The Associated Press’ latest attempt at smearing the Donald Trump administration has left them looking like Charlie Brown trying to kick a football.
In attempt to revive the hysterical rhetoric over “kids in cages” to indict Trump’s immigration policy, the AP relied on a UN report claiming that the U.S. had over 100,000 children in migration related detention facilities, more than any other country.
#BREAKING More than 100,000 children in migration-related US detention: UN pic.twitter.com/67PEWc4KFi
— AFP news agency (@AFP) November 18, 2019
The story spread like wildfire among liberals online, but there was only one problem: the 100,000 figure wasn’t from 2019. And it wasn’t even from 2018, or 2017.
It was from 2015, and we all know who was president that year.
But rather than do what a real journalistic outlet would do and simply issue a correction that their figures are as of 2015 instead of current, they retracted the story entirely.
AFP is withdrawing this story.
The author of the report has clarified that his figures do not represent the number of children currently in migration-related US detention, but the total number of children in migration-related US detention in 2015.
We will delete the story. https://t.co/p30UjEWl7u
— AFP news agency (@AFP) November 19, 2019
And they weren’t the only ones. The DNC’s War Room account on Twitter first shared the story to shame Trump, before deleting the tweet without addressing the correction.
Incredible. DNC War Room just deleted this tweet.
Apparently they didn't want to attribute Obama-era child detention rates to white nationalism.
That's what we would call a self-own. pic.twitter.com/oKnMgsIHTV
— Matt Whitlock (@mattdizwhitlock) November 20, 2019
And like the AP, Reuters simply pulled the story entirely instead of issuing a correction.
.@Reuters pulls its story: pic.twitter.com/ZCb3iKz9Te
— Amber Athey (@amber_athey) November 19, 2019
And to think, these are the same people who want you to believe that Obama’s biggest scandal was wearing a tan suit.
I had initially planned on ending this article by rhetorically asking if there has ever been a case where the media has so transparently been out to attack Trump and defend the prior administration – but then I remembered the past three years of reporting.
