The journalism industry continues to cover itself in glory at the DNC, with essentially every mainstream press outlet debasing itself in pursuit of getting Kamala Harris elected. Long-time reporter Judy Woodruff provided the latest example when she appeared to make up a story involving Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu.
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According to Woodruff, who was anchoring PBS News’ live coverage from the DNC, Trump colluded with the Israeli prime minister to stop a ceasefire deal in Gaza because it would “help” Harris. Here are her original comments, which occurred on Monday evening.
WOODRUFF: The reporting is that former President Trump is on the phone with the prime minister of Israel urging him not to cut a deal right now because it’s believed that would help the Harris campaign. I don’t know where, I don’t know, who knows whether that will come about or not, but I have to think the Harris campaign would like for President Biden to do what presidents do, which is to work on that one, and maybe there are some other domestic issues that, you know, they’d like to see come home.
That’s quite the accusation, and one you’d think a seasoned reporter wouldn’t make without impeccable sourcing. It smacks of the Russian collusion hoax, being yet another claim that Trump is somehow using foreign sources to “interfere” in the election.
Notably, Trump advising Netanyahu not to take a deal with Hamas would be smart policy given Hamas is a terrorist organization that needs to be destroyed as a governing force in Gaza, but that’s beside the point. The story wasn’t true, with both sides denying any such discussions took place.
Woodruff then went back on air to offer a quasi-clarification, explaining that she was just repeating reporting from Axios and Reuters.
The offered excuse was that she hadn’t seen “later reporting” pointing out that both sides denied the story. That too was calculated on Woodruff’s part because she’s smart enough to know there are a lot of people who hate Trump and Netanyahu and would simply dismiss any denial from them as a cover-up.
Here’s the big problem, though. There was no original reporting from Axios and Reuters saying what she claimed on Monday evening. Worse for Woodruff, both articles she cited on Trump and Netanyahu said the former president encouraged the prime minister to take the deal (with the same source saying he wasn’t sure). Later, Netanyahu would deny the phone call even took place.
For further context, here is Axios’ original reporting.
Driving the news: One source said Trump’s call was intended to encourage Netanyahu to take the deal, but stressed he didn’t know if this is indeed what the former president told Netanyahu.
- The Israeli Prime Minister’s Office issued a statement denying the call took place after the story was published. The Trump campaign declined to comment.
At no point did any news outlet report that Trump told Netanyahu to not take a deal with Hamas, much less for political reasons as Woodruff claimed. She made the story up out of whole cloth, and then, instead of admitting it, doubled down on lying about it by blaming other outlets. That’s a breach of journalistic ethics that would make Dan Rather blush. That she hasn’t been pulled off the air and punished is more proof that PBS shouldn’t be getting a dime of public funding.
