It was perfect that PolitiFact would choose April Fools Day to pluck out a “fact check” from the March 26 House hearing with the CEOs of PBS and NPR. The biggest “Pants On Fire” lie in that proceeding was these CEOs declaring they were unbiased and nonpartisan. That ignored every example that the Republican members of Congress provided, as well as from witness Mike Gonzalez of the Heritage Foundation.
PBS CEO Paula Kerger and NPR CEO Katherine Maher have NO page at PolitiFact. In fact, none of the PBS News Hour anchors and reporters have a page on PolitiFact. In fact, PBS News has a partnership with PolitiFact, where their "fact checks" are reposted on the News Hour website.
Instead of choosing the most obvious lie, PolitiFact’s Grace Abels – the "staff writer focused on LGBTQ issues" – threw a “False” rating at Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene for a statement that was more of an opinion than a factual statement. She said "they now have drag queen story time instead of good old ‘Sesame Street.’"
Abels made no disclosure of their partnership with PBS in this "fact check."
She energetically suggested Greene was saying drag queens replaced Sesame Street.
"Sesame Street" continues airing on PBS and has not been replaced by drag queen storytime.
Worse yet, Abels didn't even nail down the central fact question on PBS making a video of drag queen "Lil Miss Hot Mess" singing "The Hips On The Drag Queen Go Swish Swish Swish" to the tune of "The Wheels on the Bus." Did it air on PBS, or at least locally on PBS superstation WNET? The brass there wouldn't say!
The segment Greene flagged was funded and produced by The WNET Group, the nonprofit that operates New York City’s local PBS station, in partnership with the New York City Department of Education. PBS has said it did not distribute it.
When contacted for comment, The WNET Group Spokesperson Kellie Castruita Specter did not answer whether the segment aired on the local network or only online; she said it was no longer "in circulation." The "Let’s Learn" website says the show is "nationally broadcast" but it does not specify which markets air the show.
Abels quoted Kerger saying "The drag queen was actually not on any of our kids shows. It did not air." But WNET won't back her up on that. Why would you produce it and not air it? That makes no sense.
It's definitely "in circulation." We put the clip in our "Five Reasons to Defund Public Broadcasting" video. I put it this way in the blog post: "But we’ve come a long way from Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood." That quip is harder to "fact check."
Sign the petition to help us defund the drag-queen pushers at PBS and NPR at defundpbsnpr.org.
