Dana Milbank’s Cartoonish Depiction of Pro-Life Demonstrators

Welcome back to “Forgotten Fact-Checks,” a weekly column produced by National Review’s News Desk. This week, we look into a fabricated-quote scandal at the Washington Post, eulogize Chris Cuomo’s career, and knock more media misses.

The Mendacious Dana Milbank

Abortion always inspires a wave of ill-informed, incomplete, and outright deceitful coverage from legacy media outfits. And yet, Dana Milbank’s Washington Post column on Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization managed to, in its obvious untruthfulness, break new ground.

Milbank early on announces his intention to straw-man the cases for both the pro-life cause and the overturning of Roe v. Wade, writing “public opinion hasn’t changed. The science hasn’t fundamentally changed. No new legal theory has been promulgated. The only difference is the court now has a majority hellbent on settling scores in the culture wars.” 

No one would expect anyone who would write something so unthinking and ignorant to fairly characterize their opponents at any point, but only the most cynical of observers could have predicted the depths to which Milbank would descend.    

According to the longtime columnist, pro-life speakers outside of the Supreme Court on the morning of Dobbs’ oral arguments shouted the following into “a pole-mounted bullhorn at ear-shattering volume”:

“Maybe some of you should have been aborted, you wicked, nasty disgusting, ungodly — I don’t even want to call you women! You are bloodthirsty animals!”

“This is what happens when you allow women to emasculate men! God hates you!”

“In the name of Jesus Christ, shut your vile, sick mouth!”

“Go to Chicago! Black-on-Black killing is off the charts! . . . You don’t mind taking the White man’s dollar when he wants to kill babies!”

Incredibly, not one other reporter — and the area outside of the Court last Wednesday was crawling with reporters — reported on any of these vile sentiments. And one might have expected that they would have, since Milbank purports that these were words of the pro-lifers’ featured speakers. 

But no one, including me (I was there reporting for NR), heard anything resembling what Milbank alleges, most likely because no one said the lines in the first place. If he did indeed fabricate the quotes, Milbank has done a disservice not just to the diverse pro-lifers he was smearing, but to the pro-choice readers to which he was so obviously trying to pander to. Instead of engaging in the debate, Milbank has chosen to further poison it, humiliating himself and his employer in the process. 

The Post did not respond to a request for comment on the column, or its process for verifying the quotes therein.

Cuomo, Out

At long last, the other shoe has dropped. First Sonny went down, and then came Fredo. Andrew Cuomo was forced to step down earlier this year due to numerous credible allegations of sexual assault.

Now, his younger brother Chris has been let go by CNN for his efforts to aid his brother through the scandal. Documents released by New York attorney general Leticia James showed that Cuomo was using his sources to find out information about his accusers. As a commentator, Cuomo lacked knowledge; as a journalist, he lacked scruples. And as a man, he should be ashamed of himself. 

Brian Stelter, CNN’s chief media correspondent, speculated on air that it was “death by a thousand cuts” for Cuomo, noting that “I know there were many CNN staffers very unhappy with the situation, very frustrated by Chris Cuomo.” He added, however, that “I was hearing from some fans of Chris, some viewers who said we understood he was looking out for his family.” 

Headline Fail of the Week

A column from Hayes Brown at MSNBC is entitled, “Susan Collins’ support for abortion rights is shallow at best.” In it, Brown argues that if Collins really wants to codify Roe v. Wade into law the way she says she does, she must also support overhauling the filibuster. 

Collins supports all kinds of legislation that might not be able to pass unless the filibuster goes. Her principled defense of the 60-vote threshold doesn’t render her support for those items “shallow.” Brown’s disagrees with her support for the filibuster, but he’s dishonestly laundering that disagreement through other issues.

Media Misses

-The New York Times published an excellent report on the recent spike in brazen and violent robberies around the country. Importantly, the piece acknowledges: “The rise in thefts comes as punishments for retail theft have been broadly eased over the past decade. Since 2005, 30 states have increased the dollar threshold for theft offenses . . .”

-Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene tweeted the following on Saturday:

Amazingly, it’s still up.

-The collective media freakout over Florida governor Ron DeSantis’s plan for a small state force with parallels in 22 other states provided many examples of hysterical ignorance, but Joy Reid’s deserves special attention for the response it engendered from progressive comedienne Sarah Silverman. “So… y’all know this is fascisty bananas, right…?” asked Reid. “Please read the article before you post this stuff you’re a news outlet. The truth has to matter,” returned Silverman. The latter must be a newcomer to the former’s act.