Progressives Lied. A Woman Died. Republicans Were Blamed.

Being a progressive means you can lie with impunity and the media will declare you a truth-teller. The other day on CNN, Democrat strategist Elliot Williams defended Democrat claims that Donald Trump is a "threat to democracy" because of Trump's refusal to accept election results. Hillary Clinton, Stacey Abrams and every Democrat who thinks George W. Bush stole the 2000 election from Al Gore get a pass. But Trump is a threat to democracy. Democrats get to lie, and the media blesses their lies as truth.

In Springfield, Ohio, Republicans conjured up stories of stolen pets being eaten by Haitians. Someone came forward with a video of a woman in Canton, Ohio, who suffered from mental illness and allegedly ate a cat. Another video surfaced of two men from Congo allegedly barbecuing a cat in Dayton, Ohio. No one has produced any evidence of stolen cats being eaten by Haitians in Springfield, Ohio. The one lady who claimed her cat had been stolen and eaten by Haitians actually had her cat return home. But the stories prompted foreign actors to call in bomb hoaxes to local schools. The media and Democrats promptly blamed Trump and running mate JD Vance for what happened to the schools.

That leads me to 28-year-old Amber Nicole Thurman of Georgia. Democrats have repeatedly lied that abortifacient drugs are "as safe as Tylenol." Thurman might have said she disagrees -- if she had not died after taking those abortifacient drugs. Nine weeks pregnant, Thurman attempted to get an abortion in North Carolina. She missed her appointment. The clinic sent her home with the drugs. In a story all too common for these, again, "safe as Tylenol" drugs, Thurman had complications and a reaction. She contracted sepsis. She thereafter died.

Thurman's family says she delayed seeking medical care because of Georgia's fetal heartbeat law. To the extent Thurman believed this, she believed a progressive lie that Georgia's law would prevent treatment. The Georgia law, which prohibits abortions after a fetal heartbeat is detected, specifically exempts medical emergencies and procedures when no heartbeat is detected.

But progressives have lied repeatedly about that. Progressives have made wild claims about Georgia's law prohibiting procedures to deal with ectopic pregnancy or to perform a dilatation and curettage, etc. The left-wing publication ProPublica, which reported the story, has tried to blame the Republican law in Georgia for Thurman's death. Sympathetic progressive journalists and pundits have echoed the claim. Kamala Harris has used the ProPublica story to generate support among women in Georgia.

The whole story is premised on a lie from progressives, and that lie cost Thurman her life. She believed she would not be able to get treatment the law clearly and unambiguously allowed but that reporters from national and local news outlets lied about. Trump and Vance will be blamed for foreign hoaxes perpetrated in Springfield, Ohio, but the progressives and reporters who convinced a woman she could not get medical help will be treated as truth-tellers.

This pattern plays out over and over. Progressives believe Trump incited an insurrection on Jan. 6, so he can be vilified as the second coming of Hitler. Harris routinely lies by denying she helped raise money to bail out the rioters who burned down Minneapolis, and the media gives her a pass. The media was fine calling Harris the "border czar" until it became a political liability, then they denied the term ever applied to her.

Republicans must always be on their A-game. The press has always been out to get them. The press has never been fair. But Republicans used to play smarter. Instead of stolen cat memes, the GOP could be focusing on the growing number of violent illegal alien gangs. Instead of suggesting someone's puppy might get eaten by a Haitian, they could focus on Kadrian Harris, a 23-year-old mother killed in a car crash in Georgia by an illegal alien allowed in the country by Kamala Harris' policies.

The Democrats are helped by the press in pushing lies that get people killed. Republicans need to combat their lies with truth, not memes.

========

To find out more about Erick Erickson and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate webpage at www.creators.com.

----