CBS hired conspiracy reporter from Fox News, now she's pushing "Obamagate"

https://pressrun.media/p/cbs-hired-conspiracy-reporter-from

Eric Boehlert

When CBS News last year hired a Fox News reporter who had been aggressively wrong about the Benghazi story for three straight years, it was not a good sign. It's distressing when a mainstream media outlet is so anxious to make nice with conservatives that they hire someone like Catherine Herridge, whose career is filled with misinformation work. But that's what CBS did, despite the reporter's long and shameful history of acting more as a Republican partisan than a straight news reporter.

At Fox News, Herridge peddled whatever Republicans on the Hill were pushing — Hillary Clinton's email server was hacked by a crime syndicate! President Barack Obama was MIA the night of the Benghazi attack! She basically ran an ongoing misinformation campaign on behalf of the GOP. (Her Twitter feed still serves as one.)

Herridge has emerged in recent days as a media point person as the White House tries frantically to smear former President Barack Obama with the hollow claims of a "Obamagate" scandal.

Herridge recently treated Attorney General Bill Barr to a softball interview after he stunned the legal community when the Department of Justice dropped its charges against Trump's former national security adviser, Michael Flynn. He had already pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI in 2017 about his contacts with Russian officials during the 2016 campaign. Then Herridge was handed a Republicans "scoop," which peddled the absurd claim that Obama and Vice President Biden were part of this vast, left-wing, Deep State conspiracy to ensnare the Trump presidency.

Last week, a staffer on Biden's campaign called Herridge a "right-wing hack.” He’s not the only one taking note recently. "Democrats on Capitol Hill have grown particularly irked by [Herridge's] work, believing she’s become a de facto clearing house for conservative conspiracy theorists who want to give their material the veneer of mainstream objectivity," the Daily Beast reported. Some CBS staffers are becoming increasingly concerned. "Personally I and a few of my other colleagues are really frustrated because we thought she wanted to come to CBS to do real news, not just GOP talking points, but she’s just doing more of the same stuff,” a network source told the Daily Beast.

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