

That's part of it, and the DC crash was the first in a decade to involve as many deaths. However, the real driver of the "perception" that there are more accidents is the mainstream media attempting to push that narrative to punish Trump. Democrats in Congress are part of that hysteria as well, hoping to leverage that hysteria to cover the fact that they are intellectually bankrupt and rudderless. L'Homme Orange Mal was their only message in 2023 and 2024, and so far it's their only message in 2025.

They have no shame, and they have no credibility. And they wonder why the American public trusts used-car salesmen more than they trust the Protection Racket Media.