Fox’s cable propaganda network finally issued an apology to the family of a Marine killed in Afghanistan for claiming that the Marines made the family pick up the $60,000 cost of shipping her remains back to the United States, CNN reports.
After Florida Republican Congressman Cory Mills–you may remember him for sending dummy grenades to his colleagues when he first joined the House–made the claim, Fox ran with it online on July 25th with the headline “Family forced to pay to ship body of Marine killed after Pentagon policy change: ‘Egregious injustice’.”
“The allegations originally published turned out to be false, which I suspect Mr. Lee knew in the first place, and was the reason he did not seek comment from the Marine Corps,” wrote Marine Corps spokesman Maj. James Stenger in an email to the Fox executives after the initial story ran.
Fox later changed it to “Family shouldered burden to transport body of Marine killed in Afghanistan, GOP Rep says,” weaselly putting the blame on Mills, but keeping the story, and unfounded claim, in the public light. Stenger again emails Fox executives, saying, “Using the grief of a family member of a fallen Marine to score cheap clickbait points is disgusting.”
At some point, Fox completely pulled the story from its website, but it never issued a correction. The incident was originally reported by Military.com, which received information about communications from the Marines via a FOIA request. On Saturday, Fox released a statement saying, “The now unpublished story has been addressed internally and we sincerely apologize to the [Marine’s] family.”