Ben Shapiro’s new video about Kamala Harris’s Senate career is part of his Scamala: Kamala Harris Unmasked series on X, which tries to show why Kamala Harris is awful and people should not vote for her. Because he is entirely correct in his assessment of Harris as a human being, it would have been great if his facts were solid, too.

Unfortunately, Shapiro’s lecture includes several errors, all having to do with a story with which I am intimately familiar. Although it is probable that he didn’t mean to make these errors, it is concerning that by not bothering to do some basic fact-checking by consulting me, Ben Shapiro has helped to push a leftist narrative. We are in the middle of an amazing cultural moment when, owing to their fake reporting and disregard for facts that do not advance a leftist narrative, formerly respected bastions of American journalism like The Washington Post and The Atlantic are justifiably regarded as national laughingstocks. Now is the time for outlets on the right to step up and fill the gap, not to engage in similarly sloppy practices.

In his video Shapiro attempts to take down Kamala Harris by exploring her role in the attacks on Brett Kavanaugh during his Supreme Court nomination in 2018. I was a part of that nightmare, I wrote a book about it: The Devil’s Triangle: Mark Judge vs the New American Stasi. Indeed, I have written so much about the topic, that people are telling me “Enough is enough.” But every time I start to think that maybe they’re right and try to move on to my regular beat, something like this happens. It’s been six years since the Kavanaugh battle and yet I still regularly find people in the media pushing fake news about it.

The facts are important. If a false narrative takes hold, it can burrow deep into the culture. Shapiro is obviously a highly visible and powerful presence in media. He should be held to the same standard to which we hold The Washington Post—and he should be willing to admit to errors. My every attempt to contact him about the Kavanaugh case has come up empty. It’s unfortunate, because now his arrogance has caused mistakes that I am forced to correct. A simple phone call would have prevented it.

In his video Shapiro describes the career of Harris from San Francisco prosecutor to her role on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Shapiro describes how a woman named “Christina” Blasey Ford came forward in 2018 to accuse SCOTUS nominee Brett Kavanaugh of sexually assaulting her at a party in 1982. Shapiro then says that Blasey Ford “couldn’t name anyone else at the party.” He says Blasey Ford claimed that Kavanaugh’s “drunk friends tried to rape her.” Then Shapiro claims that Ford “wanted to remain anonymous.”

Every one of these statements is an error. The worst part is that truth reveals a much more sinister side of Kamala Harris than Shapiro’s account suggests. In fact, the plot against Kavanaugh was exactly what Kavanaugh said it was: “a calculated and orchestrated political hit.” The FBI also discovered this truth, which is why their background check ended so quickly. Kavanaugh was being set up. Kamala Harris was a main culprit. She’s not just a jabbering dingbat. Kamala Harris is profoundly evil.

Let me break this down as simply as I can. First, Ford’s first name is Christine, not Christina, as anyone familiar with the story knows. 

Second, despite what Shapiro says, Ford did name people she claims were at the party. She did not claim that a bunch of “drunk friends” tried to rape her—she claimed Brett tried to take her clothes off while another boy was in the room. That other boy, Blasey Ford said, was me. By saying “a bunch of drunk friends tried to rape her,” Shapiro is conflating Ford’s story with the madness of another woman who, at the same time, claimed that I and Kavanaugh were involved in drugging girls and gang rape.

Kamala Harris also said she believed this lunatic. Why wouldn’t she? Harris herself was working with opposition researchers to set the whole thing up. In the summer of 2018 Harris was photographed at a book party for Ace Smith, the “godfather of opposition research”—a man nicknamed “Dr. Death” for his ability to destroy lives. Smith’s disciple was Michael Avenatti, the corrupt lawyer who accused me and Brett of drugging girls and gang rape. Smith is now an official advisor to the Harris campaign.

Third: Shapiro also says that Blasey Ford was reluctant to come forward and “wanted to stay private.” Ford was never, despite what Shapiro says, a reluctant witness. In his book We’ve Got People, Ryan Grim—the guy who broke and helped spread the news about Ford in the first place and no conservative—notes that Blasey Ford took repeated steps to come forward. She’d already told friends she planned to come out publicly. She was only asking for confidentiality until she could arrange to speak with Senator Dianne Feinstein. Grim writes, accurately:

[Ford’s] letter included a request: “As a constituent, I expect that you will maintain this confidential until we have further opportunity to speak.” That line would end up being used repeatedly by Feinstein as she claimed that, in fact, Blasey Ford never wanted to come forward, and was only forced out by the media. But that argument ignored that Blasey Ford had already taken repeated steps to come forward, had already told friends she planned to do so, had already come forward to two congressional offices and reached out to the press, and was only asking for confidentiality until she and Feinstein spoke.

The Kavanaugh nightmare was an oppo research political hit that had been set up weeks earlier, and Kamala Harris was part of the set up. Ford was far from innocent. One of the very first pieces I wrote after the storm passed in 2018 addressed Ford’s use of an opposition researcher named Keith Koegler. According to the book The Education of Brett Kavanaugh,  by New York Times reporters Robin Pogrebin and Kate Kelly, Koegler had “spent many hours that summer poring over news coverage of the nomination process, biographical information about Kavanaugh, and writings and videos produced by Mark Judge. In combing through YouTube, articles, and social networks, Koegler had learned more about the house parties … and the lexicon of 1980s Georgetown Prep than he had ever thought he would care to know.”

Koegler and others had set things up, Harris was in on it, and the next step was obvious: Hit me with an unexpected allegation (I got a call from Ronan Farrow) and get me to start talking. From there, the plan was to entangle my life, which has included a struggle with alcoholism when I was younger, with the life of Brett Kavanaugh, who had a much different journey than I did. It was an oppo research hit, the lynchpin of which was to use my struggles to take my friend down, even if he had nothing to do with any of it.

Reading accounts of Ford’s behavior, it becomes clear why she never went to the police or released her therapist’s notes (which never mention Brett Kavanaugh) and why she kept asking for delays. She was waiting for me to crack. In the meantime, extortion threats and media pressure would make my life hell. It also traumatized Leland Keyser, Ford’s lifelong (and now, former) friend. Ford claimed Keyser was at the 1982 party, and Keyser was threatened when she said she had no idea what Ford was talking about. It’s no surprise that Dianne Feinstein and Ford’s own lawyers told Ford to give up the charade. This is also why so many of Ford’s ex-friends, including an FBI agent who had been friends with Ford since childhood, will no longer speak to her. Ford, like Harris, is a criminal.

Ben Shapiro might think he is wrecking Ford’s argument by saying see “couldn’t name any of the people at the party.” However, it is a far worse thing to name people you are using and threatening to promote a fake story. That’s a plot. That’s extortion. And that’s witness tampering. Harris was involved in all of this with Ford, and Ben Shapiro ought to have said so. Leftist journalism is wretched, we all know that. Conservative journalism needs to do better. Shapiro should have consulted me for his story. Indeed, he had every opportunity to do so.