How CNS Embraced Trump's Bogus Election Fraud Conspiracy

CNSNews.com gave Donald Trump plenty of space to push unchallenged his claim that the election was stolen from him. After the Capitol riot, though, CNS was briefly shocked into reporting balanced news.

By Terry Krepel
Posted 3/17/2021

The attempt by the state of Texas to interfere in the elections of other states through a lawsuit it brought straight to the Supreme Court was yet another case of CNS pushing Trump's narrative.

A Dec. 9 article by Susan Jones uncritically repeated Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton touting the lawsuit on Fox News. Two days later, another article by Jones admitted that Paxton faced "blistering criticism" for filing the lawsuit and actually detailed the responses from the states being sued -- but led off with Paxton declaring (on Fox News, of course) that "we ought to have the chance to be heard at least once."

After the Supreme Court swiftly rejected the lawsuit, CNS didn't do a story on it. instead, two days later, Jones rehashed a Fox Business appearance by Paxton lamenting that "I don't know what else we could have done, other than ask the court to at least hear our arguments." Details on what the Supreme Court said in rejecting the lawsuit were buried in an unbylined article that cited Nancy Pelosi describing the lawsuit as an example of how "Republicans are engaged in an election subversion that imperils our democracy." That was followed by an stenography piece by Melanie Arter in which she detailed Trump's ranting that "it's not over" despite the court's swift rejection of the Texas lawsuit.

CNS also published a Dec. 14 op-ed by Zack Smith of the right-wing Heritage Foundation claiming the Texas lawsuit raised "serious issues regarding election integrity and constitutional law that ought to be addressed going forward."

CNS was pushing Trump's narrative elsewhere as well. In a Dec. 14 article, Jones touted how Republican Rep. Jim Jordan demanded that Congress debate the presidential vote on Jan. 6, the day when it is supposed to sign off on the election. But even Jones conceded the Republicans' effort at obstruction would be doomed: "A simple majority vote in both the Senate and the House is required for any objection to a state’s electoral results to stand. Because the House is controlled by Democrats, that certainly would not happen."

Even the Electoral College officially declaring Biden the winner couldn't be reported straight. Jones dismissed Biden's speech after the Electoral College vote as "an attempt to bolster his legitimacy as the next president," then complained: "Biden repeated that he will be president 'for all Americans,' many of whom remain bitter about the expansion of ripe-for-fraud mail-in voting; affidavits alleging vote fraud; changes in voting laws made not by state legislatures but by election officials; and vote tallying that was shielded from view -- or conducted in the absence -- of election observers." (The article was originally headlined "Biden, Voice Hoarse, Praises 'Honest,’ ‘Free’ & ‘Fair' Election, 'Integrity' of Election Workers.")

An anonymously written article was devoted to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell lamely conceding that "the Electoral College has spoken." Craig Bannister huffed: "Hillary Clinton, who lost the 2016 presidential election despite winning the popular vote, cast an electoral vote for Joe Biden on Tuesday – then, called for abolition of the Electoral College, which cost her the presidency."

Melanie Arter uncritically wrote about how Ken Blackwell, initially identified only as "former Ohio Secretary of State," insisted that "the clock didn't stop" with the Electoral College vote; it wasn't until the fourth paragraph that she noted that Blackwell is "a Trump elector." She didn't mention at all that Blackwell was a Trump campaign surrogate who also served in Trump White House posts, which meshes with CNS' overall lack of disclosure when it publishes Blackwell's pro-Trump columns.

More bogus narrative

As the Electoral College vote neared, CNS' election fraud narrative escalated. It put a pro-Trump frame in an anonymously written Jan. 4 article on his call to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger trying to coerce the official to overturn the election in that state that "'based on what' Trump had 'heard'—ballots from November’s presidential election were being shredded in Georgia. Another article, by Susan Jones, carried the uncritical headline "Trump Claims at Georgia Rally of 2016 and 2020 Elections: 'I Won Both of Them'."

The following days featured stories like:

• 7 Senators and 4 Senators-Elect Call for ‘Emergency 10-Day Audit of Election Returns in the Disputed States’
• Sen. Hawley: 'It Is Vital That We Be Heard' on Election Irregularities
• Rep. Jordan: 'Only One Remedy Left' to Check Electoral 'End-Run' Around State Legislatures
• Eric Trump: Any Senator or Congressman ‘That Does Not Fight ... Their Political Career Is Over’

Craig Bannister even trotted out right-wing actor Jon Voight to rant, "We all know how this election was false. We all know. But, is anyone standing up for the truths? Is anyone?"

As expected from such a pro-Trump outlet, none of the articles admitted the fact that no solid, credible evidence exists of massive fraud on the level that might overturn election results. But, surprisingly, CNS did a couple articles to offer a modicum of perceived balance:

• Rep. Liz Cheney Warns Objecting to Electoral College Votes Sets ‘Dangerous Precedent’
• Romney Condemns Republican Senators Who Are Calling for 10-Day Audit of Election Returns in Disputed States
• Md. Gov: Rejecting Certification of Election 'Makes a Mockery of Our System'
• Former Schumer Aide: ‘I Expect Some Babies, Some Seditious, Whiny Losers’ to ‘Protest Something They Have No Evidence for’

On Jan. 6, CNS put an unambiguous pro-Trump tilt on the Electoral College proceedings:

• Republican Congressmen Object to States Not Following ‘Constitutional Requirements for Selecting Electors’
• Sen. Ted Cruz: Electoral Commission Should ‘Consider the Evidence and Resolve the Claims’
• Sen. Cruz Urges Colleagues: ‘Don’t Take the Easy Path’ - Take ‘Door Number Three’ to Ensure Legitimate Election

And on the morning of Jan. 6, Melanie Arter served as stenographer for Trump's speech of incitement at the rally outside the Capitol:

President Donald Trump on Wednesday claimed that the 2020 presidential election was “pure theft,” alleging that voter fraud changed the election results to favor Joe Biden.

