Oversight committee hearing witness explains how Fox News figures and hosts peddled disinformation
Lev Parnas: “Basically a letter would come over from somebody in Ukraine, I'd hand it over to John Solomon. Next thing you knew he was on Fox TV two hours later with Sean Hannity.”
Published
Citation From OAN's airing of the March 20, 2024 Oversight Committee Hearing
REP. JAMIE RASKIN (D-MD): At what point did the campaign to dig up dirt on Biden become a campaign to spread disinformation and lies about Biden?
LEV PARNAS: At some point when we hit a few brick walls, all of a sudden, then I saw the shift between the BLT group, which included John Solomon, the media personality, and Rudy Giuliani and other Trump lawyers, to start trying to push narratives that were — we had no, they were not validated. We had no way to validate them. Basically, a letter would come over from somebody in Ukraine, I'd hand it over to John Solomon. Next thing you knew he was on Fox TV two hours later with Sean Hannity.
RASKIN: At what point did Mr. Giuliani begin working directly with Russian agents and Russian assets? Individuals who would later become sanctioned by Donald Trump's own Treasury Department for spreading propaganda and disinformation against Joe Biden.
PARNAS: It was some time in probably around May, June of 2019.
RASKIN: We were you aware? Was Mr. Giuliani aware that these people were basically just doing the bidding of Vladimir Putin?
PARNAS: Absolutely.
RASKIN: So he had no hesitation about spreading lies that were concocted by Russian agents?
PARNAS: As long as it fit the narrative, absolutely not.
RASKIN: How were you and Giuliani able to take these false allegations, peddled by corrupt officials and Russian agents, and promote and amplify them here in the United States in our political system? Weren't media groups skeptical of your claims?
PARNAS: Most media groups, I'd probably say all except for Fox and a few other right-wing media groups, didn't want to take any of the information and that aggravated Rudy Giuliani and John Solomon and other players. And the main group that it was being pushed through was Fox, Sean Hannity and some other media personalities over there. But then there was also other people that were doing the bidding for the Russians. People in congress, like Senator Ron Johnson, like Congressman Pete Sessions, who sits here right now, that was with me from the very beginning of this journey into finding up digging dirt on Joe Biden.