CBS News is drawing outrage from far-left activists and media personalities after reporting on deleted social media posts from Michigan Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El Sayed.
The posts addressed the September 11 terrorist attacks and compared their death toll with later American military actions and the coronavirus pandemic.
The controversy arrives as the nation approaches the 25th anniversary of the attacks, a moment when nearly 3,000 murdered Americans will again be remembered.
CBS suggested the anniversary could bring renewed scrutiny and political trouble for El Sayed as his Senate campaign advances.
The network highlighted several deleted posts, including messages from 2020 that compared the Americans killed on September 11 with deaths during the coronavirus crisis.
Another post, published on September 11, 2021, had previously been uncovered by The Washington Free Beacon.
“Today, I mourn the 3K lives, 6K injuries, & infrastructural devastation in NYC, perpetuated ignorantly in the name of my faith. Tomorrow, I’ll mourn ~1M lives, millions of injuries, & infrastructural devastation in 3 countries, perpetuated ignorantly in the name of my country.”
That statement placed the terrorist slaughter of American civilians beside the consequences of wars conducted by the United States.
With such a comparison sitting in the public record, CBS apparently committed the unforgivable journalistic offense of telling voters about it.
Instead of confronting what El Sayed wrote, his supporters and liberal media allies attacked the network for publishing the story.
Their response quickly became a familiar exercise in blaming the messenger while treating ordinary campaign scrutiny as something sinister.
Far left commentator Hasan Piker blasted the CBS headline on X, writing, “What an insane headline.”
He then blamed the network’s ownership and leadership, declaring, “This is why the [new Paramount owner David Ellison] bought CBS and put Bari Weiss in charge.”
Weiss became editor in chief of CBS News after Ellison selected her for the position following Paramount’s multimillion dollar acquisition of The Free Press.
Her appointment has become a convenient target for progressives whenever the network publishes reporting that makes a Democrat uncomfortable.
WATCH:
Zeteo founder and former MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan also accused CBS of religious bigotry.
He asked, “Hi @CBS @CBSNews @bariweiss do you think it’s super offensive and disgusting and Islamophobic to do a tweet about the potential first ever Muslim Democratic senator which begins by referencing 9/11?”
That complaint ignored the rather obvious reason September 11 appeared in the story.
The Answer is “no!” It is NOT “Super” offensive to repeat the ACTUAL Statement from a candidate running for national office or for ANY office. Or for librarian or Janitor! Justifying a terrorist act that MURDERED 2,000 Americans on 9/11 is as DISGUSTING and it is DISQUALIFYING! pic.twitter.com/t1YuuwTJys
— Rob Schneider (@RobSchneider) September 1, 2026
El Sayed himself published comments about the attacks, and the approaching anniversary gives those deleted statements renewed political relevance.
Representative Yassamin Ansari of Arizona joined the outrage campaign, writing, “What an insane, blatantly racist headline. Unreal.”
Once again, the criticism focused on CBS for mentioning the posts rather than on the candidate who wrote and later deleted them.
Vox host and editorial director Astead Herndon lamented the condition of the press, saying, “The current state of institutional media legit bums me out.”
He added, “We’ve burned through so much credibility in recent years. And our information ecosystem is worse for it.”
A CBS News source familiar with the report dismissed the uproar and noted that stories examining deleted posts from political candidates appear “all the time.”
That is standard campaign journalism, at least when media outlets are willing to apply it to Democrats as well as Republicans.
A local CBS reporter later confronted El Sayed about the deleted posts while he was campaigning.
The candidate responded, “What happened on 9/11 is a disaster. It was a terrible attack on our country.”
El Sayed then argued that Americans should consider how to prevent service members from being sent into wars where the country has no proper interest.
That answer acknowledged the horror of the attacks but did not directly explain why the original posts vanished.
CBS News did not immediately respond to a request for additional comment.
The network nevertheless stood by a report that relied on El Sayed’s own words, not anonymous rumors or partisan invention.
The episode offers voters a revealing look at how quickly progressive activists demand special protection for favored candidates.
Apparently, old posts are fair game until the political left decides that basic scrutiny is offensive, at which point journalism itself suddenly goes on trial.
