CNN's Brian Stelter admits Hunter Biden laptop 'not just a right-wing media story'

WASHINGTON (TND) — CNN anchor Brian Stelter went from calling the Hunter Biden scandal a “classic example of the right-wing media machine” to admitting it’s “not just a right-wing media story.”

Stelter – who even called the Hunter Biden laptop story a “manufactured crisis” at one time – sat down to discuss the subject with Michael LaRosa, former press secretary for First Lady Jill Biden.

“What about Hunter? Hunter under federal investigation, charges could be coming at any time, this is not just a right-wing media story, this is a real problem for the Biden’s,” Stelter said to LaRosa, asking him if Biden may forgo running for re-election in 2024 given the controversies surrounding his son.

LaRosa told Stelter during the interview that the president intends to run for re-election, and that he doesn’t see why Biden would choose not to.

“Look they make decisions as a family, and they will make that decision when its time,” LaRosa also pointed out, noting that at the same time it’s far too early to make such a determination.

The New York Post dropped the bombshell story about Hunter Biden’s laptop just weeks before the November 2020 presidential election. It was immediately discredited by current and former intelligence officials, media outlets and political talking heads, but The New York Times and Washington Post later confirmed the legitimacy of the Post’s reporting.

READ MORE:“Journalists lose face after NYT confirms Hunter Biden emails not Russian disinformation”

Despite all of the confirmations that the Hunter Biden laptop story was indeed legitimate, Stelter still hearkened back to it during an event in April about “Disinformation and the Erosion of Democracy,” according to Fox News.

“I think there's a tension between big American newsrooms that want to check something out themselves that don't want to rely on other outlets, that don't want to just repeat and regurgitate, but then there's an audience expectation of being able to instantly cover every story and have every answer,” Stelter reportedly said during a panel discussion at a conference on disinformation in Chicago. "And so in September or October of 2020, when the New York Post has something, other outlets can't match it, there's this pressure- 'Why aren't you confirming this? Why aren't you focusing on this? Why aren't you leading on this?' Because we haven't matched it, we haven't confirmed it.”

Stelter ultimately chalked his inability to get on board up to a “tension between fast and slow journalism,” and a misunderstanding from the general public about how newsrooms work, according to Fox News.