Speaking at the Save America rally in Washington, D.C. ,Trump called on supporters to get their elected Republican officials to fight, “and if they don’t fight, we have to primary the hell out of the ones that don’t fight.”

“You primary them. We are going to let you know who they are. I can already tell you frankly, but this year, using the pretext of the China virus and the scam of mail-in ballots, Democrats attempted the most brazen and outrageous election theft, and there has never been anything like this. It’s a pure theft in American history. Everybody knows it,” he said.

“That election, our election was over at 10:00 in the evening. We are leading Pennsylvania, Michigan, Georgia by hundreds of thousands of votes, and then late in the evening or early in the morning, boom. These explosions of bullshit, and all of a sudden it started to happen,” the president said.

[...]

The president called out the mainstream media, saying they have become “the enemy of the people.”

“We don't have a free and fair press. Our media is not free. It’s not fair. It suppresses thought. It suppresses speech, and it’s become the enemy of the people. It’s become the enemy of the people. It's the biggest problem we have in this country. No third world countries would even attempt to do what we caught them doing, and you’ll hear about that in just a few minutes,” he said.

[...]

“Now, it is up to Congress to confront this egregious assault on our democracy, and after this, we are going to walk down, and I will be there with you. We are going to walk down. We’re going to walk down. Anyone you want, but I think right here, walk down to the capital, and we are going to cheer on our brave senators and congressmen and women, and we’re probably not going to be cheering so much for some of them, because you’ll never take back our country with weakness,” the president added.

“You have to show strength, and you have to be strong. We have come to demand that congress do the right thing and only count the electors who have been unlawfully slated, lawfully slated. I know that everyone here will soon be marching over to the Capitol building to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard. Today we will see whether Republicans stand strong for integrity of our elections, but whether or not they stand strong for our country, our country. Our country has been under siege for a long time,” he said.

No mention, of course, of the fact that none of Trump's election fraud claims have been proven.

And then the riots began.

After the riot: Briefly shocked into balance

CNS was briefly shocked into balance by the right-wing-driven riot at the Capitol. An early, anonymously written article on the riot was mostly straight, and an article by Arter quoted a Republican congressman denouncing it. Another Arter article noted that "Hours before protesters marched to the U.S. Capitol and stormed the U.S. Capitol building, President Donald Trump’s son, Donald Trump, Jr., mocked Black Lives Matter and Antifa protesters who looted and rioted in nationwide protests last year, comparing Trump supporters to them at the Save America Rally in Washington, D.C. This was followed by an anonymously written article highlighting that "a pipe bomb was found outside the headquarters of the Republican National Committee," which buried the fact that "A suspicious package was also discovered at the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee."

After that, Susan Jones penned articles on both Nancy Pelosi and Mitch McConnell denouncing the riot, followed by an article on Fox News' Tucker Carlson denouncing the riot while also seeming to justify it: "As long as people sincerely believe they can change things by voting, they stay calm." There was no mention of Trump's false claims of election fraud that instigated it.

But then, Craig Bannister echoed the MRC's bogus narrative that Trump was nothing but a man of peace on Twitter, under the headline "Twitter Pulls Trump Video Calling for Peace, Telling Capitol Protesters to ‘Go Home’," even citing those bogus claims in his item.

CNS then did a surprising number of items denouncing the riots and its aftermath and identifying Trump's key role in them, even noting the Trump administration officials who resigned over the riot:

• Rep. Liz Cheney: ‘The President Incited the Mob ... He Lit the Flame’
• Acting Deputy DHS Secretary: 'I Presume Folks Will Be Prosecuted'
• Rep. Crenshaw: So Many Hyped This Up as a Day of Reckoning; You Should Not Be Surprised If People Believe It
• Transportation Secretary Joins Growing List of Trump Officials Resigning in Wake of U.S. Capitol Attack
• Ted Cruz: ‘The President’s Language and Rhetoric Crossed a Line and It Was Reckless’
• Education Secretary Resigns: ‘There Is No Mistaking the Impact Your Rhetoric Had on the Situation’
• Acting DHS Secretary Resigns: ‘The Action Is Warranted by Recent Events’

But CNS also delivered some of the nitpicky things they're known for (while not explicitly defending Trump or the riots). Rob Shimshock complained that some random former "Jeopardy!" champion refused to mourn the death of Ashli Babbitt, a protester who was killed in the riot. Shimshock sympathetically described her as a "14-year veteran of the Air Force" but failed to note that she was also a QAnon conspiracy theorist.

An article by Jones on former Republican Colin Powell denouncing the riots and the police response to it framed it as "a 'bash Trump' interview with CNN," further complaining that Powell was "invited by CNN's Wolf Blitzer to view the Capitol police response through a racial lens" and parenthetically adding, "Notably, President-elect Joe Biden is among the Democrats -- many in the media -- insisting that the Capitol police response would have been more violent if the mob storming the Capitol had been mostly black." Jones repetitively hammered home that point again later in the article: "Host Wolf Blitzer brought up the race card, as Biden and many liberals have done as well."

Managing editor Michael W. Chapman grumbled that comedian Kathy Griffin issued "a tweet re-posting her infamous 2017 photo in which she posed while holding up an image of the president’s 'severed head.'" And Bannister returned to tout how "A video montage posted Thursday shows MSNBC and CNN hosts and guests excusing, denying and defending leftwing violence in 2020."