Eager to provide supposed “fact-checking” of the Republican presidential debate, on Thursday, MSNBC NewsNation host Tamron Hall declared: “But to Carly Fiorina's moment regarding Planned Parenthood. While that comment was applauded by conservatives, a lot of that Twitter traffic was also...people fact-checking her on that statement.”
NBC News senior political editor Mark Murray proclaimed: “Well, that's right. And you know, even people here at NBC News who follow the Planned Parenthood and the videos, our health care reporters, they've found that there were some serious misstatements that was made not only by Carly Fiorina, but also Ted Cruz, about those videos.”
Murray claimed that the videos merely featured “Planned Parenthood representatives talking about science” and “just being reimbursed for expenses as well as transportation costs,” not selling parts of aborted babies.
He concluded: “And so really the rhetoric didn't actually meet what was in those unedited videos.” Hall chimed in: “It didn't meet it – which makes it false, right?” Murray replied: “Well, yeah.” Hall added: “Okay. I’m just making sure we're clear on that.”
In the following 12 p.m. ET hour, host Andrea Mitchell similarly fretted over Fiorina’s condemnation of Planned Parenthood:
And one of the other big moments for her was talking about Planned Parenthood. This is a Republican line and it's obviously going to be a showdown on the Hill which could end up shutting down the government....I think this was very powerful with the Republican voters and those leaning Republican. This is a powerful argument. It doesn't fact-check, which is a challenge for Hillary Clinton. We understand she's going to be talking about that when she gets here to New Hampshire today.
Despite MSNBC’s desperate attempt to deny the horrific reality of the Planned Parenthood videos, one of them does in fact show “a fully formed fetus on the table. Its heart beating, its legs kicking, while someone says, ‘We have to keep it alive to harvest its brain,’” just as Fiorina described in the debate.
In an interview on ABC’s Good Morning America on Thursday, co-host George Stephanopoulos attempted to use the same left-wing talking points to discredit Fiorina, but was quickly shot down by the Republican.
Here is a transcript of the September 17 exchange between Hall and Murray on NewsNation:
11:41 AM ET
(...)
TAMRON HALL: But to Carly Fiorina's moment regarding Planned Parenthood. While that comment was applauded by conservatives, a lot of that Twitter traffic was also, Mark, people fact-checking her on that statement.
MARK MURRAY: Well, that's right. And you know, even people here at NBC News who follow the Planned Parenthood and the videos, our health care reporters, they've found that there were some serious misstatements that was made not only by Carly Fiorina, but also Ted Cruz, about those videos. Carly Fiorina and Ted Cruz were remarking about just some of the gruesome footage. And really the footage was Planned Parenthood representatives talking about science, and when the Republicans were talking about that they were selling these body parts and fetus parts. When you actually got down to the unedited versions of it, they were talking about just being reimbursed for expenses as well as transportation costs. And so really the rhetoric didn't actually meet what was in those unedited videos.
HALL: It didn't meet it – which makes it false, right?
MURRAY: Well, yeah.
HALL: Okay. I’m just making sure we're clear on that. But that was a part of, I think, a lot of her Twitter traffic was not just the praise for that statement.
(...)
