A USA Today reports of the Navy debunking an article about cargo ship ‘full of smuggled children’
The claim: Navy SEALs have raided a cargo ship ‘full of smuggled children’
“NAVY SEALs Raid Cargo Ship Full of Smuggled Children,” reads the headline of a Nov. 2 article from a website called Real Raw News.
The article, which racked up more than 11,000 interactions on Facebook within a week, goes on to say the SEALs recovered “200 foreign children who had been imprisoned in a decrepit cargo hold” of a ship called “the Morning Star.” Similar versions of the claim have also circulated in standalone Facebook posts.
Real Raw News has published misinformation about military operations in the past. USA TODAY has previously debunked the website’s false claims that Navy SEALs arrested former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and that the military arrested Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates.
This claim is similarly baseless. The Navy told USA TODAY the raid described in the Real Raw News story did not happen.
USA TODAY reached out to Real Raw News for comment.
Story is baseless, Navy says
According to the Real Raw News article, Navy SEALs raided a cargo ship early Nov. 2 off the coast of Long Beach, California. In addition to 200 “smuggled children,” the article claims SEALs recovered the bodies of 12 children.
As evidence, Real Raw News cites an anonymous “military adjunct.” But a spokesperson for the Navy told USA TODAY the article is baseless. “There’s nothing to that story,” Andrew DeGarmo, a public affairs officer for the Navy, told USA TODAY. “It’s false.”
USA TODAY could find no other evidence to support Real Raw News’ claims.
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Source: USA Today
