#ReleaseTheTranscript Trends After CNN Starts Deleting Damaging Reports on Joe Biden’s Ukraine Call

Bonchie reporting for RedState 

As RedState reported Thursday evening, Joe Biden’s phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky apparently didn’t go well. With Russia continuing to amass forces on the Eastern European nation’s border, the White House has publicly called an invasion imminent while Ukraine has attempted to defuse tensions by projecting strength and confidence. The contrasting styles, with Biden essentially conceding to Vladimir Putin while Zelensky insists it’s not a done deal yet, led to friction as the situation continues to escalate.

Well, that was the story anyway, at least until CNN’s Jake Tapper began to delete his reporting on the call after the White House complained it was based on “false leaks.” Shortly after, CNN’s Jim Scuitto, a former Obama administration official, began his clean-up attempt.

Natasha Bertrand, who was one of the chief purveyors of the Russian collusion hoax, eventually deleted her tweet making the original point. The behavior by a supposed “news” organization is stunning. Under no circumstances did CNN ever backtrack on its reporting when the Trump administration claimed a leak wasn’t true. Instead, you would get a defiant response about standing by their sources. Here, though, the moment the White House complained, CNN jumped into action to do their bidding.

Comparisons to Trump’s “perfect phone call” with Zelensky are being made, a call that eventually led to the former president’s first failed impeachment. In that case, just as is happening now, both sides claimed nothing untoward happened. Despite that, Democrats jumped into action at the time, demanding the transcript be released.

You won’t see those calls now, though. The White House is hunkering down, refusing to provide evidence that Biden didn’t say what he was reported to have said. And with a media outlet as compliant as CNN, why would they even feel any pressure to be transparent? What Democrats demanded during the last administration, they now refuse to do. That’s not a shocking development, yet that doesn’t make the hypocrisy any less noticeable.

Still, even forgetting the phone call for a moment, as I mentioned prior, the US State Department had said multiple times that an invasion of Ukraine by Russia is “imminent.” One has to wonder exactly why the administration is so gung-ho about conceding such a point? Why bolster Russia’s standing on that front, including the morale of its troops, instead of holding the line that an invasion will not be allowed to take place? I understand the arguments from the right and left about not getting militarily involved, but at this point, diplomacy is the name of the game. The administration’s messaging just seems moronic and counter-productive.

All of the opaqueness of the situation and questionable ethics of CNN’s behavior got #releasethetranscript trending, with major GOP figures such as Rep. Elise Stefanik joining the call. That is almost certain to not happen. The rules are different now that a Democrat is in the White House, and the shameless news media doesn’t even pretend that’s not the case.