New York Times Uses False Data To Smear Koch Brothers

As I wrote last week, global warming leftist Peter Gleick recently stole and falsified documents from the free market Heartland Institute in order to try to smear the Institute. One of the more egregiously forged portions of the documents that Gleick turned over to his political allies falsely cited the Koch Brothers are large-scale donors to the Institute.

But that didn’t stop the New York Times from reporting on the fake documents as though they were real. On February 15, the Times ran an article trumpeting that the documents “outline plans to promote a curriculum that would cast doubt on the scientific finding that fossil fuel emissions endanger the long-term welfare of the planet.” More particularly, theTimes cited the portion of the discredited forgeries concerning the Koch brothers:

The documents say that the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation contributed $25,000 last year and was expected to contribute $200,000 this year. Mr. Koch is one of two brothers who have been prominent supporters of libertarian causes as well as other charitable endeavors. They control Koch Industries, one of the country’s largest private companies and a major oil refiner.

The Koch Foundation quickly contacted the Times to let them know that they’d gotten the story wrong. But the editor, instead of pulling the story, asked the Foundation to be “more explicit.” There was nothing to be more explicit about, of course; the document containing the Koch’s name was a forgery. In point of fact, the Koch Foundation only gave $25,000 earmarked for healthcare research. As Tonya Mullins, director of communications for the Foundation wrote:

One might expect the Times to have some chagrin about its reporting that was based on material obtained by fraud, motivated by an ulterior ideological agenda, and suspect in its authenticity.  Yet even though that source lied, cheated, and stole – and refuses to answer any further question from the Times or anyone – reporter Andrew Revkin nonetheless found room to praise him, writing, “It’s enormously creditable that Peter Gleick has owned up to his terrible error in judgment.”

Welcome to the world of the New York Times, where the Koch brothers are always the villain, even after their supposed villainy has been disproved.