Last week, a story about former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton allegedly spying on former president Donald Trump exploded across right-wing media. Of course, the story was false. But that didn’t stop Fox News and other conservative outlets from cooking up wild accusations about Clinton.
The fake spying scandal started after special counsel John Durham, who’s been investigating the origins of the FBI’s Russia probe, submitted a vague technical filing claiming that a lawyer linked to the Clinton campaign used White House data to raise suspicions about Trump’s ties with Russia.
The filing was suddenly blown up by right-wing media as evidence that Trump was spied on, even though that was not true at all. Almost on cue, Trump immediately played the “victim card” and even called for the death penalty as a punishment for her alleged crime.
This went on for days and days. But the story has mysteriously all but disappeared from those conservative outlets. What happened?
CNN Chief media correspondent Brian Stelter explained that the story started to fall apart after Durham released a follow-up statement to clear things up and to distance himself from the right-wing media story by revealing the internet data question in his filing came from the Obama era, not the Trump era.
But it wasn’t after Clinton responded to the made-up controversy that all the headlines about her alleged crimes suddenly stopped.
The former Secretary of State said that the false story being propagated by Fox News and other conservative outlets “come close to actual malice.”
“Basically, she was putting these right-wing outlets on notice, saying, you’re coming close to libeling me,” Stelter noted. “I don’t think she’s actually going to sue, but it’s notable she’s saying that.”
Watch the discussion below.
