WikiLeaks conceded Wednesday that the Trump administration is “a frequent source of false information” moments after sharing links to President Trump’s “Fake News Awards.”
“Comment: While @WikiLeaks, as a primary source organization with a perfect verification record welcomes debate over ‘fake news’ it should be noted that along with the U.S. establishment press, the Trump administration is a frequent source of false information,” the Twitter account for WikiLeaks stated late Thursday evening.
Comment: While @WikiLeaks, as a primary source organization with a perfect verification record welcomes debate over “fake news” it should be noted that along with the U.S. establishment press, the Trump administration is a frequent source of false information. #FakeNewsAwards
— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) January 18, 2018
WikiLeaks did not go into further detail.
About 15 minutes before that tweet, WikiLeaks shared links to archived copies of the “Fake News Awards” after the Republican National Committee website, which hosted it, crashed. The GOP attributed the issue to high traffic.
WikiLeaks, which published hacked emails of top Democratic officials during the 2016 campaign, was found with “high confidence” to have been used by Russian intelligence to release this information as part of an effort to get Trump elected, according to a U.S. intelligence community report last year. WikiLeaks, led by founder Julian Assange, denies this assertion.
WikiLeaks was mentioned in Trump’s “Fake News Awards,” though it was not the target of his complaint. No. 3 on the list mentioned how CNN “FALSLEY reported that candidate Donald Trump and his son Donald J. Trump, Jr. had access to hacked WikiLeaks documents from WikiLeaks.”
That report was corrected on air and online a few hours after the Washington Post revealed that the email in question was actually sent on Sept. 14, 2016, one day after the WikiLeaks documents went public.
WikiLeaks responded to the award on Wednesday, saying other outlets, including NBC and CBS “originated or ‘verified’ the same false story in an extraordinary case of triple fake news placement that still lacks all transparency or discipline.”
While Trump’s #FakeNewsAwards attributes the “bronze” (#3) medal to CNN, in fact, NBC & CBS also originated or “verified” the same false story in an extraordinary case of triple fake news placement that still lacks all transparency or discipline. https://t.co/jpaIvWte0G
— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) January 18, 2018
To view the “Fake News Awards” in full, the Washington Examiner has screenshots of them here.
Editor’s note: This story has been updated to further explain the January 2017 intelligence community report that tied WikiLeaks to Russian intelligence efforts.
