Media Disinformation on Clarence Thomas Was Barely Corrected and They’ve Had Plenty of Time

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The mainstream press spend a lot of time talking about the dangers of misinformation and their fight against disinformation and the need to control and correct those things. Not so much when it’s their own, however, such as falsely attributing to a view Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.

Politico has issued a correction to a story they published last week with the headline “Clarence Thomas suggests Covid vaccines are developed using cells of ‘aborted children.'”

The story went big fast, amid a flurry of negative press directed at Justice Thomas, and not only had a huge social media presence but was picked up by other press outlets quickly. The correction? Not as much.

“An earlier version of this report misattributed the claim that Covid-19 vaccines were ‘developed using cell lines derived from aborted children’ to Thomas,” stated the correction to Kelly Hooper’s article. “The headline and article have been updated to directly state that Thomas was referencing petitioners’ claims.”

Unfortunately, the other media outlets that wrongly ran with the “news” were not as quick to share the correction, and have yet to follow Politico’s lead in correcting their own articles. They’ve had plenty of time to do so.

In fact, some of them took that time to add editor’s notes that not only didn’t correct, but compounded the original misattribution.

There were more examples, including volumes of social media commentary. But it’s a non-controversy. In his rigorous and meticulous dissenting opinion, Thomas made no such claim of fact, nor did he express “support” for it. What he did was cite it, as is utterly commonplace and necessary in legal writing.

In his dissent on a decision by the Supreme Court to not take up a religious liberty challenge to New York’s Covid vaccine mandate for health care workers, Thomas wrote, “They object on religious grounds to all available COVID–19 vaccines because they were developed using cell lines derived from aborted children.”

Thomas was stating that as a belief of the petitioners. He plainly stated that their objection, which was not the subject of the ruling nor were the justices weighing the claim’s merits, was an objection on religious grounds. Stating that is not a reflection of what the justice himself believes. He wasn’t addressing that claim on its own at all, but rather citing as an example.

What Thomas did is no different than somebody observing there are people who believe the Earth is flat. Noting that this sentiment exists does not make that person an adherent to or advocate for it.

In journalism, precise wording matters. Retractions and apologies to readers and Thomas are warranted. The press has touted itself as a source of combatting disinformation. If only they practiced what they preached.

This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.