***The complete post is on NewsBusters***
On Monday’s The Lead, host Jake Tapper was the first on CNN to admit that former Florida Health Department website operator Rebekah Jones was found to have fabricated her claims that state officials with ties to Republican Governor Ron DeSantis pressured her to manipulate COVID data, according to an investigation by the Health Department’s inspector general. But even with this revelation, Tapper failed to apologize for how he and the “facts first” network helped to elevate the lies and disinformation.
“In our health lead now, ‘insufficient evidence,’ that's what a new inspector general report says it found in response to Rebekah Jones' accusations she was asked to falsify COVID data on Florida's dashboard,” Tapper announced before handing the actual reporting to national correspondent Kristen Holmes; instead of going off on one of his infamous, self-righteous diatribes.
“Explosive claims from a prominent critic of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis were, quote, ‘unsubstantiated’ and ‘unfounded,’ according to an internal state investigation,” Holmes informed viewers.
Adding: “Now, in a 27-page report obtained by CNN and first reported by NBC News, the Florida Department of Health's Office of the Inspector General says it found insufficient or no evidence to back up most of Jones' claims, after interviews with over a dozen witnesses.”
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