- Multiple outlets have chopped up President Donald Trump’s transcript of his conversation with Ukraine.
- The outlets make it seem as though Trump asked for Ukraine to do him a “favor” and investigate Joe Biden’s son.
- In fact, the outlets cut out over 500 words in between the “favor” request, which was about election meddling, and Trump bringing up Biden.
Multiple outlets chopped up the transcript of President Donald Trump speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, making it seem as though Trump was asking for an investigation into former Vice President Joe Biden’s son.
A whistleblower complaint alleged the president had an inappropriate conversation with Ukraine. Trump released the call’s transcript Wednesday, which showed he asked Ukraine to look into CrowdStrike, a private security group the Democratic National Committee hired to look into Russian interference in its servers. Trump also asked Zelensky to look into the firing of a prosecutor who was looking into Hunter Biden’s business dealings in Ukraine.
CNN, MSNBC and NPR, among the news outlets, edited out the CrowdStrike portion of the transcript, making it seem as though Trump’s focus of the phone call was to have Joe Biden’s son investigated. In fact, the request begins by asking Ukraine to look into meddling in the 2016 election.
“And then he says, quote, ‘I would like you to do us a favor,'” CNN’s Brianna Keilar said on “CNN Right Now” Wednesday. “The president asks Zelensky to dig up dirt on Biden and his son Hunter, who sat on the board of a Ukrainian energy company while his dad was vice president.”
WATCH:
“Quote, ‘There’s a lot of talk about Biden’s son, that Biden stopped the prosecution and a lot of people want to find out about that so whatever you can do with the attorney general would be great,” she said.
What CNN failed to mention was that in between Trump saying, “I would like you to do us a favor,” is over 500 words of conversation, part of which talks about Ukraine looking into election meddling.
MSNBC peddled similar news, with correspondent Katy Tur saying Trump said, “Will you do me a favor and investigate Vice President Biden’s son?” (RELATED: What Is The Process For Impeaching A President?)
WATCH:
In an NPR article titled “Trump Asked Ukrainian President For ‘A Favor’ On Biden; DOJ Says No Charges,” the same altered transcript is peddled. The article included the “favor” sentence from Trump and immediately jumps to the portion where Joe Biden’s son is brought up.
Trump’s “favor” is regarding CrowdStrike. He said according to the transcript:
I would like you to do us a favor though because our country has been through a lot and Ukraine knows a lot about it. I would like you to find out what happened with this whole situation with Ukraine, they say CrowdStrike … I guess you have one of your wealthy people. … The server, they say Ukraine has it. There are a lot of things that went on, the whole situation. I think you’re surrounding yourself with some of the same people. I would like to have the attorney general call you or your people and I would like you to get to the bottom of it.
Later on, Trump asked Ukraine about Joe Biden’s son. Multiple outlets have reported it as though Trump asked about Hunter Biden immediately following his request for a “favor.”
“The other thing, there’s a lot of talk about Biden’s son, that Biden stopped the prosecution and a lot of people want to find out about that so whatever you can do with the attorney general would be great,” Trump said over 500 words after asking for a favor about looking into election meddling. “Biden went around bragging that he stopped the prosecution so if you can look into it. … It sounds horrible to me.”
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