A video has appeared online in recent days that purports to demolish former Breitbart reporter Michelle Fields’ version of what happened to her during the media scrum after GOP front-runner Donald Trump’s press conference, last Tuesday night. It does nothing of the sort. If anything, it corroborates her story, which has always been that she “was jolted backwards” by Trump’s campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, after she asked the candidate a question.
Trump acknowledged the question, but before he could answer I was jolted backwards. Someone had grabbed me tightly by the arm and yanked me down. I almost fell to the ground, but was able to maintain my balance. Nonetheless, I was shaken.
Here’s the video that supposedly debunks Fields’ story (Spoiler alert: It doesn’t.)
Trump supporters have stopped at nothing in recent days to try to discredit Fields, parroting the Trump campaign’s nasty smears about her previous reporting, including “debunking” her assertion that she’d been roughed up by the NYPD during an Occupy rally some years ago. Fields’s account was backed up by both photographic and video evidence, which you can see here.
Lewandowski also publicly accused Fields of being an attention-seeker “who once claimed Allen West groped her but later went silent.”
This was in reference to a gotnews.com story by Charles C. Johnson that contains this statement:
Fields declined to be interviewed on record but three different sources at PJ Media confirmed this story. (Update: Fields repeatedly and emphatically refused comment on the record and asked that I change her earlier confirmation which I have now done.)
That story actually implies that Fields is the opposite of an attention seeker.
The video above that Trump supporters are claiming proves Fields is a liar, was slowed down to the point that it actually minimizes what happened. The same footage sped up to real time, gives you a better perspective:
Again: That video that supposedly debunks @MichelleFields‘ story sped up to real time: pic.twitter.com/VcnVO9bjcz
— Nice Deb (@NiceDeb) March 14, 2016
Fields claimed that someone grabbed her tightly, yanking her back, and that she momentarily lost her balance. The sped up video corroborates this. It does nothing to prove that she’s lying. Again, she never said she was actually thrown to the ground. The video is another piece of evidence that Fields was a victim of a minor assault — like the student journalist at Mizzou was a victim of 3rd degree assault at the hands of Professor Click during a protest, last fall.
But many Trump supporters have latched on to what Washington Post reporter Ben Terris is heard saying in reaction to the incident in the audiotape that emerged shortly after the incident:
Terris exclaimed — “wow, he just like threw you down” — an expression said in the heat of the moment. It was not how he went on to describe the incident in his piece for WaPo, later that week. Yet Trump supporters are actually arguing that Terris meant “throw down” *literally* and have come up with a bizarre conspiracy theory to explain why. According to the theory, Fields and Terris concocted the controversy themselves so he could write about it later in his Washington Post hit piece on Trump. The two journalists were apparently play-acting their reactions to the altercation. Also Fields is a social justice warrior who is writing a book — which according to the conspiracy theorists — somehow plays into this.
Of course, there is a fatal flaw in this reasoning: If in fact this was all part of a pre-planned plot, wouldn’t Lewandowski have had to have been in on it? Otherwise, how would Terris and Fields know that Lewandowski would step toward them, reach out, and appear to grab Fields’ arm?
Fields it is important to note, was a pro-Trump conservative who was employed by the notoriously pro-Trump Breitbart.com until very recently. She and former editor-at-large Ben Shapiro tendered their resignations, Sunday night. Monday two more Breibart employees bailed, bringing the total number of staffers who have bolted from the organization to six.
Fields has filed a police complaint, although she initially didn’t want to, preferring a simple apology instead. Instead of apologizing however, the Trump campaign accused her of lying and went on the attack.
It’s disgusting and outrageous and it appears that they have a lot of low-watt enablers out there helping them.
Nice Deb 