The liberal media have always been in the tank for Democrats – but they used to at least pretend otherwise.
This time they didn't even bother hiding it.
ABC News just ran a Democrat campaign ad and called it a news exclusive.
The Virginia Gerrymandering Scheme That Could Flip the House in November
Virginia Democrats are days away from pulling off one of the most brazen power grabs in modern political history.
Democrat Governor Abigail Spanberger spent her entire 2025 campaign promising she had "no plans" to touch the state's congressional maps.
She signed a constitutional amendment that would redraw Virginia's districts mid-decade and hand Democrats 10 out of 11 congressional seats within weeks of taking office.
Ten out of eleven.
In a state Trump lost by six points.
The current map gives Democrats a 6-5 edge.
The new one turns it into a 10-1 blowout – locking in Democrat dominance through 2030 and potentially erasing the GOP's two-seat House majority in November before a single general election vote is cast.
Spanberger's approval has since cratered to 47% – the worst for any Virginia governor at this point in their term in recent history.
Virginians vote on the amendment this Tuesday.
Barack Obama recorded a campaign ad urging them to vote yes – and that's where ABC News comes in.
How ABC News Ran Obama's Virginia Ad Like It Was a Scoop
Obama didn't hand ABC News anything.
He posted the video himself on X.
Virginians had already watched it run before their YouTube clips for weeks before ABC slapped the word "exclusive" on it and presented it to America as a news story.
In the ad, Obama tells Virginians that voting yes will "push back against the Republicans trying to give themselves an unfair advantage in the midterms" and "level the playing field."
That's Obama's framing for a map that hands Democrats 91% of the congressional seats in a purple state.
When a news outlet calls something an "exclusive," it means their journalists dug it up – a document nobody else has, a source willing to talk only to them, information the public hasn't seen.
Obama posted this on his own social media account.
There was nothing exclusive about it.
"Every time I turn on the television here in Virginia, I see Obama saying this nonsense," retired U.S. diplomat Alberto Miguel Fernandez wrote. "For weeks now. How in the world is this 'exclusive'?"
Another viewer put it plainly: "It's so exclusive I saw it on YouTube before my video started about 20 times in the past week."
RealClearInvestigations senior writer Mark Hemingway asked the obvious question: "Why the hell does a major news network consider an extremely partisan campaign ad an 'exclusive'?"
It can't.
ABC chose to run a Democrat campaign ad and needed a label to make it look like journalism.
When the backlash hit, they deleted the post – no correction, no acknowledgment, no explanation.
That tells you everything about whether they thought what they did was journalism.
ABC News Media Bias Has a Paper Trail a Mile Long
This wasn't a one-time lapse.
In 2024, George Stephanopoulos fact-checked Trump at least five times during a presidential debate and never once challenged his opponent.
After ABC promoted false claims about Trump's legal cases, the network got sued for defamation, settled for $16 million, and issued a formal statement of regret.
In 2020, ABC suspended a veteran correspondent after he was caught on camera calling himself a socialist and admitting the network shaped its coverage around factors other than straight reporting.
Stephanopoulos – a former Clinton war room operative who has played journalist for three decades – still sits behind the anchor desk.
The settlement didn't change anything. The suspension didn't change anything.
ABC ran a Democrat campaign ad as breaking news, got called out publicly, deleted it, and went silent.
Virginia votes April 21 – four House seats, the GOP's two-seat majority, and control of Congress on the line.
ABC made their position clear.
Sources:
- Taylor Penley, "ABC News faces backlash for presenting Obama campaign ad as an 'exclusive' on redistricting measure," Fox News, April 18, 2026.
- "Virginia Use of Legislative Congressional Redistricting Map Amendment (April 2026)," Ballotpedia, April 2026.
- "2026 Virginia redistricting amendment," Wikipedia, April 2026.
- "ABC 'News' Is Fake News," WhiteHouse.gov, November 2025.
- April Corbin Girnus, "As Virginia redistricting looms, Spanberger struggles to keep 'moderate' image," Christian Science Monitor, April 18, 2026.
- Brett T., "ABC News Runs Obama's Campaign Video for VA Gerrymandering as a News 'Exclusive,'" Twitchy, April 18, 2026.