Josephine Harvey
Wed, October 27, 2021, 6:44 PM
The Wall Street Journal faced backlash Wednesday for publishing a letter to the editor from former President Donald Trump filled with demonstrably false claims about the 2020 e******n.
Responding to a Sunday Wall Street Journal editorial titled âThe E******n for Pennsylvaniaâs High Court,â the former president wrote, âWell actually, the e******n was r****d, which you, unfortunately, still havenât figured out.â
He then provided a bulleted list of âexamplesâ of v***r f***d in Pennsylvania to support his claims, relying repeatedly on data from Audit the V**e PA, an organization that has no real experience in assessing e******ns and has promoted unsubstantiated claims of fraud.
Multiple audits into the stateâs 2020 e******n results affirmed the v**e count, and numerous lawsuits challenging the results failed in court. There is no evidence of widespread fraud in Pennsylvania or any other stateâs e******n.
The Wall Street Journal published Trumpâs letter without noting these facts. The former president was deplatformed from Twitter, Facebook and other social media sites earlier this year after spreading disinformation about the e******n for months and inciting a mob of his supporters to storm the U.S. Capitol to try and overturn the results.
Since then, Trump has resorted to campaign-style rallies and tweet-like statements released through his spokesperson to spread his lies.
Media critics, journalists and political commentators slammed the Journal Wednesday for giving Trump another platform for disinformation and for passing off his false claims as âopinion.â
âTrump couldnât post this on Facebook but the editors at the WSJ collectively decided to put it on their platform. Think about that. And they think they can distance themselves from it by doing it as an LTE. As of that magically absolves them from pushing the lies,â tweeted Amanda Carpenter, political columnist for The Bulwark.
Jordan Fischer, an investigative reporter for Washington, D.C., channel WUSA9, called it a ânew lowâ for the Journalâs opinion section.
âToday they printed a litany of e******n falsehoods from former President Trump â without even a single mention of the fact that their own editorial side has thoroughly debunked these claims,â he tweeted.
Washington Post national correspondent Philip Bump made 14 observations about the letterâs veracity and observed that âthe Journal would have been better served had it explained why it chose to run the letter without contextualizing it, since that might have at least offered some clarity on the otherwise inexplicable decision.â He noted that the paper had so far declined to comment on its rationale.
The Wall Street Journal did not immediately respond to HuffPostâs request for comment.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/wall-street-journal-under-fire-004451383.htmlJosephine Harvey br Wed, October 27, 2021, 6:44 PM... (