Jake Tapper explains why he didn't fact check AOC's lie about President Trump

Greg P. | 2:25 PM on March 22, 2020

This morning on CNN’s “State of the Union,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez repeated the lie that President Trump referred to the coronavirus as a “hoax.”

AOC just repeated the lie that President Trump called coronavirus a "hoax."

This is not true, and has been debunked by numerous fact checking sources.

This would've been a great time for a fact check, @jaketapper… https://t.co/Ps1hItAKGA pic.twitter.com/X8qQEwMthF

— Abigail Marone (Text EMPOWER to 88022) (@abigailmarone) March 22, 2020

Host Jake Tapper later explained that he “thought about” fact-checking the Queens socialist, but “didn’t because he *did* call a hoax the concerns of those saying that the response from the president was insufficient and that he was downplaying the gravity of the crisis”:

I thought about it, because the president did not call the virus a hoax.

But i didn’t because he *did* call a hoax the concerns of those saying that the response from the president was insufficient and that he was downplaying the gravity of the crisis. And that too was a lie. https://t.co/MdPeulQpZ1

— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) March 22, 2020

And “it’s tough to justify taking the time for a fact check when it’s not taking a stand defining the truth”:

I guess that’s the problem with a politician who lies so often; while I agree that Democrats are mischaracterizing what he said, what he did say was also false so it’s tough to justify taking the time for a fact check when it’s not taking a stand defining the truth.

— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) March 22, 2020