What happens when a liberal journalist tweets a lie, and then a mainstream media journalist retweets the lie with one her own?

Fake news, that’s what. The kind that spreads like a bad virus in the wintertime.

Such was the case with Aaron Rupar from Vox and Washington Post feature writer Caitlin Gibson yesterday.

Rupar was reviewing President Trump’s Monday El Paso rally and posted a tweet stream of video clips from the speech. In one of them in particular, he took issue with the president’s description of Virginia Democratic governor Ralph Northam’s late-term abortion position:

Holy shit — Trump falsely accuses Ralph Northam of saying he supports "a newborn baby [coming] out into the world, and wrap the baby, make the baby comfortable, & then talk to the mother & talk to the father and then execute the baby. Execute the baby!" Huge, angry boos. pic.twitter.com/VZaZXVoi7Y — Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) February 12, 2019

Here’s the full quote:

“But the governor stated that he would even allow a newborn baby to come out into the world and wrap the baby and make the baby comfortable, and then talk to the mother, and talk to the father, and then execute the baby. Execute the baby.”

Rupar clearly believes Trump is lying about Northam’s position.

Later, the WaPo‘s Gibson piled on, retweeting Rupar’s tweet and accusing Trump of spreading the type of “lie that incites violence”:

This is the kind of lie that incites violence. https://t.co/Ar2LZ2VRn1 https://t.co/RyMZaGs741 — Caitlin Gibson (@CaitJGibson) February 12, 2019

For emphasis, the link she included in her tweet was a 2016 story about “The twisted ‘dream’ of accused Planned Parenthood killer Robert Dear Jr.”

The problem with what both Rupar and Gibson asserted regarding Trump “lying” about Northam’s stance on late term abortion? They’re both wrong. Trump got it right.

Here’s Northam’s actual quote from that WTOP interview, with bolded emphasis added:

When we talk about third trimester abortions, these are done with the consent of the mother, with the consent of the physician. More than one physician, by the way. And its done in case where there may be severe deformities, where there may be a fetus that is non-viable. So, in this particular example, if a mother is in labor I can tell you exactly what would happen. The infant would be delivered. The infant would be kept comfortable. The infant would be resuscitated if that’s what the mother and the family desired, and then a discussion would ensue between the physicians and the mother.

Here’s the video clip:

VA gov on abortion this morning: “If a mother is in labor…the infant would be delivered. The infant would be kept comfortable. The infant would be resuscitated if that’s what the mother and the family desired, and then a discussion would ensue between the physicians & mother" pic.twitter.com/cc15pVLjIQ — Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) January 30, 2019

So, no. Trump didn’t get it wrong. Rupar did. And Gibson’s tweet amplified Rupar’s lie. You know who else helped spread this lie? Maggie Haberman, the Pulitzer Prize winning journalist for the New York Times.

This isn’t the first time I’ve seen members of the media falsely suggest Trump lied about Northam’s abortion comments. The Associated Press told a whopper, too, in a February 7th piece (bolded emphasis added):

In that speech, Trump incorrectly claimed that Gov. Ralph Northam, D-Va., when discussing late-term abortions in which the infant is severely deformed or unable to survive after birth, had said “he would execute a baby after birth.”

Except it wasn’t incorrect. Northam clearly left open the option of a baby’s life being terminated after delivery.

So. many. journalists keep spreading this misinformation. And yet the national media wonders why we don’t trust them?

—Sister Toldjah is a former liberal and a 15+ year veteran of blogging with an emphasis on media bias, social issues, and the culture wars. Read her Red State archives here. Connect with her on Twitter.–