Earlier this week we took a look at this outwardly horrifying and shocking story of a 10-year-old rape victim who was seeking an abortion:
The story has all the trappings of a viral media explosion, except for the fact that there seems to be no direct evidence to support the existence of the 10-year-old girl at the center of it.
No matter: The story made it all the way up to no less than the President of the United States:
Delivering impassioned remarks on the future of abortion access in the United States, President Biden on Friday expressed outrage over the case of a 10-year-old rape victim in Ohio who was forced to travel across the state line to undergo an abortion.
"She was forced to have to travel out of the state to Indiana to seek to terminate the pregnancy and maybe save her life," Biden said in remarks at the White House. "Ten years old — 10 years old! — raped, six weeks pregnant, already traumatized, was forced to travel to another state."
Well, once the president repeats a story like this, it's harder for even our terminally useless mainstream media to ignore the glaring holes in it.
So the Washington Post's "fact checker" Glen Kesller went ahead and did that—and what he found out is not all that surprising:
The only source cited for the anecdote was [abortion Dr. Caitlan] Bernard. She's on the record, but there is no indication that the newspaper made other attempts to confirm her account. The story's lead reporter, Shari Rudavsky, did not respond to a query asking whether additional sourcing was obtained. A Gannett spokeswoman provided a comment from Bro Krift, the newspaper's executive editor: "The facts and sourcing about people crossing state lines into Indiana, including the 10-year-old girl, for abortions are clear. We have no additional comment at this time." ...
Bernard declined to identify to the Fact Checker her colleague or the city where the child was located. "Thank you for reaching out. I'm sorry, but I don't have any information to share," she said in an email.
Ahhh okay. So the newspaper publisher apparently has absolutely no corroborating information about the sensational story it published, and the sole source for that story will likewise not be clarifying it any further.
It's worth pointing out that the good Dr. Bernard is giving the same line to other media outlets that are asking about this:
Bernard responded to the Daily Caller News Foundation's request for comment but declined to offer any details to corroborate her story.
"I'm sorry, but I don't have any information to share," she wrote.
And:
Bernard declined to comment when asked for further information by LifeSiteNews on Thursday.
"Thank you for reaching out. I'm sorry, but I don't have any information to share," Bernard, an abortionist and doctor at Indiana University Health, stated in an email.
Given the totality of the evidence at hand here, do you really think Dr. Bernard's story is, at this point, at all trustworthy?
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