CBS Publishes Trump Talking Point as News. Internal Backlash Ensued

CBS published an obviously questionable talking point from the Trump regime. It faced backlash both externally and internally.

Is there a point where mainstream media feels that they are carrying too much water for the fascist Trump regime? As it turns out, there was according to recent revelations.

The story revolves around the ICE’s murder of Renee Good. It’s a story that the mainstream media fumbled very badly for days. The murder was captured on video from multiple angles and posted online.

It clearly showed Good attempting to flee the scene after ICE swarmed and circled her car. The ICE agent Good in the head multiple times with multiple shots through her rolled down side window. The ICE agent was so unbothered by the incident that he didn’t even bother to get off his cell phone. He was then whisked away from the scene of the crime as other ICE officers blocked medical treatment of the victim.

The Trump regime, in response, tried to pass off the lies that Good intentionally used her vehicle to run over ICE agents, using her vehicle as a weapon and painted Good as a terrorist in the process. It was all very obvious lies, but in response, mainstream media carried water for the Trump regime by arguing that the situation had ‘duelling narratives‘ even though the truth was as plain as day that this was a murder. This sparked backlash from the public as people complained on multiple places about the coverage. It was an obvious attempt to muddy the waters and the public, save for Trump loyalists, wasn’t having it.

It was already clear that the Trump regime was trying to pull some strings to get the mainstream media to cover the obvious Trump lies as fact or, at the very least, credible. New revelations, however, show a more vivid picture of the Trump regime doing so.

One of the obvious lies was apparently the talking point that the ICE official suffered from “internal bleeding” from the incident (something that the video evidence refutes for the most part). As it turns out, this was something that the Trump regime was trying to have “leak” to the media to try and demonize the late Good. The effort was lower than a snake belly, but apparently, they got CBS on board… at least initially.

CBS has already taken considerable flack for being poor quality. It was, after all, the same organization that Trump had installed a political censor under the name “bias monitor”. As a result of that and many other issues, the “news” organization has earned the online nickname “SeeBS”. So, when Trump officials “leaked” the story to the organization about how the ICE agent suffered from “internal bleeding”, CBS quickly hit the publish button. What ensued was backlash both externally and internally. From The Guardian:

CBS initially published the account about officer Jonathan Ross on X, formerly Twitter. About 30 minutes later, the network followed up with another post, containing a link to an article by two correspondents that similarly cited “two US officials briefed on his medical condition”.

The report, which was not extensively covered by other news organizations, drew an immediate response on social media from critics who questioned the network’s sourcing – and whether it aligned with the Trump administration’s preferred focus.

But there was also internal skepticism at the network about the report, according to emails viewed by the Guardian. It was met with “huge internal concern” by some, one CBS News staffer said. Others viewed the conversations as standard editorial discussions.

Before the original report was published, a medical producer at the network suggested in an email to colleagues that “it would be helpful to ask what type of treatment he received”, and whether the officer received surgery or any other type of procedure.

In another email, an executive expressed skepticism about the broad nature of the medical diagnosis, and what it actually entailed. “I’m no doctor, but internal bleeding is a very broad term and can range in severity,” wrote CBS News senior vice-president David Reiter.

“A bruise is internal bleeding. But it can also be something serious,” Reiter continued. “We do know that the ICE agent walked away from the incident – we have that on camera.” (The network’s story noted that “videos from the scene showed Ross walking away after the incident”.)

The network’s top editor, Bari Weiss, expressed a high level of interest in the story on an editorial call on Wednesday morning, according to staffers who listened.

“There was big internal dissension about the ‘internal bleeding’ report here last night,” the CBS News staffer, who was not authorized to speak publicly, said. “It was viewed as a thinly veiled, anonymous leak by [the Trump administration] to someone who’d carry it online.”

(emphasis mine)

I don’t know about you, but this report is pretty damning. The Trump regime wanted to push talking points and got their hired lackey at CBS to publish it. This despite the obvious lack of evidence to support it. You want to know why there is such a lack of trust in the media? This is just one of many examples that is absolutely destroying that trust. The Trump regime used CBS has their own personal megaphone regardless of what evidence there is and CBS did Trumps dirty work of spreading disinformation.

Of course, the damage that was done for the publication of the likely lie wasn’t just exclusive for CBS. Numerous other mainstream media spread that likely disinformation as well without questioning it. Here’s what I saw today:

ICE officer who shot Renee Nicole Good suffered internal bleeding, feds say (USAToday)
ICE agent who fatally shot Renee Good suffered internal bleeding, DHS says (Global News)
ICE agent who shot Renee Good suffered internal bleeding, was hospitalized after she clipped him with car: DHS (New York Post)
DHS claims that ICE agent who shot Renee Good suffered ‘internal bleeding’ after the confrontation (The Independent)
ICE Agent Suffered Internal Bleeding After Minneapolis Shooting (NewsWeek)
ICE agent who shot Renee Good suffered internal bleeding, officials say (ABC)

So, it seems that multiple mainstream media outlets carried the story without questioning the talking point. This despite the very serious questions surrounding the validity of it in the first place. Again, though, this is what destroys trust in the media. It’s not because there is disinformation online, but because of what the mainstream media produces. The laziness of mindlessly carrying the talking point of one random source with zero thinking really only hurts the reputation of the mainstream media even more.

Drew Wilson on Mastodon, Twitter and Facebook.