As the Fox News/Dominion lawsuit is about to begin, Rachel Maddow called out the network for pushing pro-Russia propaganda.
Video:
Rachel #Maddow "That is the network that circulated the fake documents that were altered crudely to make it look like Russia is definitely winning the war and Ukraine is definitely losing and that's the document that Fox News highlighted on their network last Thursday night. " pic.twitter.com/3Kc4PcYB2t
— Sarah Reese Jones (@PoliticusSarah) April 18, 2023
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Maddow said:
Another point here perhaps a bigger problem here is that there is a Fox News Channel problem associated with this in this whole scandal about these classified documents being posted online, you might have heard along the way that some of the documents were altered, so it wasn’t just that this was a classified material that the public was never supposed to see, part of the issue here was that some of these documents were altered from what they originally said. Well, according to “The wall Street journal” the changed documents, the doctored documents were the ones posted online by this woman or the network she was running, this pro-Putin, pro-Russian social media network that put them into wider circulation, specifically what was changed well, one was changed to make Russian casualties in the war look way lower than they were. And to make Ukrainian casualties look way higher than they were it made it look like Russia was doing way better in the war than they are and look like Ukraine was losing really badly.
Another way to put it is the way they put it when they discussed it on Fox News, ” The second thing we learned from these slides is that despite direct U.S. Involvement, Ukraine is, in fact, losing the war. Seven Ukrainians are being killed for every Russian.”
Ukraine is losing the war Ukraine is losing the war, seven Ukrainians are being killed for every Russian. That’s not actually what you can learn from the slides. That’s what you can learn from the documents that were allegedly posted online by this Massachusetts Air National Guardsman arrested that week but then in order to get that seven Ukrainians killed for every Russian killed, in order to get that, you can only learn that from the slides that were crudely doctored by th pro-Russia pro-Putin media network that circulated the classified information in the first place but only reportedly after changing the documents to try to make it look like Russia’s war is going way better than it is so how did these documents get into circulation this weird pro-Russia social media network affiliated with somebody who just got out of the U.S. Navy, that is the network that also circulated the fake documents that were altered crudely to make it look like Russia is definitely winning the war and Ukraine is definitely losing and that’s the document that fox News highlighted on their network last Thursday night.
Maddow never mentioned Tucker Carlson’s name, but she did play a clip from him and added that the Russian propaganda was shown on Fox’s top-rated hour. Carlson knew that the documents were altered, but broadcast the lie anyway.
It is the exact same behavior that the network engaged in after the 2020 election. Evidence suggests that Fox knew that Trump’s claims about stolen elections and voting machines were false, but they ran with them anyway.
The larger point is that Fox News is a disinformation outlet, and even the pressure and scrutiny of the Dominion lawsuit has not forced a change in behavior. Fox News may never change. It may have to be put out of business or limited by losing one massive lawsuit after another.
Maddow nailed it. Fox News and Tucker Carlson are undermining the United States.
Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.
Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association
