Thread by @DrewHolden360

🧵THREAD🧵

Today the “Russian bounties” story - where Russia was supposedly paying to have US soldiers killed - quietly imploded.

For the last year, Dems, the media & others have pushed this conspiracy theory endlessly.

If you think that’s exaggerative, have a look⤵️

The worst offender was @nytimes, who broke the original story and went on to convince the families of soldiers who had been KIA that perhaps the Russians were to blame and President Trump didn’t care.

Will we get a follow up? Will the families?

But they were far from alone. @CNN pushed the conspiracy theory just as frequently as anyone did.

You’ll notice that, while some of the stories note the bounties are “alleged”, eventually CNN dropped that, despite the narrative being disputed (and having since fallen apart).

@CNN also made a habit of having elected Dems on to suggest a path forward on these unverified allegations, glossing over the fact that they may or may not even be true. Here’s @SenGillibrand and @SenDuckworth. (More on electeds later)

@brianstelter, I’m asking you earnestly: will you retract this story? Or at least amend it significantly, given the implications of your reporting?

If not, why not?

@washingtonpost gave Trump Four Pinocchios on a fact check when he said that the intel - which, again, was unverified and has since evaporated - was even disputed.

I mean, cmon!

But probably the most unhinged in their insistence was @MSNBC. They pushed this conspiracy theory time and time again across their platform as if the allegations were rock solid.

Turns out, they weren’t. @FrankFigliuzzi1, @Lawrence

@MSNBC unsurprisingly got their chief Russian propagandist, @maddow/@MaddowBlog involved on this one, too.

You would think that the Russian collusion hoax imploding would chasten her. Apparently not.

But Maddow isn’t @MSNBC’s only conspiracy theorist.

@JoyAnnReid was one of the most outspoken proponents of the Russian bounties conspiracy theory (these are only a handful of her tweets - she could’ve had a thread to herself).

The rush among outlets to go from explosive but unconfirmed reports to gospel truth was contagious.

Here’s just a few stories from @politico:

I know it isn’t much of the money they get but it’s still jarring to me that @NPR is allocated money from US taxpayers.

Notice particularly in this first one how the story is clearly framed as if the allegations are already beyond dispute.

@thedailybeast broke this story - which I’ve linked to at the end of the thread - which is good and important reporting.

They also pushed the original bounties claim, too.

But this only scratches the surface. Everyone was running with this story despite all the red flags.

Here’s just a smattering from:
@Reuters
@AssociatedPress
@NBCNews (yikes)
@NYDailyNews

And you’ll remember that plenty of politicians got involved in this narrative, too.

@JoeBiden and @KamalaHarris made it an important component of their campaign.

How many voters’ minds might this conspiracy theory have changed?

They weren’t alone. Lots of other powerful Democrats got involved. The Senate in particular went into a full court press.

Here’s just a few, from:
@SenDuckworth (the loudest critic on this, and worth doubling up on)
@SenWarren
@SenMarkey
@CoryBooker

And the lower house wasn’t any better. @SpeakerPelosi was probably the worst offender.

In retrospect, it sure looks like Trump was right to call the story - forced out of terrorist detainees - a hoax.

But there were plenty of others in the House. Many of the names won’t shock you. Here’s:
@RepSwalwell (go figure)
@RepAdamSchiff (double go figure)
@tedlieu (quickly becoming a 🧵favorite) and
@sethmoulton (“treasonous behavior”)

Of course the trolls, grifters, child predators and the rest of the ghouls at @ProjectLincoln were pushing this one hard.

I try to have grace and charity on here. I can’t muster it with the Lincoln Project.

Obligatory @kurteichenwald and @SethAbramson mentions (just unhinged stuff here).

It won’t surprise you that the Never Trump crowd were adamant about this story. Here we see @SteveSchmidtSES, @BillKristol, @TheRickWilson (plus @MollyJongFast, who like Rick has also blocked me) and no thread would be complete without @JRubinBlogger

All of the internet loudmouths were on this one. I’ve only got so much space and so much patience but here we’ll see:
@DanRather
@tribelaw (go figure)
@KevinMKruse and
@Scaramucci (this might be libel?)

There hasn’t been a more widespread or pernicious conspiracy theory in recent memory than “Russian bounties.” It was always thinly sourced and disputed. Yet it was treated as the gospel truth because Orange Man Bad.

Where are the corrections? Where are the retractions?

I don’t think we’ll get any. I don’t think any heads will roll. I don’t think any lessons will be learned.

But you know what I do think? I do think this’ll happen again. And that’s embarrassing.

In many ways, this story was the Russian Collusion hoax in miniature: Trump is bad, so we’ll believe anything that’s said about him, especially if it involves Russia.

A truly shameful showing from those who are meant to tell the American people the truth.

Full story is here from @thedailybeast: thedailybeast.com/us-intel-walks…

For those who have asked, I don’t have anything to sell or subscribe to. But if you can, food banks are in desperate need because of the pandemic, and need your help.

For those in DC, Capital Area Food Bank is a great option. capitalareafoodbank.org