Topic: WorldNetDaily
Last week, we detailed how WorldNetDaily was heavily hyping a series of planned pro-Trump rallies across the country this past weekend, as well as the fact that WND editor Joseph Farah would be speaking at one of them.
Well, those rallies came and went ... and WND didn't cover them. No "news" article on the rallies was ever posted at WND.
Why? Right Wing Watch's Brian Tashman went to the Washington, D.C., rally across from the White House and found the answer: "While several speakers addressed the crowd as if the day would be treated as a watershed moment in American political history, the Lafayette Square gathering only attracted a few dozen people." Tashman also summarized Farah's speech:
The next speaker, WorldNetDaily editor Joseph Farah, similarly declared that prayer and divine intervention were directly involved in Trump’s electoral victory, saying that Democrats “should not be investigating Russia’s influence on the outcome—they should be investigating God’s influence on the outcome!”
Trump, he said, is “the deliverer we’ve been given by God almighty,” calling his presidency a “window of mercy” and “an answer to our heartfelt prayers.”
“God has given us a miracle” with Trump’s election, according to Farah, along with a holy “reprieve” and a “second chance” for a “political and spiritual revival.” If Trump hadn’t won, Farah said, America would have had a future of “socialism, corruption, decay, tyranny, perversion, immorality [and] lawlessness.”
Farah said that “the ‘fake news’ cartel has cast a spell over America for the last 30 years, at least,” claiming that conservatives are blacklisted from the media.
The first acknowledgement at WND that these rallies actually took place is Farah's March 7 column, which reproduces his speech at the sparsely attended rally. He made even more references to the purported divine intervention that resulted in Trump's election, at one point saying, "If the Democrats and the media want to investigate the 2016 election, I’ve got some news for them: They should not be investigating Russia’s influence on the outcome! They should be investigating God’s influence on the outcome." He continued:
Do you believe God has opened a window of mercy and grace for America?
Do you believe He’s giving us an opportunity to seize this moment?
Do you believe what we’re witnessing in Washington today is the answer to our heartfelt prayers for the future of our country?
Do you believe the fate of this political and spiritual revolution is every bit as much in your prayerful hands as it is in the determination of this deliverer we’ve been given by God Almighty?
Then let’s agree – right here and now – to make this rally the first of many that grow ever larger, always beginning and ending in fervent appeals and petitions to the Creator of the Universe to straighten our individual and collective paths.
Tellingly, Farah doesn't link to any WND stories about the rally (since there aren't any) or even of a video of his speech; the column embed a long-shot image, apparently taken from the back of the sparse crowd, of someone who is described as Farah giving the speech (since you certainly can't tell from the image itself).
The column, however, does include an editor's note: "To learn more about future such rallies around the country, sign up for free notices from WND." That hasn't exactly worked out so far, has it?
