Just par for the course for the Demedia Complex™
Early media accounts of a phone call between former President Donald Trump and a top Georgia investigator contained false quotes, prompting at least one major media outlet to issue a correction.
The Wall Street Journal first published audio last week of the roughly six-minute call on Dec. 23 between Trump and Frances Watson, the chief investigator of the Georgia Secretary of State’s office, in which Trump urged her to look for fraud in mail-in ballots in Fulton County, where much of Atlanta is located.
Indeed, Trump can be heard telling Watson, who was in the middle of conducting an audit of voting results in Cobb County, that he won the 2020 election and that she would be “praised” when the “right answer comes out.” He also insisted “something bad happened.”
…
In response to Trump, the investigator said: “I can assure you that our team and the [Georgia Bureau of Investigation], that we are only interested in the truth and finding the information that is based on the facts.”
However, the audio shows that early reports in January about that call, based on anonymous sourcing, misquoted Trump. In those reports, Trump was quoted as urging Watson to “find the fraud,” and if she did so, the investigator would be a “national hero.”
However, the audio shows that early reports in January about that call, based on anonymous sourcing, misquoted Trump. In those reports, Trump was quoted as urging Watson to “find the fraud,” and if she did so, the investigator would be a “national hero.”
Outlets such as CNN published these quotes, corroborating what was first reported by the Washington Post. While CNN’s version, reliant on a single anonymous source, remains unchanged, the Washington Post stuck a long correction note to the top of its report:
As it turns out, Trump did not say “find the fraud” nor did he tell the woman she would be “a national hero.” Instead he said she should “scrutinize” the ballots from Fulton County avowing there was “dishonesty” going on there. Click the link at the beginning to read the full text of WaPo’s correction.
Pot Full of Frogs 