Though what they’re doing is pretty predictable, it is still absolutely hilarious to me to see the knots the mainstream media, so-called “fact checkers,” and Democrats are tying themselves into in order to try and shield Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg from criticism that he is backed by billionaire Democrat funder George Soros.
We saw it last week when Washington Post “fact checker” Glenn Kessler not only debunked his own argument against Republican claims about a Soros-Bragg connection but also got dinged big time by Twitter users who used the “Community Notes” feature to rain all over Kessler’s parade.
Ben Collins, a discredited NBC News “senior reporter” on disinformation (I kid you not), also tried his hand at absolving Bragg last week and failed miserably when Twitterers pointed out two things: that the link he used also debunked his claim, and that his own network had previously noted how Soros indirectly funded Bragg through a left-wing PAC.
Regardless of the actual facts, however, Democrat apologists in the press will “Democrat apologist” you all day long if they think it will get their guy off the hook, and that is exactly what CNN’s Daniel Dale attempted in a recent “fact check” he did on former President Donald Trump’s statements about Soros funding Bragg.
Dale first played the “anti-Semitic” card very early on in his write-up, suggesting (wrongly) that the attacks on Soros were steeped in anti-Semitism, an oft-repeated claim from leftists that has no basis in reality.
“Soros, a longtime supporter of Democratic campaigns, various liberal causes and prosecutors who favor criminal justice reform, has been a frequent target of antisemitic conspiracy theories painting the Jewish philanthropist as a puppetmaster behind various US and international events,” Dale wrote.
Dale’s next line regurgitated a deceptive talking point from a Soros spokesman who claimed Soros and Bragg “have never once communicated in any way”:
Soros did not make any direct contributions to Bragg’s 2021 election campaign, and a Soros spokesperson, Michael Vachon, told CNN last week that the two men have never once communicated in any way.
As if two people need to meet in order for someone to back their campaigns through funding.
Dale then correctly pointed out that Soros’ donations to Bragg were “indirect” through Color of Change PAC, though he made sure to inform readers what the PAC’s spokesperson thought of the Republican critics who pointed out the connection:
Rather, Soros’s connection to Bragg is indirect: he has been a major donor to a liberal political action committee that supported Bragg’s candidacy. A spokesperson for the PAC denounced the Soros-related attacks on Bragg in an interview with CNN last week, calling them “antisemitic,” “anti-Black” and an overstatement of both Soros’s role in the PAC’s decision-making and the PAC’s role in Bragg’s election victory.
Later, Dale wrote about what Color of Change spent on Bragg’s 2021 campaign:
The Color of Change PAC, which has backed progressive district attorney candidates around the country, spent slightly over $500,000 supporting Bragg, Color of Change president and PAC spokesperson Rashad Robinson told CNN last week.
Though Dale tried to make it sound coincidental that the PAC spent that money right after Soros donated $1,000,000 to it in May 2021, he accidentally gave the game away in his last paragraph. Note the wording (bolded emphasis added by me):
Trump claimed last week that Soros spent more than $1 million on Bragg’s campaign, but that figure is inaccurate.The Color of Change PAC did announce in May 2021, the month that Soros made a $1 million donation to the PAC, that it was planning to spend over $1 million on an independent expenditure campaign in support of Bragg’s candidacy. But the PAC paused the pro-Bragg spending after hearing an uncorroborated allegation against Bragg that it was not able to thoroughly investigate at the time because of legal restrictions on PACs communicating with candidates, Robinson said. It ended up spending about half of what it had planned, Robinson said, and kept the rest of Soros’s donation for other uses.“Soros didn’t give us money to give to Alvin Bragg. Soros made a donation to Color of Change,” Robinson said.
As Newsbusters Joseph Vazquez observed, it was like Dale was inadvertently conceding the overall point Trump was trying to make – that Bragg was Soros-backed:
Dale must not have realized the implication of his framing. But Dale still tried to tell readers to ignore their lying eyes by quoting Robinson, who deflected: “‘Soros didn’t give us money to give to Alvin Bragg. Soros made a donation to Color of Change.’” Per Dale’s framing, some of Soros’ money was used to support Bragg. But Dale dismissed this by zeroing in on how Soros didn’t make a “direct” contribution to Bragg and didn’t speak to him. For Dale, Soros’ connection to Bragg was just “indirect.”
Except “indirect” is exactly how these shady funding operations work, supporting candidates by funneling money to the existing PACs to bolster their profiles and election chances.
The bottom line here is that Bragg is indeed backed by George Soros:
‘Nuff said.
— Stacey Matthews has also written under the pseudonym “Sister Toldjah” and can be reached via Twitter. —
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