The Biggest Media Lies of the Past Decade

For the better part of a decade, large segments of the mainstream media have prioritized political narratives over verifiable facts, particularly when those narratives harmed conservatives or shielded Democrats. The result has been a series of high-profile falsehoods that shaped public perception, influenced elections, and eroded trust. Here are some of the clearest examples from 2016 to 2024, grounded in primary records, official investigations, and contemporaneous reporting.

The Steele Dossier (2016–2017)

The Steele dossier, a collection of opposition research memos compiled by former British spy Christopher Steele and funded by the Hillary Clinton campaign and Democratic National Committee through Fusion GPS, alleged a vast Trump-Russia conspiracy, including a supposed “pee tape,” Michael Cohen meetings in Prague, and Carter Page dealings with high-level Russians. BuzzFeed published it in January 2017. Left-leaning news outlets like CNN, MSNBC, The New York Times and The Washington Post extensively covered the allegations, framing them as credible or “vetted.”

Subsequent investigations dismantled the core allegations. The FBI’s own spreadsheet and Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s report found most claims unverified, contradicted by Steele’s primary sub-source, or based on rumor. Special Counsel Robert Mueller and others confirmed Cohen never traveled to Prague. Durham’s work further highlighted the dossier’s unreliability and partisan origins. The Washington Post later corrected and removed key reporting that had amplified it.^[1-3]

Widespread media amplification fueled years of Russia collusion coverage that ultimately misled voters and unfairly cast a shadow over the Trump presidency.^[4-6]

The “Very Fine People” Narrative (2017)

After the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, then-President Donald Trump held a press conference on August 15, 2017. He condemned neo-Nazis and white nationalists “totally,” stated there were “very bad people” in the pro-statue group, and noted that some participants on both sides of the statue debate were “very fine people.” He explicitly separated those protesting the removal of a Robert E. Lee statue from the extremists.^[7]

Major left-wing news outlets and politicians repeatedly claimed Trump had called the neo-Nazis and white supremacists “very fine people.” The media aired abbreviated clips from the press conference of Trump saying "very fine people on both sides". This version became a staple of left-wing news coverage and was later featured in Joe Biden’s 2020 campaign launch.

Full transcripts and video from C-SPAN show the opposite. Trump distinguished the groups and condemned the racists. Less than a minute after Trump said "very fine people on both sides", he stated: "I'm not talking about the neo-Nazis and the white nationalists because they should be condemned totally".^[7]

But many Americans didn't see this part of the video. Mainstream media conveniently cut it out to make Trump look bad. The selective editing stuck for years. To this day, Democrats still use the false story to slander Trump as "racist" and many Democrat voters believe it.

Eventually, left-biased "fact-checkers" like Snopes rated the claim that Trump praised neo-Nazis as false in 2024 – a full 7 years after the incident.^[8]

The Jussie Smollett Hate Crime Hoax (2019)

In January 2019, actor Jussie Smollett reported that two men attacked him in Chicago, using racial and homophobic slurs, pouring bleach on him, putting a rope around his neck, and yelling that it was “MAGA country.” Politicians including Kamala Harris described it as an attempted modern-day lynching. Left-wing news networks ran wall-to-wall coverage treating the claim as a clear hate crime by Trump supporters.^[9-12]

Chicago police determined Smollett had staged the attack, paying two Nigerian brothers (whom he knew from the set of Empire) $3,500 to participate. Surveillance, bank records, and the brothers’ statements supported the staging. Smollett was charged, and though initial charges were dropped in a controversial deal, a special prosecutor later secured a conviction on false-report counts (later overturned on double-jeopardy procedural grounds in 2024; the underlying evidence of orchestration was not reversed).

Media outlets that had amplified the original story offered far less sustained correction. This incident is the perfect example of the news media pouncing on a story that supports a preferred narrative (white racism in America) and amplifying it before all the facts come out.

The Covington Catholic High School Incident (2019)

A short video clip from the Lincoln Memorial on January 18, 2019, showed Covington Catholic High School students—some wearing MAGA hats after attending the March for Life—appearing to confront Native American activist Nathan Phillips, who was beating a drum. Headlines and commentary portrayed the teens as racist aggressors mocking an elder. The school and diocese initially apologized under pressure. Public figures called for punishment.^[13]

Longer videos released soon after showed a different sequence: the students were waiting for buses when a group identifying as Hebrew Israelites began hurling vulgar, racial, and homophobic insults at them and at Native American demonstrators. Phillips then approached the students. An independent investigation commissioned by the diocese found no evidence the students made racist or offensive statements. Nick Sandmann, the student at the center of the clip, maintained he stood still to de-escalate.^[13]

Sandmann and his family filed multiple multimillion-dollar defamation lawsuits against major media outlets that had rushed to judgment. He sued CNN for $275 million over its coverage; the network settled in January 2020 under confidential terms. He sued The Washington Post for $250 million; that case settled in July 2020, also confidentially. He sued NBCUniversal for $275 million and settled in December 2021, again with confidential terms. Additional suits were filed against outlets including The New York Times, ABC, CBS, and others; several were later dismissed by a federal judge in 2022.^[14-17]

The mainstream media's initial rush to judgment produced doxxing threats and reputational harm before the fuller record emerged. This is yet another example of left-wing media bias amplifying a narrative (racist white boy) before the full set of facts were revealed.

