The Washington Post’s so-called fact-checker, Glenn Kessler, has had a very bad week, finding his own tweets slapped with “community notes” pointing out that they are less than factual.
On Tuesday, it happened for the third time in five days when Kessler jumped on Twitter to attack both Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump for trying to “intimidate” the judge in the shaky Trump indictment case.
They posted a link to an article revealing that the judge is not only a huge Democratic donor, but his daughter actually worked for Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign.
“Both Trump sons have now posted photos of the judge’s adult daughter. Totally irrelevant — and obviously intended to intimidate,” Kessler tittered.
Both Trump sons have now posted photos of the judge’s adult daughter. Totally irrelevant — and obviously intended to intimidate. pic.twitter.com/nmYxjGjKIG
— Glenn Kessler (@GlennKesslerWP) April 4, 2023
This is what Donald Trump Jr. actually posted:
Seems relevant… yet another connection in this hand picked democrat show trial. The BS never ends folks.
Daughter of Judge on Trump Case Worked on Biden-Harris Campaign https://t.co/5FtA7K9732
— Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) April 4, 2023
Kessler’s claim is a flat-out falsehood.
Neither Trump son posted any photos at all. What they did was link to a Breitbart story that has the photo of the judge and his daughter as its featured image. It showed up automatically when the Trumps inputted the story’s URL in their tweets.
Soon, a community note was appended to Kessler’s outrageous fake news tweet.
“The posts in question contain a link to an article alleging that the judge’s daughter previously worked on the Biden-Harris campaign. Neither individual attached a photo; it is the preview image for the linked article,” the note read.
I’m sorry the truth keeps happening to you. pic.twitter.com/r8dvkkmF5f
— Jeremy Redfern (@JeremyRedfernFL) April 5, 2023
Kessler was lambasted by hundreds of Twitter users for lying about what the Trump brothers did. “Do you think before you tweet?” one asked him.
Do you think before you tweet?
— Buzz Patterson (@BuzzPatterson) April 5, 2023
Hey @washingtonpost come get your boy before @CommunityNotes humiliates him again
— Christopher F. Rufo ⚔️ (@realchrisrufo) April 4, 2023
“Why hasn’t this ‘fact-checker’ been fired yet?” another user wondered.
Why hasn’t this “fact-checker” been fired yet? This guy can’t fact or check…
— Bradley Laborman (@BradmanTV) April 5, 2023
But Kessler made his fake news even worse by altering the Trumps’ tweets, saying, “I removed the photos from their tweets so as not to spread the image further.”
This sent writer Mollie Hemingway to blast Kessler.
“Did you really just deceptively edit these tweets in order to falsely portray the LINKING OF A NEWS STORY ABOUT A PUBLIC FIGURE as the posting of a private individual’s photo? Wow, BANNER FREAKING WEEK, GLENN,” she wrote.
Did you really just deceptively edit these tweets in order to falsely portray the LINKING OF A NEWS STORY ABOUT A PUBLIC FIGURE as the posting of a private individual’s photo? Wow, BANNER FREAKING WEEK, GLENN.
— Mollie (@MZHemingway) April 4, 2023
Kessler, though, did far worse than lie about what the Trump sons did.
In actuality, his goal was to discredit the story revealing that the man in charge of Trump’s case is not only a donor to the far, far left, but his daughter even worked for those whom Trump will be running against in 2024.
How can this judge be at all unbiased as he lords over Trump’s case? That is a question Kessler doesn’t want people to ask.
Kessler must be getting used to community note smackdowns. On Saturday, he got one for claiming that George Soros didn’t donate to left-wing District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s political campaign.
After Kessler claimed that the “incendiary” accusation is false, Twitter noted that it isn’t really false at all because Soros donated $1 million to the PAC Color of Change, which had announced it intended to give $1 million to Bragg’s campaign.
The fact-checker was fact-checked a second time when he incorrectly claimed that the first community note said Color of Change donated a cool million to Bragg.
But, as the second community note pointed out, the original note didn’t say Color of Change donated $1 million. What it said was “the Color of Change PAC *pledged* $1 million. Soros donated $1 million to the PAC days after it endorsed Bragg and pledged more than $1 million in spending to support his candidacy.”
Kessler’s whining was so pitiful that Elon Musk himself chimed in with this zinger:
Only thing on fire are Kessler’s pants
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 1, 2023
Glenn Kessler has gotten away with his partisan lies and fake news published under the guise of “fact-checks” for years. Finally people are calling him out.
