South Dakota Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg acknowledged during his interviews with police investigators last year that he was reading political articles — including a piece about Joe Biden, laden with conspiracy theory — just before he was beaten and killed. a pedestrian with his car.
Ravnsborg is currently facing three counts of felony counts, charges of Governor Kristi Noem for resigning and indictments for killing 55-year-old Joseph Boever, next to a road last year.
Ravnsborg, who was returning from a political dinner on Sept. 12, initially told police after beating Boever that he thought he had hit a deer and eventually left the scene of the incident. The next morning, however, Boever’s body was found.
In videos released this week, interrogators can be seen informing the attorney general last September that Boever’s glasses were found inside his vehicle, revealing that the “victim’s face went through the windshield,” contradicting Ravnsborg’s claims. who was unaware that he hit a man until the next day.
The recently released videos also show investigators scouring the lead lawyer’s phone records and revealing that Ravnsborg scanned through websites while driving at night, opting for a particular article just before he touched Boever.
“At 10:20:49, you were at Dakota Free Press place, “an investigator told the attorney general, in a clip first marked by Media Matters research partner Timothy Johnson. “All this on the phone at work. A minute later, you were on the RealClearPolitics website. “
“And then, about a minute later, this article was published in Just The News,” the interrogator continued, referring to the site founded by pro-trump columnist John Solomon.
Meanwhile, the investigator noted that the article in question was “about Joe Biden and something to do with China” and that Ravnsborg was at that link until a minute before the accident, and asked the attorney general if you remembered reading this while driving.
Ravnsborg said he remembered “looking at them,” but then “left the phone off,” prompting the researcher to point out that this activity on his phone occurred just about a minute before he called 911 to report the accident.
“So what worries me is that before the time of the impact there was a period of time before calling 911,” the researcher withdrew. “You had to realize what was going on, stop, get your wheels back, go out and look at the damage a little bit, find out what the hell is going on, find out where you are, call 911.”
“So it’s reasonable to say that it took a minute or two from the impact to when you had the phone with 911, right? That would be reasonable, “the interrogator concluded.
The article in questionmeanwhile, it appears to have been a Just The News editorial of a right-wing documentary claiming that then-candidate Biden and his family had a long history of self-enrichment in China. During the last months of the 2020 election, President Donald Trump and his media allies tried to turn the controversy over Biden’s son Hunter into the centerpiece of the campaign.
Interrogators continued to talk to Ravnsborg about his use of the telephone during the time of the fatal collision. Although the attorney general insisted he did not “remember reading the article” and believes he left the phone down before touching Boever, authorities expanded the content of the article in more detail and showed that there click.
“This is some conspiracy with Joe Biden in China,” one researcher noted.
“I guess I would say I look at the headlines a lot. I don’t read articles while driving, “Ravnsborg replied, adding,” I’ve never heard of Just the News. “
Meanwhile, Solomon has been a major player in the pro-Trump media ecosystem for years. After a long journalistic career that included stops in The Washington Times, Newsweek/ The daily beast, i Washington Post, Solomon became the “investigative reporter” of Fox News presenter Sean Hannity, who repeatedly expanded Solomon’s questionable reports on the so-called liberal “deep state” plan against Trump.
After his work was hit with the label “opinion” after the editorial complaints during his time in The hillFinally, Solomon split on his own and founded the right-wing website Just The News in late 2019.
He was also scrutinized during Trump’s first impeachment hearing, when it was revealed that he had been in frequent contact with Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani and Giuliani’s Ukrainian associates. The hillThe editor-in-chief announced that Solomon’s columns on Ukraine, which helped fuel Giuliani’s Ukrainian efforts to dig dirt in Biden, would be subject to review.
Solomon did not immediately respond to a request for comment on this story.