At a rally on Sunday, Sen. Jon Ossoff smeared White House aide Natalie Harp by suggesting the president likes to “travel with Natalie” and not much else – implying a sexual dalliance between the 80-year-old president and his 35-year-old aide. If the president was a Democrat, the liberal journalists would cry smear. But it’s Trump, so Brian Stelter is touting Ossoff as a savvy social-media player.
Stelter’s "Reliable Sources" newsletter on Wednesday carried the headline “Jon Ossoff and the art of the viral clip.” He began:
Screenshot from YouTubeSen. Jon Ossoff knew exactly what he was doing by invoking President Trump’s “travel with Natalie” last Sunday.Google searches for Trump’s executive assistant Natalie Harp spiked by 5,000%. News outlets hurried to meet the demand for info by publishing new stories about Harp.
Liberal commentators cheered Ossoff while conservative commentators condemned him. Yesterday on Fox News, a bemused Jesse Watters remarked, “This is the first time we have covered Ossoff on this show in six years.”
That’s hard to believe, but it amounts to a victory for Ossoff. His “travel with Natalie” line — part of a broader but still just TikTok-length argument that Trump “doesn’t want to do the job” of president — showed a sophisticated understanding of the social media environment. It titillated, provoked and enraged different audiences simultaneously.
Stelter's not asking what should be the first journalistic question to Ossoff: Is it true? Is Trump banging his assistant? Or is Stelter saying the facts don't matter? It's the savvy of the guy smearing this young woman that's the narrative.
CNN's Chief Media Analyst didn't find anyone savvy for making a sly dig at Biden being accused of finger-inserting rape by a staffer named Tara Reade in 2020. Fox media reporter Brian Flood noted Stelter's aversion to that. He wouldn't have hailed anyone making a joke about Ashley Biden writing about showering with her father in her diary. But Ossoff? He's just so remarkably clever!
The article spinning off his newsletter added:
Ossoff is a natural. Clippable moments from his campaign speeches have repeatedly taken off on social media platforms and garnered millions of views.
Earlier this summer, veteran political journalist Jonathan Martin, now a columnist and host for Politico, said “the Ossoff model” entails a “weekend rally, clips delivered for social media and a tight corruption focus.”
Ossoff’s most recent viral moment also emphasized alleged corruption: His full sentence invoking Harp was, “He wants to build his ballroom and travel with Natalie on their apparently defenseless flying palace gifted by the Emir of Qatar.”
Stelter detailed how Jesse Watters processed the whole smear on Fox News, and that the Watters segment was another Ossoff win.
Amanda Litman, president of Run for Something, which works to get young progressives elected, said “younger candidates, at basically every level, are fluent in the internet. They understand the lingua franca. They know their strengths and they lean into them.”
For Ossoff, she told CNN, that’s delivering speeches “that can be clipped up, because that’s really his strength.”
Stelter lined up Litman and Obama bro Tommy Vietor to underline his narrative of Ossoff, the King of the Toss-off.
>> @TVietor08: "What’s odd is how few candidates seem to be executing what was once the most basic campaign tactic!”
Here's what he's talking about: https://t.co/Hzr8iMqF0q— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) August 19, 2026
These might work with the Left. But is CNN only grading political candidates by how much they thrill CNN's hard-core Trump-hating audience? Facts did not come First in this analysis.
PS: The partisan fact checkers like PolitiFact threw "Pants On Fire" tags at people calling Ossoff a "socialist" during his first run for the Senate in 2020. That was "false and ridiculous." But they haven't pounced on Ossoff on this smear.
