ABC Moderator Linsey Davis Admits:

The Wall Street Journal - Sept 18
How the Trump Campaign Ran With Rumors About Pet-Eating Migrants—After Being Told They Weren’t True

SPRINGFIELD, Ohio—City Manager Bryan Heck fielded an unusual question at City Hall on the morning of Sept. 9, from a staff member of Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance. The staffer called to ask if there was any truth to bizarre rumors about Haitian immigrants and pets in Springfield.

“He asked point-blank, ‘Are the rumors true of pets being taken and eaten?’” recalled Heck. “I told him no. There was no verifiable evidence or reports to show this was true. I told them these claims were baseless.”

By then, Vance had already posted about the rumors to his 1.9 million followers on X. Yet he kept the post up, and repeated an even more insistent version of the claim the next morning. ...

... Thirty-six bomb threats had been logged as of Tuesday evening. ...

... “We have told those at the national level that they are speaking these things that are untrue,” added Springfield Mayor Rob Rue, a registered Republican. But he said claims have been “repeated and doubled down on.”

Vance insisted on CNN this past Sunday that he had firsthand accounts of the incidents from constituents, but the media had paid no attention to migrant problems in American cities “until Donald Trump and I started talking about cat memes.” He added, “If I have to create stories so that the American media actually pays attention to the suffering of the American people, then that’s what I’m going to do.”

...