Hvis en medarbeider ble feilsitert, hvorfor grep ikke Brad Raffensperger inn umiddelbart? Foto: John Bazemore / AP / NTB

Washington Post måtte mandag beklage at avisen tilla Trump uttalelser i samtalen med Georgias øverste politiske leder, Raffensperger, som var falske. Alle medier brakte storyen om at Trump beordret Raffensperger til å finne bevis på valgfusk. Det ble fremstilt som at Trump bestilte bevis. Nå beklager Washington Post og sier deres kilde var uetterrettelig.

The Washington Post made a massive correction Monday to a January report about a phone call between then-President Donald Trump and Georgia elections investigator Frances Watson, admitting it wrongly attributed multiple quotes to Trump based on an anonymous source.

The Post initially reported Trump had told an official working in Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger’s office to «find the fraud» in the state, which he lost narrowly to Joe Biden, and that she would be a «national hero» if she did.

Avisene publiserte opptak av samtalen og man må lure på hva mediene driver med når avisen nå sier at et nytt opptak har dukket opp der Trump bare uttrykker håp om at det rette svaret vil foreligge  og at Raffenspergers medarbeider vil ha ære av det.

However, a newly emerged recording of the Dec. 23 call found he didn’t use those words. Instead, Trump said she would be «praised» when the «right answer comes out» and encouraged her to closely examine mail-in ballots in Fulton County, the heavily blue and most populated county in the state.

Innrømmelsen/korreksjonen støtter Trump-velgernes oppfatning av at mediene ikke er til å stole på.

The Post published a lengthy correction to its story: «Correction: Two months after publication of this story, the Georgia secretary of state released an audio recording of President Donald Trump’s December phone call with the state’s top elections investigator. The recording revealed that The Post misquoted Trump’s comments on the call, based on information provided by a source. Trump did not tell the investigator to «find the fraud» or say she would be «a national hero» if she did so. Instead, Trump urged the investigator to scrutinize ballots in Fulton County, Ga., asserting she would find «dishonesty» there. He also told her that she had «the most important job in the country right now.» A story about the recording can be found here. The headline and text of this story have been corrected to remove quotes misattributed to Trump.»

Washington Post panned for massive correction to Trump-Georgia election story: ‘So, they made up quotes’