Fallout from the debacle of the presidential debate between former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris continues, with three further developments calling into question the fairness and integrity of the two moderators and the debate's sponsor, ABC News.
Yesterday, news emerged that host Lindsey Davis is a sorority buddy of VP Kamala Harris, former Clinton operative Mark Penn called on ABC to come clean about the rigged debates with an objective, outsider investigation, and Black Insurrection X feeds vowed to release evidence from a network whistleblower that Harris received questions in advance and knew the hosts would only fact-check Trump.
The conduct of the debate has brought the station into disrepute and ruined its reputation.
Sisterhood
The New York Post reported on Davis and Harris' relationship.
“Davis, 46, sparked a backlash by refuting the former president's false claim that doctors had discussed post-birth abortions, with Republicans arguing that the ABC host had not been as harsh on Harris' false claims,” ​​the Post explained.
It has now been revealed that the two were both members of Alpha Kappa Alpha.
Harris became a member of the sisterhood while she was an undergraduate at Howard University in Washington.
The Democratic presidential nominee graduated from a private, historically black university in 1986 with a Bachelor of Arts degree.
Davis became a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha while an undergraduate at the University of Virginia, graduating in 1999 with a bachelor's degree in psychology.
The two sorority members had met at least once before, during a one-on-one interview with ABC last year.
In fact, Trump's claim was not false, as shown by a video of former Virginia Governor Ralph Northam, who is a pediatric neurologist.
And House Democrats voted against a bill that would have required doctors to provide life-saving treatment to babies born after a botched abortion.
That fact aside, the obvious question is why Davis was allowed to moderate the debate and why she didn't disclose her relationship with Harris.
User X explained the issue: Above all else, loyalty to other sorority members is paramount.
“As a sorority member myself, I can speak from first-hand knowledge,” she wrote.
You become part of a tradition, a legacy, and a connection to one another for life. There is not a single sorority nationwide that does not practice this philosophical belief. It is a social contract that you actively vow to uphold.
The thread went on to say that the women “cannot claim to have 'nothing to do' without challenging the entire tradition of sisterhood.”
The sorority also cannot claim there is no connection between Davis and Harris, as the user noted the sorority invited Harris to its events.
The WorldNetDaily X feed featured a video of Davis and ABC's George Stephanopoulos, a former Clinton supporter, discussing sororities during coverage of President Joe Biden's inauguration. Davis said sorority members expected Harris to wear a pearl necklace, the sorority's symbol.
Pen Request
Meanwhile, when it comes to Penn, a former adviser to President Clinton told Just the News' John Solomon that ABC should launch an internal investigation with an independent law firm.
“I don't know what they told the Harris campaign,” Penn said.
“I think the next day, the suspicions about this have really risen. I think an independent third party should look at all of the internal texts and emails and see to what extent they were trying to fact-check a single candidate and manipulate the outcome of this debate. I don't think that's enough under the circumstances to warrant anything more.”
Solomon also noted that Harris is close friends with Dana Walden, co-chairman of Disney, which owns ABC. Walden oversees ABC News. The New York Times said Harris and Walden are “special friends,” and that Walden has been a donor to Harris' campaigns for the past 20 years.
Whistleblower claims debate was rigged
A report from Black Insurrectionist also made headlines yesterday.
“We will be releasing an affidavit from an ABC whistleblower about this debate,” the X poster promised.
The whistleblower alleged that Harris “received sample questions essentially identical to those posed in the debate, as well as an assurance that she would fact-check Donald Trump and that she herself would not be fact-checked.”
These claims have not been verified, but as critics such as Glenn Greenwald have pointed out, that is exactly what happened.
“At no time did the hosts tell Kamala Harris that her statements were out of context, misleading, deceptive, exaggerated or false,” he wrote.
This is not because Kamala Harris spoke for 90 minutes without making a false statement — she made countless false statements that could and should have been subject to fact-checking.
It's not surprising that the ABC host has been so openly hostile towards Trump and soft on Harris.
The Media Research Center's NewsBusters analyzed host David Muir's coverage of both candidates and found that while Harris' coverage was 100% positive, Trump's coverage was 93% negative.
