The Washington Post’s chief fact-checker Glenn Kessler tried to run interference for Joe Biden after the president falsely claimed during a CNN town hall Tuesday evening that the United States did not have a COVID-19 vaccine when he transitioned into the White House in late January, but it backfired.
Shortly after Biden’s blatantly false assertion made its rounds on the internet, Kessler began his defense of the new president, choosing to explain “how to tell whether a politician might be telling a deliberate lie or just had a verbal stumble.”
Biden said on CNN: “it’s one thing to have the vaccine, which we didn’t have when we came into office, but a vaccinator — how do you get the vaccine into someone’s arm?” Yep, that’s wrong. Sounds bad. But did he mean it?…
— Glenn Kessler (@GlennKesslerWP) February 17, 2021
Instead of issuing a fact check of his statement, Kessler questioned whether Biden actually meant what he said, justifying his words as merely a gaffe.
“Did he say something different elsewhere in the town hall? Yes, just minutes before: ‘We came into office, there was only 50 million doses that were available.’ That’s a clue he knows the vaccine was created when he became president,” Kessler wrote on Twitter. “Is it different than what he said before? Yes, 1/26: ‘We want to give credit to everyone involved in this vaccine effort and the prior administration and the science community and the medical sphere — for getting the program off the ground. And that credit is absolutely due.'”
B) Is it different than what he said before? Yes, 1/26: “We want to give credit to everyone involved in this vaccine effort and the prior administration and the science community and the medical sphere — for getting the program off the ground. And that credit is absolutely due.”
— Glenn Kessler (@GlennKesslerWP) February 17, 2021
Kessler concluded his fact-check-splaining by claiming it is “more telling” if a politician repeats the same lie “day after day.”
“I know it’s fun to snip a clip and act outraged on social media. But what’s more telling is if a politician over and over says the same falsehood, day after day, no matter how often he or she has been fact-checked,” Kessler said. “No going to mention any names, of course.”
I know it’s fun to snip a clip and act outraged on social media. But what’s more telling is if a politician over and over says the same falsehood, day after day, no matter how often he or she has been fact-checked. No going to mention any names, of course.
— Glenn Kessler (@GlennKesslerWP) February 17, 2021
What Kessler failed to mention is that, in addition to Biden’s so-called verbal stumble saying that vaccine production in the United States did not begin until after he assumed office, Vice President Kamala Harris recently claimed in an interview with Axios that the Biden administration was “starting from scratch” on coronavirus vaccine distribution, a quote the Washington Post fact-check desk covered.
You mean like if say the Biden Administration over and over said the same falsehood, day after day, no matter how often they’ve been fact checked, that there was no vaccine plan in place when they assumed office? https://t.co/XF6PHxvg1s pic.twitter.com/Xsj6U8qGn5
— CJ Grover (@cj_grover) February 17, 2021
Even before Harris’s interview, the White House sources repeatedly claimed they inherited no vaccine distribution plan from the Trump administration.
“There is nothing for us to rework. We are going to have to build everything from scratch,” one source reportedly told CNN’s MJ Lee.
National Institutes of Health Director Anthony Fauci disputed the allegations by the administration last month, clarifying that “we certainly are not starting from scratch.”
Kessler previously feigned innocence in a Twitter fight about his lack of objectivity in calling out the lies of politicians, specifically Biden, after taking issue with The Federalist’s running list of Biden’s lies since he has taken office. The list mimics Kessler’s own fact-checking style, which was haphazardly applied to former President Donald Trump and his administration for four years. Stephen Miller, a popular conservative commentator and podcast host, also began keeping a list.
