Fact Checkers Can’t Verify Biden’s Wild Claim That 10-Year-old Girl Crossed State Lines for Abortion

Fact checkers say they’ve been unable to verify Joe Biden’s claim that a 10-year-old girl crossed state lines to receive an abortion after Roe v. Wade was repealed after it was revealed the story has only one source for the assertion.

Last week Biden was the subject of another viral social media moment when the 79-year-old “devout Catholic” claimed that a 10-year-old girl, a rape victim, needed to cross state lines to receive an abortion after laws regarding the practice were returned to the states by the Supreme Court.

“This isn’t some imagined horror; it is already happening,” said Biden. “Just last week, it was reported that a 10-year-old girl was a rape victim – 10 years old – and she was forced to have to travel out of state to Indiana to seek to terminate the pregnancy and maybe save her life.”

In calling out the extremism of many red state #AntiAbortion laws, President Biden recounted the story of a 10-year-old rape victim forced to cross state lines in order to receive reproductive care@nowthisnews pic.twitter.com/YcE5z2RX75

— Nguyen #fbpe #fbr (@haaohaoo) July 8, 2022

Conservatives immediately questioned that something like that would occur – even the most conservative states tend to offer exceptions for cases of rape, incest, or pregnancies that would threaten the life of the mother – and quickly learned that the sole source for the story, Caitlan Bernard, is affiliated with the far-left ACLU.

She claimed to have provided the abortion to the 10-year-old, who crossed state lines from Ohio to Indiana seeking to terminate a child.

An ACLU affiliated activist OBGYN it seems. pic.twitter.com/IDXwT0VIL1

— STAHL (@S0ClALIST) July 3, 2022

Now mainstream fact checkers at The Washington Post have scrutinized the veracity of the story.

Again, the sole source for the claim is Caitlan Bernard, an Indiana abortion provider who claims she had the minor patient referred by “a child abuse doctor” while speaking to the Indianapolis Star. She claimed the alleged rape victim was over six weeks pregnant, and the Indianapolis Star reported that the minor “soon was under her way to Indiana” for Bernard to perform an abortion.

The Washington Post examined the claim and was unable to verify, meaning that despite Bernard being on the record, there is only one source for a claim that made it as high as the White House.

They attempted to speak to the journalist behind the story, Shari Rudavasky, but ultimately heard from the newspaper’s executive editor, Bro Krift, who told the Post that “The facts and sourcing about people crossing state lines into Indiana, including the 10-year-old girl, for abortions are clear,” and that the paper would have “no additional comment at this time.”

Despite still being unable to verify the story after speaking to child services agencies in Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati, Dayton, and Toledo had not heard of any such story.

Republican Gov. Mike DeWine also seemed to cast doubt on the story, with the Ohio governor’s press secretary telling the Post that “The rape of a 10-year-old certainly would be newsworthy.”

In it’s final – perhaps, bizarre – verdict, the Post says that while it was unable to verify the story in any capacity beyond speaking to the Indianapolis Star’s executive editor, it “has acquired the status of a ‘fact’ no matter its provenance.”

Regardless of the “status” of the claim, it is the Biden administration that has declared misinformation to be one of the greatest threats to Democracy™. Critics will likely say that the government that created a Disinformation Governance Board – only to get rid of it after critics complained – should verify claims before they’re amplified by the president.