Politics Trump conspired with Fox News to create the retracted Seth Rich story

The Fox News Channel and a wealthy supporter of President Trump worked in concert under the watchful eye of the White House to concoct a story about the death of a young Democratic National Committee aide, according to a lawsuit filed Tuesday.

The explosive claim is part of the lawsuit filed against Fox News by Rod Wheeler, a longtime paid commentator for the news network. The suit was obtained exclusively by NPR.

Wheeler alleges Fox News and the Trump supporter intended to deflect public attention from growing concern about the administration's ties to the Russian government. His suit charges that a Fox News reporter created quotations out of thin air and attributed them to him to propel her story.

Fox's president of news, Jay Wallace, told NPR on Monday there was no "concrete evidence" that Wheeler was misquoted by the reporter, Malia Zimmerman. The news executive did not address a question about the story's allegedly partisan origins. Fox News declined to allow Zimmerman to comment for this story.

The story, which first aired in May, was retracted by Fox News a week later. Fox News has, to date, taken no action in response to what it said was a failure to adhere to the network's standards.

The lawsuit focuses particular attention on the role of the Trump supporter, Ed Butowsky, in weaving the story. He is a wealthy Dallas investor and unpaid Fox commentator on financial matters who has emerged as a reliable Republican surrogate in recent years. Butowsky offered to pay for Wheeler to investigate the death of the DNC aide, Seth Rich, on behalf of his grieving parents in Omaha, Neb.

On April 20, a month before the story ran, Butowsky and Wheeler — the investor and the investigator — met at the White House with then-press secretary Sean Spicer to brief him on what they were uncovering.

The first page of the lawsuit quotes a voicemail and text from Butowsky boasting that President Trump himself had reviewed drafts of the Fox News story just before it went to air and was published.

Spicer now tells NPR that he took the meeting as a favor to Butowsky, a reliable Republican voice. Spicer says he was unaware of any contact involving the president. Butowsky now tells NPR that he was kidding about Trump's involvement.

"Rod Wheeler unfortunately was used as a pawn by Ed Butowsky, Fox News and the Trump administration to try and steer away the attention that was being given about the Russian hacking of the DNC e-mails," said Douglas Wigdor, Wheeler's lawyer.

 

The back story

On May 16, the Fox News Channel broke what it called a bombshell story about an unsolved murder case: the fatal July 2016 shooting of 27-year-old Democratic Party staffer Seth Rich.

Unfounded conspiracy theories involving Rich abounded in the months after his death, in part because WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange cryptically suggested that his death may have been related to the leaks of tens of thousands of emails from Democratic Party officials and their allies at the peak of the presidential campaign.

Fox News' story, which took flight online and ran in segments across major shows, breathed fresh life into the rumors. Fox reported that the leaks came from inside the party and not from hackers linked to Russia — despite the conclusions of the nation's most senior intelligence officials. The network suggested that Democrats might have been connected to Rich's death and that a cover-up had thwarted the official investigation.

The network cited an unnamed FBI official. And the report relied heavily on Wheeler, a former police detective, hired months earlier on behalf of the Riches by Butowsky.

These developments took place during growing public concerns over a federal investigation into the Trump camp's possible collusion with the Russian government during the campaign. The allegations have since touched the president's son and son-in-law, his former campaign manager, his attorney general and his first national security adviser, who resigned as a result.

The question of Rich's death took on greater urgency for Butowsky after Trump fired FBI Director James Comey in early May. Comey had been overseeing the Russia investigation. The story ran just a week later.

Fox's report went sideways shortly after it was posted online and aired on Fox & Friends. It was denounced by the Rich family, D.C. police, Democratic Party officials and even, privately, by some journalists within the network. Within hours, Wheeler told other news outlets that Fox News had put words in his mouth.

Despite those concerns, Wheeler appeared on the shows of Fox Business host Lou Dobbs and Fox News star Sean Hannity, who devoted significant time to the story that night and in subsequent days. In speaking with Wheeler, Hannity said: "If this is true and Seth Rich gave WikiLeaks the DNC e-mails ... this blows the whole Russia collusion narrative completely out of the water."

A week later, on May 23, Fox retracted the story, saying the reporting process failed to live up to its standards. Hannity said he would take a break from talking about Rich's murder out of respect for the family. And there it has largely stood — until now.

 

The fake news story

In the lawsuit, the private investigator sets out a different version of events. Wheeler was a paid Fox News contributor since 2005. He alleges the story was orchestrated behind the scenes and from the outset by Butowsky, the Dallas wealth management consultant and also Fox News commentator, who hired him for the Rich family.

The following account reflects the verbatim quotes provided from the texts, emails, voicemails, and recorded conversations cited in Wheeler's lawsuit, except as otherwise noted.

According to the lawsuit, Trump's press secretary Sean Spicer met at the White House with Wheeler and Butowsky to review the Rich story a month before Fox News ran the piece.

On May 14, about 36 hours before Fox News' story appeared, Butowsky left a voicemail for Wheeler, saying, "We have the full, uh, attention of the White House on this. And tomorrow, let's close this deal, whatever we've got to do."

Butowsky also texted Wheeler: "Not to add any more pressure but the president just read the article. He wants the article out immediately. It's now all up to you."

Spicer admits to meeting with the two but denies claims about the president.

"Ed's been a longtime supporter of the president and asked to meet to catch up," Spicer told NPR on Monday night.

"I didn't know who Rod Wheeler was. Once we got into my office, [Butowsky] said, 'I'm sure you recognize Rod Wheeler from Fox News.' "

Spicer said Butowsky laid out what they had found about the case. "It had nothing to do with advancing the president's domestic agenda — and there was no agenda," Spicer says now. "They were just informing me of the [Fox] story."

 

Tillerson rocks. Much better than I expected.

Mattis is as good a Secy of Defense as everyone expected.

Mnuchin is doing just fine at Treasury.

Wilbur Ross is doing great at Commerce.

I can name some surprisingly good cabinet members as well. Rick Perry and Ben Carson.

But that doesn't fit the narrative.

 

I'll definitely be voting Libertarian. Maybe the people will wise up after watching these sleazebags and knuckleheads in action at the same time.

At least I'm willing to say that he does some thing right when he does (as I did with Obama).

 

Other things you are willing to do:

downplay or deny anything he does wrong.
trumpet any polls that seem even marginally positive for him, ignore the ones that aren't.
accuse his detractors of being liars, hypocrites, whiners, etc.
pretend that you don't do any of those things.

barfo

 

When he does something wrong, I won't be downplaying it.

It's rather the opposite of making something out of nothing. It's not like him or his people bleach bit erased emails that were of interest to ongoing investigations, smashed mobile devices with hammers, etc.

I've posted every poll that RCP posts.

How many polls do you see here?



"One"
--barfo

I accuse liars and hypocrites of being liars and hypocrites. Realize you have to know you're saying something wrong for it to be a lie.

I think you're the pretender.

 

You'll be denying it instead. Ok, got it.

You are right, I forgot one:

Deflecting everything by saying "But Hillary's emails!"

But whenever the trend is momentarily good, you post the trendline with big red arrows added. For some reason you didn't do that today?

barfo