Last week the Associated Press and Reuters both published a story alleging that 100,000 children were currently in the custody of immigration enforcement. They jumped the gun, not realizing that the 100,000 figure was actually from 2015, and thus couldn’t be used to push an anti-Trump narrative. Rather than issue a correction, both publications simply pulled both stories in an attempt to make them disappear.
Perhaps in an attempt to outperform their competitors in dishonesty, the New York Times reported misinformation later in the week, which they simply decided to stand by.
The story is from Maggie Haberman, the meat of which is that the secretary of the Navy and the admiral who leads the SEALs threatened to resign or be fired if Trump interferes with disciplinary actions against Edward Gallagher. As she reported:
The secretary of the Navy and the admiral who leads the SEALs have threatened to resign or be fired if plans to expel a commando from the elite unit in a war crimes case are halted by President Trump, administration officials said Saturday.
The high-level pushback to Mr. Trump’s unambiguous assertion on Twitter this past week that the commando, Chief Petty Officer Edward Gallagher, should remain in the unit was an extraordinary development in what was already an extraordinary case, one with few precedents in the history of presidential relations with the American military.
“The secretary of the Navy and the admiral who leads the SEALs have threatened to resign or be fired if plans to expel a commando from the elite unit in a war crimes case are halted by President Trump, administration officials said Saturday.” https://t.co/b0ogA8JHVA
— Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) November 23, 2019
It later turned out that the Navy Secretary Richard Spencer, who she alleged threatened to resign, didn’t threaten to resign.
MORE: Spencer tells reporters if @realDonaldTrump gave official order to stop disciplinary proceeding, he would follow it. "If the President requests to stop the process, the process stops. Good order and discipline is also obeying orders from the President of the United States"
— Nick Schifrin (@nickschifrin) November 23, 2019
Haberman added the following blurb to her piece in the third paragraph to address the contradictory revelation: “The Navy secretary, Richard V. Spencer, later denied that he had threatened to resign but said disciplinary plans against Chief Gallagher would proceed because he did not consider Mr. Trump’s statement on Twitter to be a formal order. Mr. Spencer added that the president, as commander in chief, had the authority to intervene and that it would stop ‘the process.'”
That uproots the entire thesis of the piece, doesn’t it? Not according to Haberman, who doesn’t even make note of the addition/correction of in her piece. She just casually quotes Spencer as if it doesn’t obliterate her narrative.
And making matters even more embarrassing, instead of correcting the error, Haberman would like us to know that the Times stands by their reporting. Why exactly is unclear.
We stand by the story. Thanks Frank. https://t.co/N627MrGZoL
— Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) November 23, 2019
Since initial publication of this article, Spencer has been fired by Defense Secretary Mark Esper.
The Times ought to finally revise their slogan – “all the fake news that’s fit to print.”
