Seven years down the line, Snopes is correcting the record.
The leftist-leaning website purports to be a "fact-checker" of current events but somehow missed its chance to set the establishment media narrative straight about one of the crucial events of former President Donald Trump's first year in office.
Considering now-President Joe Biden cited that deliberately false narrative as one of his reasons for running, the Snopes "fact check" is more than a little bit late -- but it could play a role in Thursday's presidential debate.
In fact, Scott Adams, the creator of the "Dilbert" comic strip and a Trump supporter, called the development "the biggest story of the year" -- and all but demanded Trump throw it in Biden's face when the two men face off in Atlanta.
This is the biggest story of the year.
Biden based his 2020 campaign on the most easily debunked hoax in the history of hoaxes.
And the press covered for him.
But Snopes, to their credit, couldn't live with that lie.
Trump's Third Act is knocking at the door. But unless… https://t.co/sIPBn8Kn60
— Scott Adams (@ScottAdamsSays) June 24, 2024
In the "fact check" published Thursday, Snopes debunked the myth that Trump had referred to neo-Nazis who staged a march in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017 as "very fine people."
In fact, what he said -- clearly enough for anyone interested in actually listening -- was that there were "very fine people" on both sides of a raucous debate taking place in Charlottesville over the future of statues honoring heroes of the Confederacy.
In other words, well-intentioned Americans could have reasons for thinking statues of Confederate figures should remain on public view that have nothing to do with the pro-slavery beliefs of the Confederacy or the horrifying ideas of neo-Nazis.
They might believe in honoring American history, warts and all. They might simply believe that wanton destruction of the artifacts of the past is not the behavior of civilized people, and has marked an era of butchery from the French Revolution to the time of the Bolsheviks and the contemporary Islamist fanatics of the Taliban.
But Trump's words then were crystal clear:
A transcript of Trump's words, published by Politico in August 2017, has the argument.
"George Washington was a slave owner. Was George Washington a slave owner? So will George Washington now lose his status, are we gonna take down — excuse me — are we gonna take down statues of George Washington?" Trump asked.
"How about Thomas Jefferson? What do you think of Thomas Jefferson? You like him? ...
"It's fine. You're changing history, you're changing culture, and you had people — and I'm not talking about the neo-Nazis and the white nationalists, because they should be condemned totally. But you had many people in that group other than neo-Nazis and white nationalists, OK? And the press has treated them absolutely unfairly."
That quote, with emphasis added, was available to any journalist willing to look for it. Snopes' piece includes the transcript from CNN.
But it's only now that the supposed "fact-checker" site is interested in looking into it? Whenother "fact-checkers" acted much more quickly?
The piece never explains why the website waited seven years to tell the truth, manufacturing a news hook by noting that: "In spring 2024, social media posts re-surfaced raising questions about an infamous comment from former U.S. President Donald Trump related to violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, over the removal of a confederate statue."
Under normal circumstances, that would be just another example of media bias in action, even when it's pretending to be above all that, but in this case, with the November election looming, it might not be a dead issue.
Biden cited Trump's supposed words in the first minutes of his video announcing his campaign for the presidency in 2019, as The Washington Post reported at the time under the headline: "For Joe Biden, Charlottesville defines the Trump presidency."
"With those words, the president of the United States assigned a moral equivalence between those spreading hate and those with the courage to stand against it," Biden said in his video, according to the Post. "And in that moment, I knew the threat to this nation was unlike any I had ever seen in my lifetime."
But it was a lie then, it was a lie when the establishment media spread it in 2017, and it's a lie now. No matter how Democrats use it, it will always be a lie.
The only difference is a major left-wing fact-checker has called it out for being a lie.
Given that that was a rationale for the Biden presidency -- a presidency that has been a disaster for the American people by every conceivable metric -- it's worth asking exactly what Biden's rationale for a second term is.
Has he not destroyed American security enough with his border disaster?
Has he not ruined the American economy and Americans' savings with rampant inflation?
Has he not destroyed the security of the world by essentially inviting the Russian invasion of Ukraine and stabbing Israel, one of the U.S. closest allies, in the back?
It's well past time for Biden to exit the White House, and for a man who can do the job to return to power.
Among the host of lies that have been told about Trump, Charlottesville was among the worst, and it was also the one most easily debunked.
It only took Snopes seven years to do it.
But if voters are paying attention, and it comes up at Thursday's debate, it's better late than never.
