{"id":2690261,"date":"2026-10-23T14:39:30","date_gmt":"2026-10-23T18:39:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaign10-years-later-fact-checker-glenn-kessler-is-still-in-denial-about-the-russia-collusion-hoax\/"},"modified":"2026-10-23T14:39:30","modified_gmt":"2026-10-23T18:39:30","slug":"utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaign10-years-later-fact-checker-glenn-kessler-is-still-in-denial-about-the-russia-collusion-hoax","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/utm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaign10-years-later-fact-checker-glenn-kessler-is-still-in-denial-about-the-russia-collusion-hoax\/","title":{"rendered":"Glenn Kessler Clings To Russia Collusion Hoax 10 Years Later"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">20<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Futm_sourcerssutm_mediumrssutm_campaign10-years-later-fact-checker-glenn-kessler-is-still-in-denial-about-the-russia-collusion-hoax%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2690261&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>WASHINGTON, D.C. \u2014 Former Washington Post \u201cfact checker\u201d Glenn Kessler was awarded the \u201cPhilip J. Klass Award for outstanding promotion of critical thinking and scientific understanding\u201d Thursday night. But when confronted with his persistent Russia collusion hoax propaganda, Kessler insisted \u201cthere is no Russia collusion hoax.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Kessler was given the award by a group called the National Capital Area Skeptics at an event titled \u201cFact-Checking in a World of Misinformation\u201d in the Media and Public Affairs Building of George Washington University.<\/p>\n<p>The Federalist has <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/tag\/glenn-kessler\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">extensively<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2025\/07\/28\/with-wapo-exit-pinocchio-wielding-propagandist-glenn-kessler-leaves-behind-more-fiction-than-fact\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">tracked<\/a> Kessler\u2019s career of partisan deception, which includes lying about Russian collusion and the bogus Steele dossier, refusing to consider evidence that the coronavirus leaked from a Chinese lab, <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2020\/12\/14\/this-washington-post-fact-check-of-trumps-election-integrity-claim-is-a-ragbag-of-lies\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">altering<\/a> statements about election integrity to fit the narrative of a \u201cfact check,\u201d waving off concerns about the coronavirus shot, and much more.<\/p>\n<p>Kessler also leaned into his mathematically <a href=\"https:\/\/www.realclearpolitics.com\/articles\/2020\/09\/10\/no_trump_hasnt_made_20000_false_or_misleading_claims.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">absurd<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2025\/07\/29\/glenn-kesslers-departure-from-wapo-signals-the-end-of-media-fact-checking\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">claim<\/a> that President Donald Trump had said \u201cover 30,000\u201d false or misleading statements in his first term, 16,000 of which came in the first three years and 14,000 of which came in the final year.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, Kessler admitted at the GW event he actively refused the same treatment for President Joe Biden, stating, \u201cI was injured by Trump. I had to go through four months of physical therapy \u2026 when Biden came in, they wanted me to do it for Biden. I said, \u2018I\u2019ll do 100 days for Biden. I\u2019m not going to do anything more.&#8217;\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Interviewer Joel Achenbach, a former staff writer\/science journalist at The Washington Post, told him \u201cobviously, you did a heroic job for years, in what had to been an exhausting job too, particularly after 2016.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>When asked by The Federalist if he was worried \u201cfact checkers\u201d have lost their credibility after perpetuating the Russia collusion hoax and cooperating with social media companies to censor Americans who countered approved narratives about Covid, Kessler became extremely defensive.<\/p>\n<p>He attempted to explain away the hoax by pointing to the Senate Intelligence Committee report stating Russia attempted to interfere with the 2016 election, but that entirely alters the claim that \u201cfact-checkers\u201d like Kessler had been making all along. <\/p>\n<p>When confronted by the fact that the hoax that he perpetuated falsely asserted Trump colluded with the Russians to alter the election, and asked if he has read the documents showing the hoax was a <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2025\/07\/23\/report-russia-hoax-was-built-on-one-scant-unclear-and-unverifiable-fragment-of-a-sentence\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">concoction<\/a> of the Obama administration to kneecap Trump, Kessler became exasperated.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m sorry, just to be frank, what you\u2019re saying you\u2019re repeating things that are simply false,\u201d he asserted. When pushed again on if he had actually read the documents, he responded with an annoyed \u201cyes.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is a great example of the kind of strange, you know, partisan mindsets that that you know people that aren\u2019t thinking critically will accept. But those things are not true,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>A GW student journalist in the room seemed to find it ironic that the person talking about objectivity and critical thinking skills was wholly incapable of participating in the very thing he was advocating, stating in a passed note, \u201cHe could not deal with any criticism \u2014 so typical!\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Kessler\u2019s refrain that \u201cit is increasingly a world of misinformation, and it is indeed getting worse,\u201d stood in stark contrast to the <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/tag\/russia-hoax\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">mountains<\/a> of <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/tag\/russia-collusion-hoax\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">evidence<\/a> that the entire narrative was a fabrication.