CNN’s Sciutto Calls Trump Linking Terror Attack to Migrants A ‘Cautionary Tale’ About ‘The Persistence of Disinformation’

CNN anchor and chief national security analyst Jim Sciutto pulled no punches on Thursday in laying into President-elect Donald Trump for wrongly linking the New Orleans terror attack on New Year’s Day to migrant crime.

Sciutto referenced media reporter Brian Stelter’s coverage of the Fox News report, which was later updated in the morning, that appeared to lead Trump to link the attack to someone who crossed the border. Authorities later identified the attacker, who killed 14 people and left dozens wounded, as an American-born Army veteran.

“This is an important cautionary tale from @brianstelter in the age of information bubbles and persistence of disinformation,” Sciutto wrote before quoting from Stelter’s article:

New: An erroneous early Fox News report about the New Orleans terror attack is warping the political dialogue in the aftermath of the deadly rampage.

The false report from Fox, which was attributed to anonymous sources, confused the public – and evidently President-elect Donald Trump too. The misinformation is still circulating more than 24 hours later – serving as a cautionary tale about the news ecosystem as the new year begins.

During the 10 a.m. hour on Wednesday, Fox reported that the New Orleans suspect’s truck crossed the US border in Eagle Pass, Texas “two days ago.” Some of the right-wing network’s coverage explicitly said “the suspect” drove across the border, leaving viewers with the impression that a foreigner might be responsible for the deadly carnage.

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Eight minutes after the first Fox segment that mentioned the border, Trump issued a statement about “criminals coming in” from other countries. While Trump didn’t mention Fox directly, he is known to be an avid consumer of the cable network and has tapped several of its personalities for his incoming cabinet.

Sciutto went on to share the entire article in a lengthy thread. Stelter also reported on how many of Trump’s allies quickly echoed his claims that the terrorist was a foreign national:

“Biden’s parting gift to America — migrant terrorists,” Donald Trump Jr. wrote, sharing the Fox claim on X. “Shut the border down!!!” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene exclaimed.

Trump himself continued to post to his Truth Social platform calls to secure the border in the context of the attack.

“With the Biden “Open Border’s Policy” I said, many times during Rallies, and elsewhere, that Radical Islamic Terrorism, and other forms of violent crime, will become so bad in America that it will become hard to even imagine or believe. That time has come, only worse than ever imagined. Joe Biden is the WORST PRESIDENT IN THE HISTORY OF AMERICA, A COMPLETE AND TOTAL DISASTER. What he and his group of Election Interfering “thugs” have done to our Country will not soon be forgotten! MAGA,” Trump posted on Thursday after the attacker had been identified.

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) and other GOP members of Congress offered similar takes. Johnson linked the “wide open border” to the attack on Thursday afternoon, telling Fox’s Larry Kudlow, “They tried to convince us the greatest threat to the homeland was racially motivated extremism when we all looked at the wide open border and thought logically that might lead to terrorist attacks in the future. You know, we need a dramatic change.”