Democratic presidential candidate former Vice President Joe Biden speaks about the coronavirus Thursday, March 12, 2020, in Wilmington, Del. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

In a rare moment of intellectual honesty, The Washington Post published an article today, taking former Vice President Joe Biden to task for posting a deceptively-edited video to attack President Donald Trump. Democratic politicians – and their allies in the press – have been using the Coronavirus outbreak to launch political attacks on the president. But the Biden campaign has taken it to another level.

Shortly after the Coronavirus became national news, the establishment media published a series of dishonest and blatantly political stories in an effort to use the virus as a political cudgel. In one instance, they tried to convince the American public that Trump had called the outbreak a “hoax,” despite the fact that he was referring to the Democrats’ attacks when he used the word during a speech in South Carolina on Feb 28.

Several entities, including Facebook, have debunked the lie, showing that the president was calling the Democrats’ narrative about the disease a “hoax.” But this did not stop the former vice president from perpetuating the falsehood. The Washington Post published an article giving Biden “Four Pinocchios” for a recent political ad that splices the president’s South Carolina speech in a way that makes it seem as if he is calling the Coronavirus outbreak a hoax.

From WaPo:

“At the 10-second mark, the camera shows a tight shot of the president saying “coronavirus” and then cuts to a wide shot where he says, “this is their new hoax.” Both clips are from Trump’s Feb. 28 campaign rally in North Charleston, S.C., but he never said “coronavirus, this is their new hoax.” Rather, Biden’s ad clipped a large part of Trump’s speech to make it seem as though he had.”

The article continues, noting that, “The full quote shows Trump is criticizing Democratic talking points and the media’s coverage of his administration’s response to coronavirus. He never says that the virus itself is a hoax, and although the Biden camp included the word ‘their,’ the edit does not make clear to whom or what Trump is referring.”

Of course, Biden’s team denies any wrongdoing. Andrew Bates, the campaign’s spokesman, attempted to deflect. “Donald Trump is the most dishonest president in American history and one of the least credible human beings in the world,” he said in a statement to The Washington Post. “We don’t trust his next-day cleanup attempt, and he has made many comments in that same vein. And the claim that the American Dream was ‘dead’ in the final year of the Obama administration — during the longest streak of job growth in American history — is categorically untrue and another reminder of Donald Trump’s deep cynicism.”

Unfortunately for the Biden campaign, The Washington Post wasn’t buying what they were selling and gave them four Pinocchios.

Of course, the blame for spreading the “hoax” lie does not fall squarely on Biden. It was the media that initially peddled this untruth. As RedState’s Nick Arama wrote, “Then media completely twists what he says and blows it up. Thousands if not millions will then be sucked in, believing he actually said that, despite it making no logical sense with his prior comments and actions on the matter.”

Put simply, Biden’s camp was only repeating the same deception that was spread by establishment media outlets, proving even further that Americans cannot trust the Fourth Estate, especially when it comes to the president. While Trump has downplayed the outbreak, and the White House’s messaging has been flawed, it is abundantly clear that they are working around the clock to develop a solution to the problem.

If the Democrats and the media – but I repeat myself – were interested in saving lives, they wouldn’t be so laser-focused on leveraging the Coronavirus as a political weapon. But, it appears they hate the president more than they value the wellbeing of the American public.

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