Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.) falsely attributed an Obamacare horror story to the conservative group Americans for Prosperity and some of its donors after being misled by New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, according to a political fact-checking outlet.
In one of Reid’s numerous harangues against AFP and two of its benefactors, cancer research supporters Charles and David Koch, he claimed an AFP ad "made up from whole cloth" a story about a Washington woman whose Obamacare premiums rose by $700.
The anecdote was not, in fact, the product of an AFP ad, as Reid claimed. It was brought to light in Rep. Cathy McMorris-Rogers’ (R., Wash.) response to the State of the Union address in February.
A Reid spokesman said the senator made the inaccurate claim after reading a Krugman column.
FactCheck.org noted that Reid’s complaints about false Obamacare ads themselves contain falsehoods.
Reid went on to say that Republicans were making up stories out of "whole cloth" about individuals hurt by the Affordable Care Act. But neither of the anecdotes he cited were fabricated. In fact, we’re not aware of a story about the impact of the ACA that was completely made up. As with many political claims, the stories that are false or misleading have some basis in fact. […]
On Feb. 26, Reid later backed down, a bit, from the "whole cloth" claim, saying, "I can’t say that every one of the Koch brothers’ ads are a lie, but I’ll say this: Mr. President, the vast, vast majority of them are."
Still, the other example Reid had given — about a leukemia patient whose insurance policy was canceled — wasn’t "absolutely false," as he had claimed. And certainly not "a lie."