Barack Obama's criticism of Fox News sounds familiar

President Barack Obama has attacked Fox News for misrepresenting poverty in America, saying it broadcasts a “constant menu” of individuals who want to leech off the state.

Speaking on Tuesday during a panel discussion on poverty at Georgetown University, Obama said the idea that the poor were “lazy” and “undeserving” was “still being propagated”.

"If you watch Fox News on a regular basis, it is a constant menu — they will find folks who make me mad. I don't know where they find them. They're like, ‘I don't want to work, I just want a free Obama phone’ — or whatever.

"And that becomes an entire narrative. Very rarely do you hear an interview of a waitress, which is much more typical, who’s raising a couple of kids and is doing everything right but still can’t pay the bills."

Sound familiar?

Obama went on: "If we're going to change how John Boehner and Mitch McConnell [his Republican opposition] think, we're going to have to change how our body politic thinks, which means we're going to have to change how the media reports on these issues and how people's impressions of what it's like to struggle in this economy looks like, and how budgets connect to that."

The Centre for Poverty Research estimates that 14 per cent of American working adults are in poverty.

You can watch Obama's comments in full below

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