Fox News collaborated with the White House to concoct a fake story about Seth Rich

[knapplc]

Remember things like this when Trump calls CNN "fake news" and praises Fox News. One has journalistic integrity. One does not.

 

 

Behind Fox News' Baseless Seth Rich Story: The Untold Tale

The Fox News Channel and a wealthy supporter of President Trump worked in concert under the watchful eye of the White House to concoct a story about the murder of a young Democratic National Committee aide, according to a lawsuit filed Tuesday.

The explosive claim is part of the lawsuit filed against Fox News by Rod Wheeler, a longtime paid commentator for the news network. The suit was obtained exclusively by NPR.

Wheeler alleges Fox News and the Trump supporter intended to deflect public attention from growing concern about the administration's ties to the Russian government. His suit charges that a Fox News reporter created quotations out of thin air and attributed them to him to propel her story.

Fox's president of news, Jay Wallace, told NPR Monday there was no "concrete evidence" that Wheeler was misquoted by the reporter, Malia Zimmerman. The news executive did not address a question about the story's allegedly partisan origins. Fox News declined to allow Zimmerman to comment for this story.

The story, which first aired in May, was retracted by Fox News a week later. Fox News has, to date, taken no action in response to what it said was a failure to adhere to the network's standards.

The lawsuit focuses particular attention on the role of the Trump supporter, Ed Butowsky, in weaving the story. He is a wealthy Dallas investor and unpaid Fox commentator on financial matters, who has emerged as a reliable Republican surrogate in recent years. Butowsky offered to pay for Wheeler to investigate the death of the DNC aide, Seth Rich, on behalf of his grieving parents in Omaha.

On April 20, a month before the story ran, Butowsky and Wheeler — the investor and the investigator — met at the White House with then Press Secretary Sean Spicer to brief him on what they were uncovering.

The first page of the lawsuit quotes a voicemail and text from Butowsky boasting that President Trump himself had reviewed drafts of the Fox News story just before it went to air and was published.

 

By way of contrast, CNN fired three people, including a supervisor, over a failure to properly fact-check a story. Fox has simply retracted their story.

Three CNN journalists, including the executive editor in charge of a new investigative unit, have resigned after the publication of a Russia-related article that was retracted.
Thomas Frank, who wrote the story in question; Eric Lichtblau, an editor in the unit; and Lex Haris, who oversaw the unit, have all left CNN.

"In the aftermath of the retraction of a story published on CNN.com, CNN has accepted the resignations of the employees involved in the story's publication," a spokesman said Monday evening.

An internal investigation by CNN management found that some standard editorial processes were not followed when the article was published, people briefed on the results of the investigation said.

The story, which reported that Congress was investigating a "Russian investment fund with ties to Trump officials," cited a single anonymous source.

These types of stories are typically reviewed by several departments within CNN -- including fact-checkers, journalism standards experts and lawyers -- before publication.

This breakdown in editorial workflow disturbed the CNN executives who learned about it.

[zoogs]

Wow.

 

On second thought, it's not even surprising that this is how Team Trump operates.

[Danny Bateman]

This story still isn't dead. It still lives on in conspiratorial circles.

 

Hard to underscore how disgusting and terrible this looks for both involved parties. But Fox News will do anything to push it's agenda & keep eyeballs on itself, and Team Trump will go to any end to score some political points.

[TGHusker]

And Hannity pushed it big time on his radio and TV shows. As discussed else where, he was boasting that he alone was beating the drum on this story - well we know why. Talk about collusion.

Hannity never disavowed the story and claimed he would 'pick it up later' when the time was right.

[TGHusker]

http://www.thedailybeast.com/forget-seth-rich-sean-hannity-finally-found-a-muslim-to-blame-for-the-dnc-hack

 

Hannity now blaming Wasserman Schultz IT guy- Imran Awan, who was just arrested for fraud trying to leave the country. for the DNC hacks.

I heard the local talk radio host say this morning that Awan had been at a party with Seth Rich the night Rich was killed. My guess is he heard

it on Hannity's show. They are really reaching now - ok they were before also - now it is loony tune time. Hannity is going nutso in trying to steer the narrative away from Trump/Russia.

[Enhance]

Wow.

 

On second thought, it's not even surprising that this is how Team Trump operates.

What's worse is the reaction from some of his supporters and supporters of Fox News, and by reaction, I mean lack there of.

 

A relative of mine yesterday had the audacity to suggest Fox News is the only outlet covering the nation accurately right now, and then seemed totally unperturbed by the false Seth Rich story and lawsuit.

[VectorVictor]

 

Wow.

 

On second thought, it's not even surprising that this is how Team Trump operates.

What's worse is the reaction from some of his supporters and supporters of Fox News, and by reaction, I mean lack there of.

 

A relative of mine yesterday had the audacity to suggest Fox News is the only outlet covering the nation accurately right now, and then seemed totally unperturbed by the false Seth Rich story and lawsuit.

 

 

Because engaging in critical thought processes and holding your echo chamber accountable require too much effort?

[Enhance]

Especially when it's inconvenient to your viewpoint and lifestyle.

 

I've mostly removed CNN from my list of news sources after the Russia article; it wasn't the only reason I stopped looking at their content, but it was the final straw. I had already removed Fox years prior. It's disappointing when others struggles to make similar adjustments. I don't think either of those outlets have done enough in the way of building trust with their viewers, though I would certainly argue Fox is worse.

[Enhance]

Several posts moved from this thread into "Where to get your news" thread per TGHusker's request.