Quick Fact: Rush forwards falsehood that Hasan advised Obama transition


Responding to a caller's claim that alleged Fort Hood shooter Maj. Nidal Hasan helped “shape our foreign policy and our domestic policy,” Rush Limbaugh commented: “Especially before Obama was elected, I know.”

From the November 12 edition of Premiere Radio Networks' The Rush Limbaugh Show:

LIMBAUGH: Brenda in Upland, California, great to have you on the EIB Network. Hi.

FEMALE CALLER: Hi Rush. How are you?

LIMBAGUH: Fine and dandy. Appreciate your call.

FEMALE CALLER: Thank you. I was calling about the think tank that Maj. Hasan was in that you mentioned yesterday.

LIMBAUGH: Yeah, the George Washington University International Policy Center for Strategic and international Social Studies, self defense studies, foreign policy --

FEMALE CALLER: No nonpartisan! Nonpartisan.

LIMBAUGH: Non partisan. But it was an eight-month-long, or nine-month-long transition seminar.

FEMALE CALLER: Yes, and, you know, I got a pdf copy of it and I started reading it and I thought it was really, really interesting. I mean there are suggestions here. Of course, you know, closing GITMO, relabeling the global war on terror. Where have we heard that before? They talk about man-made disasters versus natural disasters. I mean, to their credit they actually use the word terrorism in this report, but they call it a major hazard and say that it's not an existential threat to the U.S. because we're too big and too populous. But keep it all in the context of this was crafted and formulated with a terrorist. Hello?

LIMBAUGH: And somebody who at the time was known to be one or at least consorting with them and emailing them and now we have learned perhaps even sending them moolah.

FEMALE CALLER: Sending money to Pakistan. It's unbelievable. How did we get to a point in this country where a terrorist can help shape our foreign policy and our domestic policy?

LIMBAUGH: Especially before Obama was elected, I know.

FEMALE CALLER: Yes. Oh yes, I understand that Obama didn't appoint him to this. But this proposal was given, it was set up to give to the next administration. And as I read off, you can see that large portions of this have been incooporated into where we're at today.

LIMBAUGH: That's why I said when, you know -- this is almost too frightening to contemplate.

Fact: No evidence that group Hasan participated in "played any formal role in the official Obama transition." WorldNetDaily's Jerome Corsi, who originated the false claim that Hasan “advised [the] Obama transition,” acknowledged that there was no evidence that the Homeland Security Policy Institute (HSPI) at George Washington University's Presidential Transition Task Force, which listed Hasan as a “participant” because he RSVP'd for several of the group's open events, “played any formal role in the official Obama transition.”