Did the U.S. military arrest Avril Haines, the director of National Intelligence, on August 2, 2022? No, that's not true: A duty officer at the Pentagon told Lead Stories that this claim was "false." The claim is not corrobrated by contemporaneous reports from reputable media outlets that Haines has been arrested. The U.S. military is not allowed to arrest civilians under the Posse Comitatus Act. Real Raw News has a history of creating fictional stories about public figures. The disclaimer on the Real Raw News site states that, "This website contains humor, parody, and satire."
The claim appeared in an article published by Real Raw News on August 3, 2022 titled "Military Arrests DNI Avril Haines" (archived here) which opened:
Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines took a gunshot wound to the arm Tuesday morning when JAG investigators arrived at her Maryland home with a military arrest warrant charging the Deep State stooge with treason and murder-for-hire, sources in the U.S. Navy Judge Advocate General's Corps told Real Raw News.
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Military Arrests DNI Avril Haines | Real Raw News
In an email to Lead Stories on August 8, 2022, a duty officer at the Pentagon wrote that this claim was "false."
The U.S. military is not allowed to arrest people that are not explicitly associated with them. The Posse Comitatus Act does not allow federal troops to participate in law enforcement that impacts civilians.
There have been no recent reports from reputable media outlets that Haines has been arrested. News sites such as Reuters and The New York Times have no reports about such an arrest.
Lead Stories reached out to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. We will update this story when we receive responses.
Real Raw News has a long history of publishing false claims in mock news stories, many of them about convictions and executions of various public figures at Naval Station Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. For example, the site reported former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was hanged (she wasn't); former White House Chief of Staff John Podesta was executed (he wasn't); and that "the military" convicted former Attorney General William Barr on charges of treason (it didn't).
The website for Real Raw News includes a disclaimer that warns readers not to take its content too seriously. Specifically, it says:
Information on this website is for informational and educational and entertainment purposes. This website contains humor, parody, and satire. We have included this disclaimer for our protection, on the advice on legal counsel.
(Source: RealRawNews.com screenshot taken Tue Aug 3 16:39:48 UTC 2021)
Lead Stories has covered claims published by Real Raw News in the past. Previous Lead Stories debunks of Real Raw News items is collected here.
