Presidential hopeful Vivek Ramaswamy shredded liberal media on Friday after one of its favorite claims that the military was infiltrated with right-wing white supremacists collapsed.
The Pentagon released its long-awaited report on “domestic extremism” in the military in late December and found after two years of taxpayer-dollar-funded research and interviews with more than 100 defense officials and experts, government studies, articles and other data, the “problem” didn’t actually exist.
The report, conducted by the Institute for Defense Analyses, found that if anything, the “risk to the military from widespread polarization and division in the ranks may be a greater risk than the radicalization of a few service members.”
Ramaswamy slammed the media for running with the claim for two years despite little to no evidence.
“The media endlessly hyped stories about ‘white supremacy’ and ‘extremism’ in the U.S. military for years,” Ramaswamy said in a Tweet. “Was it true? Nope. It was a total joke with no basis in fact. In fact, the Biden administration commissioned a report that found extremism was nonexistent and then shamefully buried it by releasing it on the day after Christmas. I’m calling on the following news organizations to retract and apologize for their smears of American service members as white supremacists.”
The media endlessly hyped stories about “white supremacy” and “extremism” in the U.S. military for years. Was it true? Nope. It was a total joke with no basis in fact. In fact the Biden administration commissioned a report that found extremism was nonexistent and then shamefully…
— Vivek Ramaswamy (@VivekGRamaswamy) January 5, 2024
Ramaswamy tagged NBC News Axios, Vice and Boston Globe.
NBC News ran the headline: “Pentagon report warns of threat from white supremacists inside the military” in February of 2021, before the commission of the study. Weeks later, Axios published a story entitled: “Pentagon report: Domestic extremists pose serious threat to the military.”
VICE News flat-out claimed extremism existed in the ranks with their video piece: “American Terror: The Military’s Problem With Extremism in the Ranks.”
The Boston Globe published in July a piece: “‘The single biggest threat to the security of the country’: Extremism in the military is alarming experts.”
The media wasn’t the only ones who ran with the narrative, with Democratic lawmakers perhaps responsible for getting the ball rolling in a letter sent to the Department of Defense alleging, “White supremacists are joining the military and permeating the ranks.”
“The spread of white supremacist ideology is dangerous for the military and threatens to rupture civil-military safeguards that our democracy requires,” the letter read. (RELATED: Another Massive Media Fever Dream Fell Apart Over Christmas. Hardly Anyone Noticed)
The Department of Defense further went on to issue a slew of new regulations in December of 2021 prohibiting military members from engaging in so-called “extremist activities” which included simply “liking” something on social media that was considered an extremist view.
The regulations did not specify what was considered an extremist organization or message and left that up to the commanders in charge.
A survey conducted by the RAND Corporation in May of 2023 found veterans are less likely to support far-right or far-left extremist groups when compared to the general public. RAND found zero evidence to support the claim veterans are more likely to be part of an extremist group than average Americans.