It’s as if certain members of the media are in a race to see who can report the most hilariously wrong thing about the Trump presidency.
On Thursday, for example, an NBC News story claimed incorrectly that Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch wrote an article in college opposing campus military recruiters over LGBT issues. He didn’t.
Later that same day, many reporters overhyped a supposed scoop alleging the White House had eased restrictions on Russia so that U.S. companies could go into business with the Federal Security Service, the successor of the KGB. It didn’t really.
More ridiculous than even these easily debunked stories is a separate, short-lived report published Thursday alleging that Trump had changed the name of “Black History Month” to “National African American History Month.”
The bogus claim first originated with TMZ, which originally published the story under the headline: “Donald Trump Changes Black History Month to African American History Month.”
That article has since undergone major changes. The headline now now reads, “PRESIDENT TRUMP Most Modern Presidents Declared ‘NATIONAL AFRICAN AMERICAN HISTORY MONTH.'”
That’s a significantly different story, no?
The headline is not the only thing to have undergone serious revisions in the story, which disappeared for a time Thursday afternoon from TMZ’s website. The article has been overhauled so that it argues now that references to “National African American History Month” are perfectly normal for the White House.
“Donald Trump, turns out, did not officially change Black History Month to National African American History Month … it’s been that way for decades,” it now reads. “Trump’s official presidential proclamation uses the words, ‘African American History Month’ — but President Obama did the same. In fact, since President Carter … almost all Commanders-in-Chief have used the same language in proclamations.”
Well, okay. What’s the story then?
Sadly, TMZ’s major walk-back didn’t come until after the initial bogus claim found a foothold with believing audiences, including certain members of the press. This is about par for the course with supposedly shocking, but ultimately incorrect, reporting.
The story was even re-reported by a few websites, including Bustle and a Fox Houston affiliate, before TMZ scrapped everything and rewrote its initial report.
If this is the kind of reporting we can come to expect under a President Trump, it’s going to be a very long, very unpleasant and very confusing four years.