<\/p>\n<p>Achenbach asked Kessler whether he\u2019d ever made any major errors, and Kessler said he had not \u2014 only some partial missteps that prove \u201cno fact check is ever finished.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere was never any thing that I recall where we had to retract the article or anything like that,\u201d Kessler said. \u201cYou know, I always said, you know, no fact check is ever finished, and we update with new information.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>But the \u201cfact checking\u201d industry is continuing to lose credibility. Just this week, the \u201cfact checkers\u201d were again proven to be unquestioning shills of their Democrat friends, as even more evidence comes out suggesting Rep. Ilhan Omar really did <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/PirateWires\/status\/2113286541640687687?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">marry her brother<\/a> and allegedly committed immigration fraud. Snopes, another \u201cfact checker\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/www.snopes.com\/fact-check\/ilhan-omar-marry-brother\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">rated<\/a> this claim \u201cunfounded.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>As The Federalist\u2019s Mark Hemingway observed, \u201cthat \u2018fact checkers\u2019 tried to make their judgments on complicated matters of rhetoric and policy sound definitive to the point of pseudoscientific objectivity was always absurd \u2026 The first Trump presidency made it painfully obvious that \u2018fact checking\u2019 did not exist as a fair and independent vocation. It was strictly an attempt to control the public debate.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In his dubious defense of \u201ctruth,\u201d \u201cobjectivity,\u201d \u201ccritical thinking,\u201d and the rest, Kessler ended the night by decrying the hyper-partisanship of American discourse, which he blamed entirely on Trump because he was apparently the first to break the dam on saying \u201cthe other side is evil.\u201d Achenbach dutifully agreed, stating, \u201cTrump changed the tone of what you\u2019re allowed to say.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>But while Achenbach made some attempt to say political rancor had plagued American discourse since the founding, which is true, Kessler, with all his objectivity, blamed first and foremost Trum, and then the House speakership of Newt Gingrich in the mid-1990s.<\/p>\n<p>True to form, Kessler happened to omit the fact that Democrats have been calling Republicans \u201cNazis,\u201d a synonym for evil in the Western political lexicon, since the 1940s.<\/p>\n<p>In 1948, just three years after World War II, President Harry Truman <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/1948\/10\/26\/archives\/president-likens-dewey-to-hitler-as-fascists-tool-says-when-bigots.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">likened<\/a> Republican presidential nominee Thomas Dewey to Adolf Hitler directly. The same <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/opinion\/3201957\/reductio-ad-hitlerum-60-years-democrats-falsely-calling-republican-nominee-fascist\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">happened<\/a> in 1964 with Republican presidential nominee Barry Goldwater, while President Lyndon Johnson <a href=\"https:\/\/www.whitehousehistory.org\/videos\/daisy-ad-1964-preserved-from-35mm-in-the-tony-schwartz-collection\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">said<\/a> a Goldwater presidency would bring about American nuclear holocaust. The invective was extended to Presidents Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, and George W. Bush, as well as Republican nominee Mitt Romney.<\/p>\n<p>Trump has had it worse than all of those Republicans combined.<\/p>\n<p>While those are just presidents or presidential candidates, the trend trickles down to all levels of Republican candidacy. What it has achieved, which Kessler seemed intent on papering over, is the wave of <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/tag\/left-wing-political-violence\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">left-wing violence<\/a> that has been unleashed in recent years, which has no counterpart on the right.<\/p>\n<p>From the assassination of Charlie Kirk, to the shooting of Trump, to the shooting of congressional Republicans at baseball practice, to the Black Lives Matter riots, and much more, the rhetoric has achieved its intended result.<\/p>\n<p>Every time, Democrat politicians are given cover by the corporate media, including the fact checkers like Kessler, to continue their push toward violence.<\/p>\n<hr>\n<p>   Breccan F. Thies is the White House correspondent for The Federalist. He is a co-recipient of the 2025 Dao Prize for Excellence in Investigative Journalism. As an investigative journalist, he previously covered education and culture issues for the Washington Examiner and Breitbart News. He holds a degree from the University of Virginia and is a 2022 Claremont Institute Publius Fellow. You can follow him on X: @BreccanFThies.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>WASHINGTON, D.C. \u2014 Former Washington Post \u201cfact checker\u201d Glenn Kessler was awarded the \u201cPhilip J. Klass Award for outstanding promotion of critical thinking and scientific understanding\u201d Thursday night. But when confronted with his persistent Russia collusion hoax propaganda, Kessler insisted \u201cthere is no Russia collusion hoax.\u201d Kessler was given the award by a group called<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":179,"featured_media":2690262,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/IMG_0853-1-scaled.jpeg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[546],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2690261","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-federalist"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/IMG_0853-1-scaled.jpeg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2690261","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/179"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2690261"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2690261\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2690262"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2690261"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2690261"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2690261"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}