Fox News White House reporter Kevin Corke further blurred the line between the network’s opinion and “straight news” divisions on Wednesday when he openly questioned the authenticity of a whistleblower at the center of the House’s impeachment inquiry while declaring the “fix is in” against President Donald Trump.
Appearing on the president’s favorite morning program Fox & Friends, Corke covered the White House’s scorching letter to House Democrats declaring that Trump will not cooperate with the “unconstitutional” impeachment inquiry.
The Fox reporter went on to note that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi responded by warning the White House that “continued efforts to hide the truth of the president’s abuse of power from the American people will be regarded as further evidence of obstruction.”
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“So, it sounds like the fix is in, right?” Corke remarked before noting that the White House was taking aim at House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-CA), a favorite target of Team Trump’s.
After noting the White House has blasted Schiff for concocting a “false version” of the Ukraine call during a recent Congressional hearing, Corke added that this wasn’t the only thing for which Schiff has been “strongly criticized.”
“I don’t know what he was thinking about reading that on the record,” the Fox News reporter said. “Effectively, he said he was just sort of making this up. But the real thing that’s bothering, I think, a lot of people also is that the House Intel Committee chair has been accused of lying about his contacts with the so-called whistleblower.”
Corke was referencing the New York Times report that the whistleblower who sounded the alarm over Trump seeking foreign assistance in the upcoming election contacted the House Intelligence Committee early on to seek guidance on filing their complaint. Schiff has faced criticism, largely from Republicans and conservatives, for claiming he has not had contact with the whistleblower.
The Times, however, reported that the whistleblower contacted a committee aide, Schiff wasn’t personally in contact with the whistleblower, and the congressman was not aware of the whistleblower’s identity or the full account of the complaint.
Corke has a history of flirting with or embracing fringe conspiracy theories and far-right politics. In May 2017, Corke mass-deleted tweets promoting baseless alt-right conspiracies after The Daily Beast spotted them. Earlier this year, he excited followers of the crazed pro-Trump QAnon conspiracy when he tweeted a picture of a coffee cup emblazoned with the letter “Q,” adding the caption: “My kind of coffee.” (He later deleted the tweet.)
Corke finished his Wednesday morning dispatch by telling the Fox & Friends hosts he gets to see all these developments “from the catbird seat at the White House.”
Interestingly, it was just a few months ago when Trump took a break while speaking to reporters on the White House lawn to shake Corke’s hand and compliment the Fox correspondent for treating him “fairly.”
