A recent ruling by the left-leaning fact-checking website Snopes.com has ignited a firestorm of anger and anxiety among liberals. Snopes declared, just before the first Biden-Trump debate, that former President Donald Trump never praised neo-Nazis at a Charlottesville protest as ‘very fine people’ in a 2017 press conference. This declaration directly challenges a narrative frequently employed by Democrats.
Snopes checker Taija Perry Cook asserted that while Trump did acknowledge ‘very fine people on both sides,’ he explicitly clarified that he wasn’t referring to neo-Nazis and white supremacists, adding they should be ‘condemned totally.’ Consequently, Snopes rated the claim ‘False.’ This development, despite its seemingly odd timing, could significantly impact the upcoming debates. It might stifle Biden from employing one of his favored attacks against Trump.
The question of ‘why now?’ arises. Perry Cook pointed to a tweet from tech executive Shaun Maguire, who, on June 16th, shared a video of Trump’s press conference with over 120,000 followers through the account ‘End Wokeness.’ Maguire, a recent Trump endorser, labeled this ‘a case study in media manipulation.’
This subject holds historical significance because the leftist media and Democratic partisans have long perpetuated the narrative that Trump aligned himself with neo-Nazis based on his statement about ‘very fine people’ on both sides of the Confederate statue controversy. During the 2020 Republican convention, then-PBS reporter Yamiche Alcindor distorted Trump’s remarks, stating, ‘We can think back to his response after Charlottesville, when he said there are very fine people that go to Nazi rallies.’ President Biden’s campaign launch video further amplified this misinformation. After showcasing footage of neo-Nazis, Biden claimed Trump ‘assigned a moral equivalence between those spreading hate and those with the courage to stand against it.’
While other fact-checkers have attempted to provide context, even Politifact, in an article by then Editor-In-Chief Angie Drobnic Holan on April 19, 2019, six days before Biden’s campaign video, failed to offer a definitive ‘Truth-O-Meter’ ruling. There was no ‘False’ or ‘Pants On Fire’ tag, and no PolitiFact article addressed the truthfulness of Biden’s video when it was released. Snopes and PolitiFact provided transcripts for context. A reporter argued, ‘The neo-Nazis started this thing. They showed up in Charlottesville.’ Trump then countered by saying ‘very bad people’ were alongside ‘very fine people.’
Trump further clarified: ‘Excuse me, they didn’t put themselves down as neo-Nazis, and you had some very bad people in that group. But you also had people that were very fine people, on both sides. You had people in that group — excuse me, excuse me, I saw the same pictures as you did — you had people in that group that were there to protest the taking down of, to them, a very, very important statue and the renaming of a park from Robert E. Lee to another name.’ Trump then questioned whether the statues of George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, who were slave owners, should be removed. (Subsequently, some statues have been removed, while others were toppled by leftist protesters, a similar fate met by Abraham Lincoln’s monuments.) Trump concluded, ‘You’re changing history, you’re changing culture, and you had people — and I’m not talking about the neo-Nazis and the white nationalists, because they should be condemned totally.’
Snopes, though one of the earliest fact-checking websites, isn’t known for its impeccable reputation. Founded in 1994 by David and Barbara Mikkelson, its initial purpose was documenting ‘urban legends’ and exposing hoaxes. Notably, Snopes engaged in a public clash with the satirical website Babylon Bee. A satirical headline from the Babylon Bee, ‘CNN Purchases Industrial-Sized Washing Machine To Spin News Before Publication,’ sparked Snopes’ ire. The spoof began, ‘In order to aid the news station in preparing stories for consumption, popular news media organization CNN purchased an industrial-sized washing machine to help its journalists and news anchors spin the news before publication.’ While it seemed apparent that the Babylon Bee piece was a satirical jab at the perceived media bias and ‘fake news’ controversy, some readers interpreted it literally. Snopes, however, felt compelled to deem it ‘FALSE,’ publishing an article titled ‘Did CNN Purchase an Industrial-Sized Washing Machine to Spin News? The news media organization reportedly invested in mechanical assistance to help their journalists and news anchors spin the news before publication.’
David Mikkelson, Snopes co-founder who authored the article, claimed that he discovered individuals who interpreted the satire literally. He stated, ‘Although it should have been obvious that the Babylon Bee piece was just a spoof of the ongoing political brouhaha over alleged news media ‘bias’ and ‘fake news,’ some readers missed that aspect of the article and interpreted it literally.’ This incident prompted Facebook to send a notice to Adam Ford, owner of the Babylon Bee, informing him that an ‘independent fact checker’ had identified ‘disputed’ information in their humor and threatened to restrict their reach. Facebook later acknowledged their error and apologized. The Snopes article now carries the tag ‘Labeled Satire.’
The pro-Biden media has relentlessly preached that Donald Trump should be ‘fact-checked in real time’ and even advocated for his speeches and comments not to be broadcast live due to their alleged unreliability. These ‘independent fact-checkers’ are hailed as democracy’s saviors. However, this underscores their inherent bias, as Biden and the Democrats rely on these ‘independent’ websites to discredit their opponents and bolster their argument that Republicans and conservative media outlets are democracy-undermining misinformation factories. Their ultimate goal is to align themselves with democracy and portray liberal journalism as the epitome of truth. Any ruling against them compromises their carefully crafted image. It’s no surprise that they are enraged by Snopes’ recent ruling.
