CNN’s Story Contradicting Devin Nunes on Susan Rice Is Based Entirely on Anonymous Sources

Nunes has been criticized for the way he handled and presented this information—not without reason—as he rushed to the press with it before handing it over to the rest of the intelligence committee. As a result, Nunes has recused himself from the intel committee’s Trump-Russia probe, but he’s still looking into Rice’s unmasking and the questionable conduct of the intelligence committee more generally. However, Democrats on the committee have now seen the information that Nunes has, and no one denies that Rice is behind the unmasking.

CNN responded to the Rice revelation in a way that was frankly discrediting for a respectable news organization. They refused to cover it, except to have their reporters overtly discredit it and even called it “false” in chryons. (See plenty of examples of the bizarre way they handled this story here.) Even MSNBC, ostensibly much more liberal than CNN, treated the Rice story as legitimate.

After ignoring and downplaying the Rice story, CNN began heavily pushing a story Tuesday night that contradicts Nunes: “CNN Exclusive: Classified docs contradict Nunes surveillance claims, GOP and Dem sources say.” Well, that sounds like it could be a big deal. Let’s look at the story, shall we?:

This story, then, is sourced completely anonymously and stands in direct contrast to Rep. Nunes’ public assertions that he’s seen information about Rice’s conduct that he finds alarming. Further, the claims that Rice did nothing “unusual or illegal” are tendentious at best. Nunes has been consistent all along that no evidence he’s yet seen would allow him to conclude what Rice did was illegal. (Trump, as he’s wont to do, has muddied the waters by saying he “thinks” Rice comitted a crime, but Nunes has been clear on this.) Nonetheless, when someone in Washington defaults to the defense that what they did wasn’t illegal, it’s often a sizable tell they’re defending some other abuse of power.

As for judging whether Rice’s behavior was “normal and appropriate,” without knowing what Rice actually did, that’s in the eye of the beholder. There are many standard operating procedures in Washington that ordinary people find pretty abhorrent and could result in political consequences if exposed. If you believed Trump and/or his associates are not above doing Putin’s bidding—as many partisans and members of the media apparently do—perhaps you’d think it was “normal and appropriate” to be surveilling his associates. Trump supporters who note the lack of hard evidence of Trump-Russia connections might understandably argue that using surveillance powers to keep tabs on the opposing party and incoming administration is the stuff of banana republics.

It doesn’t help that CNN’s thesis—that Rice did the unmasking, but it’s perfectly normal—just happens to be the exact talking point that former Obama administration officials were pushing when the story broke last week. Worth noting: CNN national security correspondent Jim Sciutto is the first byline on this story. Sciutto is also a former Obama administration official, and here’s what he said about the Rice story when it broke last week: “This appears to be a story largely ginned up, partly as a distraction from this larger investigation.”

It’s not that I think Sciutto is incapable of good reporting, but asking me to choose between Devin Nunes asserting on record he’s seen abuses of power, and Sciutto first dismissing Nunes out of hand and later refuting Nunes with anonymous sources making subjective claims, well, that isn’t much of a choice at all. CNN provides zero new facts, and no source is on record and available for other reporters to question. Maybe more evidence will emerge later to vindicate CNN’s reporting here. For now there is very little there there, and what there happens to be there, is little more than a convenient story for congressional Democrats to attack Nunes with:

You’d think CNN would be more cautious given that there have been plenty of anonymously sourced stories on Trump that have fallen apart or otherwise been justly criticized for not exercising due diligence, as I noted in a recent issue if THE WEEKLY STANDARD. Along these lines, CNN’s story on the “dossier” claiming, among other things, Trump had trysts with Russian prostitutes—and which Scuitto also had a hand in writing—was pretty justly criticized. CNN’s reporting lent credence to easily confirmable allegations that turned out to be false, even as they played up anonymous intelligence sources saying the dossier should be “investigated seriously.” In fairness, CNN later reported “US investigators corroborate some aspects of the Russia dossier,” but that was also completely anonymously sourced.

The media writ large, and CNN in particular, have some credibility issues at the moment. And one way to rebuild credibility would be to stick to the realm of impartial reports with on-the-record sources and verifiable facts. Instead, the default position of CNN and other media outlets seems to be to downplay or dismiss stories that might benefit Trump. And they downplay these stories when it means giving Susan Rice—a woman who has repeatedly, demonstrably told untruths about major national security issues for no other obvious reason than insulating President Obama from the political consequences of their collective, even deadly, incompetence—a seemingly incomprehensible amount of deference.