The people being interviewed belong to the Virginia Citizens Defense League, a gun-rights group that supplied the audio to the Free Beacon.
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Couric can be heard in the interview asking activists from the group, “If there are no background checks for gun purchasers, how do you prevent felons or terrorists from purchasing a gun?” It then cuts to the next scene. During the delay, a video loop plays, presenting the pro-gun individuals as silent, unable to answer Couric’s question on background checks.
Asked how Couric reacted when she saw that portion of the film before its release, a spokesman for the project said, “Katie questioned the pause, but the director made the decision to use it to lead into the discussion of the hole in background checks”.
The documentary, Under the Gun, focuses on issues of gun violence and safety. One of the same voices emphasizes that background checks can not catch latent criminals, only actual ones; that the government does not have the ability to predict who will be a felon and deny Second Amendment rights based on that prediction.
Katie Couric and Stephanie Soechtig are speaking out about the considerable amount of heat they’ve gotten from the gun lobby since EPIX premiered their latest documentary collaboration, Under the Gun.
According to the Beacon, audio of the roundtable confirms Van Cleave’s assertion, and reveals that members immediately answered a similar question. She then intentionally removed their answers and spliced in nine seconds of some prior video of our members sitting quietly and not responding. Like they couldn’t answer a basic straightforward question.
“The makers of a new documentary on gun control are dealing with fallout over what a appears to be a deliberate attempt to make gun rights activists look bad or confused or even stupid, but anchor Katie Couric is standing by it”, Baier explained in the lead-in to Kurtz. Nora Ryan, whose network EPIX aired the film, praised the “creative and editorial judgment”. People deserve to recognize themselves in how they appear in interviews. She said, “I support Stephanie’s statement and am very proud of the film”.
UPDATE 2:25 P.M.: This post has been updated with comment from a spokesperson for EPIX.
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The film’s director, Stephanie Soechtig, is accused of manufacturing a long pause of nine seconds in the film that did not exist in the original taping of the film. Washington Post media critic Erik Wemple said the edit was “just plain wrong”.
