Nina Jankowicz is about as qualified to lead a “Disinformation Governance Board” under the Department of Homeland Security as she is to head a “Leftist Propaganda Jingle Board” under the National Endowment for the Arts.
Sadly, she is, in fact, in charge of the first one. The existence of that dystopian-sounding agency was announced this week and Jankowicz, a fellow with the Wilson Center who focuses on disinformation, was tapped to lead it. Politico, which broke the news, said the board will “coordinate countering misinformation related to homeland security, focused specifically on irregular migration and Russia.”
“Irregular migration” is the latest nice way of saying illegal immigration. While countering misleading information given to potential migrants by human traffickers looking to entice them to make the journey to the border is theoretically useful, it’s not yet been made clear by DHS why we need an agency with an Orwellian name to do it.
As for Russia, Jankowicz infamously whiffed on the biggest Kremlin-related disinformation story in recent memory, repeatedly implying or declaring that Hunter Biden’s laptop was somehow a product of the Putin regime.
But let’s not talk about that right now. Let’s talk about Nina Jankowicz’s singing.
Yes, singing. It seems that Jankowicz is a wannabe parodic crooner. And, being mildly famous in certain corners of the Beltway, she has a) a platform with which to put her work out there and b) absolutely no filter.
Here she is giving us her rendition of “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious” from “Mary Poppins” — only this time it’s about (ugh) disinformation. As actor and conservative social media icon James Woods put it, “This one absolutely has to go into the 2022 Time Capsule.”
This one absolutely has to go into the 2022 Time Capsule. #MinistryOfTruth pic.twitter.com/gww1JncUZW
— James Woods (@RealJamesWoods) April 29, 2022
“Information laundering is really quite ferocious / It’s when a huckster takes some lies and makes them sound precocious,” Jankowicz sings in the clip. “By saying them in Congress or a mainstream outlet / So disinformation’s origins are slightly less atrocious.”
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“It’s how you hide a little, hide a little lie,” she continued.
“When Rudy Giuliani shared bad intel from Ukraine / Or when TikTok influencers say COVID can’t cause pain / They’re laundering disinfo and we really should take note / and not support their lies with our wallet, voice or vote.”
(At The Western Journal, we’ve noted how loosely the Biden White House seems to treat the term “disinformation,” which should worry all of us — particularly since this is now one of the arbiters of what constitutes disinformation. We’ll keep bringing America the truth about the administration’s attempt to label real news as fake; you can help us by subscribing.)
That’s troubling enough for reasons we’ll get to in a moment. In the meanwhile, perhaps you want a sample of another one of Jankowicz’s hits. Here she is singing a rendition of David Friedman’s “My Simple Christmas Wish” with a slight alteration to the lyrics:
WARNING: The following video contains graphic language that some viewers will find offensive.
This is Biden’s director of the Disinformation Governance Board.
— The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) April 29, 2022
“I want to be rich famous and powerful / Step on all my enemies and never do a thing,” she croons. However, instead of the original lyrics — “What do I have to fake to be famous and powerful?” — she sings, “Who do I f*** to be famous and powerful?”
All right, perhaps you can chalk the last one up to a bad karaoke performer having a bit of fun. If she wasn’t well-served that evening, she certainly gives off that vibe. This was apparently from a 2015 show/party put on by La-Ti-Do — “where spoken word and musical theatre collide every Monday night,” according to a description on the YouTube post of this fiasco — titled “I Hate the Holidays.” Listen to Jankowicz’s version of the song more than once and you will, too.
However, Mary Poppins oughtn’t be let off the hook so easily for ruining “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious” — not when she’s just been put in charge of what conservatives are derisively calling the “Ministry of Truth.”
If someone thinks something is disinformation and doesn’t wish to support it “with our wallet, voice or vote,” that’s one thing as an individual. It’s quite another when Jankowicz is actively leading the DHS’ Disinformation Governance Board — which uses tax dollars to fight whatever the administration thinks is fake news — and she seems to have an expansive view of disinformation.
She also was a peddler of disinformation of her own — namely, regarding Hunter Biden’s laptop, which she repeatedly implied was somehow a product of Russia.
This is from Jankowicz live-tweeting during the 2020 presidential debates:
Back on the “laptop from hell,” apparently- Biden notes 50 former natsec officials and 5 former CIA heads that believe the laptop is a Russian influence op.
Trump says “Russia, Russia, Russia.”
— Nina Jankowicz ???? (@wiczipedia) October 23, 2020
But wait! She said Wednesday this was just right-wing — dare I say it? — disinformation.
“For those who believe this tweet is a key to all my views, it is simply a direct quote from both candidates during the final presidential debate. If you look at my timeline, you will see I was livetweeting that evening,” she wrote.
For those who believe this tweet is a key to all my views, it is simply a direct quote from both candidates during the final presidential debate. If you look at my timeline, you will see I was livetweeting that evening. https://t.co/nI7ZgBtTLC https://t.co/4DjBl9bzt0
— Nina Jankowicz ???? (@wiczipedia) April 27, 2022
All right, then. What about this tweet regarding a 2021 Office of the Director of National Intelligence report about foreign interference in the 2020 election? Just her passing information along again, right?
IC has a high degree of confidence that the Kremlin used proxies to push influence narratives, including misleading or unsubstantiated claims about President Biden, to US media, officials, and influencers, some close to President Trump.
A clear nod to the alleged Hunter laptop.
— Nina Jankowicz ???? (@wiczipedia) March 16, 2021
Of course, no evidence has publicly been produced that anything on the laptop was “misleading or unsubstantiated.” In fact, its contents are acknowledged as fact by virtually every serious news organization by this point.
Or what about this tweet, where she passed along another article which she said cast “yet more doubt on the provenance of the NY Post’s Hunter Biden [laptop] story”?
Lots of news yesterday, so initially missed this piece by @shustry casting yet more doubt on the provenance of the NY Post’s Hunter Biden story.
In 2019, people in Ukraine were trying to sell access to alleged Biden emails for $5 million. https://t.co/khn5TVrMRW
— Nina Jankowicz ???? (@wiczipedia) October 22, 2020
And these are just her tweets. As the New York Post pointed out, this is what she said about the laptop at the time: “We should view it as a Trump campaign product.”
Even if the Disinformation Governance Board’s purview remains confined to Russia and “irregular migration” — and the odds of that are infinitesimal — she’s been so thoroughly wrong on the one Kremlin-related disinformation story that she shouldn’t be at the helm.
Jankowicz made it clear: She thought the laptop was a lie. And now, Mary Poppins doesn’t just want to “not support” what she calls “lies with our wallet, voice or vote.” She wants to do it with tax dollars from your wallet and the amplified voice of the federal government. That prospect is every bit as frightening as a cross-country car trip with nothing but Nina Jankowicz songs playing on the stereo.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
