McAuliffe fact-check retraction leaves state buzzing

Virginia public radio station WCVE in Richmond retracted a column posted to its website today — a fact check piece about former Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe.

The piece, which was also shared by statewide news aggregator Va News from the Virginia Public Access Project, called out McAuliffe for falsely claiming his Republican opponent, Glenn Youngkin, praised him during a panel discussion the Youngkin hosted in 2018, on which McAuliffe was a panelist.

The WCVE piece reported the video of the panel discussion the McAuliffe campaign used to create a recent TV ad was deceptively edited to make it look like Youngkin praised him, but in fact, was reading back comments made by someone else about McAuliffe.

The station said it retraced the fact check story because it omitted something — we don’t know what that something may be — from its reporting.

“We’ve retracted an [P]olitifact piece on a McAuliffe campaign ad due to a substantial omission in our reporting. We apologize for our error and will publish a retraction notice on the VPM site.”

We've retracted a politifact piece on a McAuliffe campaign ad due to a substantial omission in our reporting.

We apologize for our error and will publish a retraction notice on the VPM site.

— VPM (@myVPM) June 29, 2021

The radio station is not taking calls but is asking callers to leave their information on a recording, telling them that someone will call them back on the next business day. We’ve left our information and asked why this post was retracted.

Both the McAuliffe and the Youngkin campaigns are silent on the issue so far.

Virginia Republicans, however, are not so quiet and have accused the radio station of catering to the Democrats.

“The Mainstream Media is attempting to cover for Two-Faced Terry and his campaign of lies. Must be nice to have the Liberal Media do your bidding for you.”

The Mainstream Media is attempting to cover for Two-Faced Terry and his campaign of lies.

Must be nice to have the Liberal Media do your bidding for you. https://t.co/1LDbGxCQth

— Virginia GOP (@VA_GOP) June 29, 2021

Graham Moomaw, who covers the Virginia government for the Virginia Mercury, was left scratching his head.

“Not every day you see a retraction on a fact-check. Curious what happened here.”

Not everyday you see a retraction on a fact-check.

Curious what happened here https://t.co/tmAeikpOti

— Graham Moomaw (@gmoomaw) June 29, 2021

McAuliffe had taken heat after the Washington Post reported McAuliffe falsely claimed the state had a massive budget shortfall caused by Republicans when he took over as governor in 2014.

McAuliffe and Younkin make up a handful of candidates, all vying to become Virginia’s next governor. McAuliffe served as governor from 2014 through 2017. State law prevents governors from serving two consecutive terms.