There has been a story floating around conservative leaning websites and news outlets regarding the father of a 4-year-old girl losing his life while in transfer due to anti-trump protesters. As you can imagine this is quickly sparking outrage over the protesters.
As the photo above states someone with an unknown identity sent a message to someone or a group on social media platform Facebook that one of their patients died while in transfer due to their ambulance being stopped by protesters and needing to drive an extra 45 minutes on a different route to get around them. The "safety pin" reference the person is talking about is regarding safety pins protesters are wearing in a symbolic nature so show they are safe people for minorities and the people of the LGBTQ+. On Nov. 15, Paul Joseph Watson of infowars.com reported on this story and many other news sites followed suit.
This story: Real or Fake?
Let's start with the basics of proving claims and arguments... sources. So far there is not a single credible source that can be linked to this. Every website so far either does not list where they obtained this information or links their source to the Infowars article which does not list a source other than a screenshot of the conversation. We can't even confirm who took the screenshot or who made the message in the first place. No data is available as far as location, what ambulance company, what hospitals to and from, and no police reports or obituaries have been confirmed. There is no evidence to back up this claim other than a screenshot which in this day and age it is not hard to doctor a story in order to get a reaction.
Next up, some of the pages themselves admit that the information is unconfirmed but are stating that it is "likely" referencing various interstates that have been blocked by protesters as well as the incident in Chicago during a Trump rally outside of the UIC arena where protesters did block an ambulance. While this information certainly helps to show a pattern it does not give concrete evidence to this case. Paul's article on Infowars even states that the information is not proven. Just because an educated guess was made from one recent past event and the conditions make this scenario more likely does not make it fact. From just that information it is speculation at best.
As it stands right now this story has no concrete evidence to support it and should not be used as factual evidence to support a claim you may have regarding the ethics of the protesters. At best I can mark this story as "unconfirmed" since it is still so new and not much time has been given to investigate it. However if no further information becomes present regarding this and this is all we get... I'm calling it as fake. You just can't go around making claims like this without being able to prove them. Methods such as these to fear-monger or do sympathy plays with unproven or false information is one of the biggest reasons left leaning media is in such a bad position now. If further updates become available this article will be updated as well.
---UPDATE---
It has been five days since this incident was first reported by Paul Joseph Watson of Infowars and there is still no evidence to back this up including no police reports or obituaries. After re-investigating the subject there seems to be no sources or further information either. What I'm going to chalk this up to is simply misinformation that was created and spread to try and cause outrage toward the protesters by playing on readers sympathy. This is not the first time or the last time this will happen as it is a common and easy tactic to use to try and turn people against a movement or idea especially when it involves such a heated political event.
