Matt Gertz at MMFA (09.18.2020):
[UPDATE (9/19/20): After this story’s publication, Fox17 took down the article that generated the right-wing media conspiracy theories. The station issued a statement to CNN’s Oliver Darcy saying in part: “In a segment that aired earlier this week, we incorrectly asserted that Mayor Cooper's office withheld COVID-19 data from the public, which implied that there had been a cover up. We want to clarify that we do not believe there was any cover-up, and we apologize for the error and oversight in our reporting." Darcy also noted that Fox17 is owned by the right-wing Sinclair Broadcast Group.]
Right-wing commentators are using a Wednesday report from a local Nashville, Tennessee, broadcast affiliate to falsely accuse Mayor John Cooper of hiding information about the supposedly low number of coronavirus cases linked to city bars and restaurants. That initial story is based on the reporter’s bizarre misinterpretation of emails from Cooper’s office, and the data in question was actually provided to another Nashville journalist and published six weeks ago.
There’s no question about the role of bars and restaurants in spreading the coronavirus. Public health experts inside and outside of President Donald Trump’s administration agree that they are a key vector. Indeed, Dr. Deborah Birx, a leader of the White House coronavirus task force, urged Tennessee to shutter all bars and restrict restaurant dining in a July visit to the state.
But the Nashville report nonetheless rocketed through right-wing media, with commentators using the reporter’s twisted, inaccurate interpretation to buttress their narrative that Democratic mayors are lying to the public to keep businesses closed for political reasons. By Thursday night, the story reached Fox News, where hosts who regularly attack coronavirus measures slammed Cooper’s purported “cover-up” and suggested that coronavirus restrictions on bars and restaurants are unnecessary.
The article by Fox17’s Dennis Ferrier was headlined “COVID-19 emails from Nashville mayor's office show disturbing revelation,” and it claimed that the coronavirus cases linked to bars and restaurants “may have been so low that the mayor’s office and the Metro Health Department decided to keep it secret.” He based this conclusion on two banal email exchanges, which he suggested show those offices discussing “the low number of coronavirus cases emerging” from those locations and “how to keep it from the public.”
Other Nashville journalists who had reported on the city’s coronavirus response quickly dismantled Ferrier’s story on Twitter. “The emails do NOT say what the reporter implied,” commented Newschannel 5’s Phil Williams. “Bizarre and inaccurate story,” tweeted Tennessee Lookout’s Nate Rau. “Not to elevate their clicks here but did the author of this story ... read the email they are referring to?” asked Nashville Post’s Kara Hartnett.
While Ferrier presents the exchange as a sinister plot to keep information from the public about purportedly low numbers of coronavirus cases linked to bars and restaurants, it shows nothing of the sort. In fact, an image of the exchange he showed on the air -- but did not specifically mention in either his on-air or written report -- suggests that the exchange between Waller and Eagles about the data not being for public distribution happened before Eagles had seen the data, not after he saw it. The emails show that it was Eagles’ request for Waller to provide “countywide contact tracing data” that led Waller to ask whether the data was for public release.
[...]
Ferrier’s absurd framing nonetheless dominated right-wing media on Thursday. Outlets like The New York Post, The Daily Mail, and National Review credulously regurgitated his report. There was heated reaction on pro-Trump Twitter. The Daily Wire’s Ben Shapiro claimed that Ferrier’s story showed that “Nashville city government covered up the fact that restaurants and bars were not a vector of covid-19 transmission so as to legitimize the continued lockdown.” “This certainly looks like a cover up by city officials,” Outkick’s Clay Travis tweeted. “A coverup to justify a lockdown,” commented Fox senior political analyst Brit Hume. And Donald Trump Jr. commented that “everyone involved should face jail time,” adding, “How many other Dem run cities is this happening in?”
By Thursday night, Fox News hosts Tucker Carlson and Laura Ingraham had taken up this dishonest framing. They slotted Ferrier’s reporting as more evidence to support their already aggressive campaign denouncing any and all recommendations that public health officials have made for slowing the virus spread as ineffective efforts by political hacks.
