Fake news misleads unsuspecting audiences with narratives created from thin air. Sloppy and biased reporting, though different from fake news, is arguably as bad because the end result is the same: Readers are led astray.
While media tries to combat the rise of fake news, it continues to struggle miserably with its own problems of being sloppy and misleading.
Consider the following: A number of Hillary Clinton supporters believe Russia “tampered with vote tallies in order to get Donald Trump elected,” according to a recent survey published by the Washington Post.
That these supporters believe the Russians interfered with election totals is crazy.
All that is known so far about Russia’s role in the election is that someone hacked the email accounts of Democratic National Committee staffers and that John Podesta, Clinton’s campaign chairman, fell for a phishing scam.
Both the CIA and the FBI agree on this.
The DNC and Podesta are both private entities, and neither one has any official role with the state. Neither one has any say on how votes are tallied.
There’s nothing to back the claim that Russia interfered with voter totals. No U.S. intelligence agency has said anything like this, and President Obama himself stated nothing of the sort happened in the 2016 election.
Yet, here we are, looking at a silly poll showing some Clinton voters believe Russia fudged the numbers.
Who can blame these people for believe the election was “hacked”? After all, it’s all they’ve heard and read in the news since Clinton’s stunning defeat on Nov. 8.
Media have been anxious to cover the Russian hacks, but they’ve done it in an exceptionally irresponsible and sloppy fashion. It’s no wonder so many people believe the Kremlin played a much bigger part in the election of Trump.
Just look at how these headlines are worded [emphases added]:
- From the Associated Press: “Obama orders sanctions against Russian officials, intelligence services in response to election hacking.”
- From the New York Times: “U.S. Punishes Russia for Election Hacking, Ejecting Operatives.”
- From Reuters: “U.S. set to announce response to Russian election hacking: sources.”
- From the Washington Post: “Obama administration is close to announcing measures to punish Russia for election interference.”
- From the Wall Street Journal: “US Punishes Russia Over Election Hacking With Sanctions.”
The list of examples goes on and on and on.
These headlines, and the opening paragraphs that accompany them, leave one with the distinct impression that Russia’s involvement in the election was far more direct and consequential than the White House or any intelligence agency has claimed.
But the facts of the matter remain: Only the DNC and Podesta were hacked. This is no small matter, to be sure. However, referring to what happened to those private entities as an “election hacking” is misleading, and the survey published by the Post suggest that at least some people have taken it to mean votes were tweaked.
Also, aside from being misleading, there’s a second, more dangerous side effect to these sloppy and thoughtless headlines: They undermine the legitimacy of Trump’s victory.
Obama went out of his way at his year-end press conference to assure the press that Trump was elected legitimately, and that there was nothing to suggest the election totals had been tampered with. Clinton and her army of surrogates also argued during the campaign that questioning the outcome of the election is a “threat on our democracy.”
“Hacked election” headlines in all their carelessness have created a narrative in which Trump is president only because the Russians fudged the election totals, and a not-entirely-insignificant number of American voters believe this.
Newsrooms would do well to back away from wording these reports in such a way as to mislead readers and give the impression that election totals were “hacked,” and that Trump didn’t win fair and square.
Then again, perhaps that’s the point.