The Hunter Biden Laptop (2020)

The New York Post broke a story on emails from a laptop abandoned by Hunter Biden at a computer repair shop in Delaware, detailing business dealings involving foreign entities and references to Joe Biden. Within days, dozens of former intelligence officials signed a letter claiming it had “all the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation.” Left-leaning news outlets amplified this message and social media throttled or outright blocked the story from being shared, claiming it was "disinformation".^[18-20]

The laptop was authentic. It turns out the FBI had possession of the laptop since late 2019. The contents of the laptop were later used as evidence in Hunter Biden’s federal gun trial, and multiple outlets eventually confirmed the material. No evidence emerged that it was Russian disinformation. In fact, a House Judiciary and Intelligence committee investigation in 2023 concluded that the letter signed by former intelligence officials was a coordinated effort meant to help candidate Joe Biden in the final weeks of the 2020 campaign.^[21-27]

What was widely reported as "Russian disinformation" just weeks before the 2020 election, turned out to be the biggest factual news bombshell of the year. Unfortunately, the misreporting and suppression of the story likely had a material impact on the outcome of the 2020 election. A post-election survey highlighting various media censorship issues - including the Hunter Biden laptop story - concluded that 6% of Biden voters who were unaware of the information presented would have changed their vote for Trump, and 17% of Democrat voters may not have voted for Biden at all.^[28-29]

The COVID Lab Leak Theory (2020–2023)

From the earliest months of the COVID-19 pandemic, mainstream media, public-health officials, and many scientists dismissed the hypothesis that the virus originated from a laboratory accident at the Wuhan Institute of Virology as a fringe conspiracy theory, often labeling it racist or xenophobic. A February 2020 Lancet letter organized by EcoHealth Alliance’s Peter Daszak asserted that scientists “overwhelmingly conclude” a natural origin. The March 2020 “Proximal Origin of SARS-CoV-2” paper in Nature Medicine, influenced by NIH leaders including Anthony Fauci and Francis Collins, further argued against a lab origin. Social-media platforms censored discussion of the theory, and left-wing news coverage treated it as debunked.^[30-33]

Internal emails later showed private concerns among some of the same scientists about lab manipulation features in the virus. U.S. intelligence assessments evolved: the FBI concluded with moderate confidence that a lab incident was most likely; the Department of Energy reached the same conclusion by 2023. The CIA later shifted to favor the lab-leak hypothesis. Germany's intelligence agency also confirmed the lab leak hypothesis. Congressional investigations documented efforts to suppress the theory and the role of U.S.-funded research at the Wuhan lab.^[34-42]

What media and officials had branded a dangerous falsehood for years eventually became an open, evidence-based debate once political pressure eased.

While natural zoonosis remains a possibility, efforts to find an animal origin of the virus have failed. We now know that the early systematic dismissal and social/media pressure against the lab-leak hypothesis was not evidence-based but politically driven.

President Biden's Cognitive Decline (2020–2024)

Throughout Joe Biden’s presidency and reelection campaign, White House officials, Democratic leaders, and much of the press insisted the president was sharp, engaged, and fully capable. Concerns about age, verbal stumbles, or limited schedules were dismissed as right-wing attacks, “cheap fakes,” or isolated gaffes. Left-wing media coverage repeatedly defended Biden through all of his stumbles, falls, and obvious cognitive decline.^[43-45]

Special Counsel Robert Hur’s report in Feb 2024 described Biden as an "elderly man with a poor memory" based on interviews in which Biden struggled with basic timelines. Finally, what Democrats had been trying to hide for so long spilled out into the open at the June 2024 debate. Biden's cognitive struggles could no longer be denied or defended.^[46-47]

After the debate performance, books by Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson, along with reporting from multiple outlets, documented a pattern of limited work hours, forgotten names of aides, and efforts by staff and family to manage and conceal the extent of decline from the public and even some Cabinet members. Former aides later acknowledged slowed decision-making.^[48-49]

The gas-lighting around Biden's mental fitness went on for years, until the media could no longer get away with it. Democrats quickly pivoted to Kamala Harris for the presidential nomination, who ended up losing the election.

Mainstream Propaganda Machine

These episodes share a similar pattern: narratives that advanced left-wing political preferences were elevated quickly, often with incomplete evidence, while contradictory facts arrived more slowly and received less sustained attention. Primary transcripts, FBI statements, police files, and later investigative reporting consistently undercut the initial storylines.

The mainstream media, which is biased towards left-leaning political interests, promotes narrative alignment over objective fact-based journalism. This unfortunate reality has done lasting damage to public discourse and resulted in the public's loss of trust in many news outlets.