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Update: 11:57 a.m.: CNN has issued a correction, blaming the error on not waiting for the full opinion to be read. Here it is:
In his opinion, Chief Justice Roberts initially said that the individual mandate was not a valid exercise of Congressional power under the Commerce Clause. CNN reported that fact, but then wrongly reported that therefore the court struck down the mandate as unconstitutional. However, that was not the whole of the Court’s ruling. CNN regrets that it didn't wait to report out the full and complete opinion regarding the mandate. We made a correction within a few minutes and apologize for the error.
Original: If you tuned into CNN today for your news on the Supreme Court's ruling on the Affordable Care Act, you just witnessed a news agency get everything, completely, utterly wrong.
Here's what happened:
The Mistake:
On the homepage:
The Breaking Banners:
On Twitter:
Update 11:55 a.m.: There's no mention of the incorrect ruling on CNN's official Twitter feed--just Retweets about the correct ruling--but NPR had jumped on CNN's lead at around 10:08 a.m.:
Breaking: @CNN reporting #SCOTUS has ruled that the individual mandate for health care is unconstitutional.
— NPR Politics (@nprpolitics) June 28, 2012
As a commenter pointed out, it was CNN's Breaking News Twitter Feed that had this initially:
Supreme Court strikes down individual mandate portion of health care law. on.cnn.com/LvVRcK
— CNN Breaking News (@cnnbrk) June 28, 2012
And followed shortly with this:
Correction: The Supreme Court backs all parts of President Obama’s health care law. on.cnn.com/LvVRcK
— CNN Breaking News (@cnnbrk) June 28, 2012
On Television (via Buzzfeed):