Remembering
James Robison

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The Brew: Tapper’s Truths and a High School Hoax

In this screenshot from video, CNN anchor Jake Tapper joins The Megyn Kelly Show to discuss his new book, Original Sin.

By Gayle McQueary Published on May 22, 2025

How do you know you’ve done something wrong? If you’re CNN anchor Jake Tapper, you offer mea culpas during the press tour for your book release.

But before we talk about that, let’s find out how a 24-year-old illegal immigrant was able to pose as a high school student before that story becomes the plot of new B movie.

High School Hoax: 24-Year-Old Poses as Student

In a story that seriously sounds like a new Netflix hit drama, a 24-year-old Venezuelan man who entered the country on a three-year work visa, Anthony Emmanuel Labrador Sierra, was arrested near Toledo, Ohio, yesterday after allegedly posing as a 16-year-old to enroll in high school and attending for more than a year and a half. According to police, Sierra used a falsified Venezuelan birth certificate and claimed to be a homeless teen brought into the country by human traffickers.

He began attending Perrysburg High School last January and was later taken in by a local couple, Kathy and Brad Melfred, who obtained legal guardianship and helped him obtain a Social Security number and Ohio driver’s license. The deception unraveled when a woman contacted the Melfreds, claiming Sierra was the father of her child and providing evidence of his true age and identity.

Authorities confirmed Sierra’s real birthdate as March 27, 2001, and noted that his work visa had expired in November 2023. He was pulled over on the highway and arrested Sunday, then charged with felony forgery.

He is currently being held on a $50,000 bond and is prohibited from leaving Wood County, Ohio if released. The case has drawn attention for its complex mix of immigration issues, identity fraud, and the vulnerabilities of public school enrollment systems.

Tapper’s Contrition: “I Should Have Asked More” Questions

CNN anchor Jake Tapper is on a book tour promoting a released about the media’s mass coverups for Joe Biden titled Original Sin — but it’s his confessions, not his chapters, that are making headlines.

In a candid and sometimes confrontational interview with Megyn Kelly on Tuesday, Tapper admitted that conservative media had been right to raise early concerns about Biden’s cognitive health. He expressed regret for not pressing Biden harder during a 2020 interview, especially after the president failed to release promised health records.

Kelly didn’t hold back. She accused Tapper and other mainstream journalists of enabling a “coverup” by ignoring the visible signs of Biden’s decline. “It could only ever work if you allowed it,” she said, referencing moments like Biden’s freeze-ups at a Juneteenth celebration and a fundraiser hosted by George Clooney, and wandering off at the G7 summit last year.

When asked if he had followed up on the lack of Biden’s health disclosures, Tapper responded, “That’s correct, I didn’t.”

“Conservative media was right and conservative media was correct,” Tapper admitted. “There should be a lot of soul-searching, not just among me, but among the legacy media to begin with, all of us, for how this was covered — or not covered — sufficiently.”

Tapper also reflected on his role as one of the moderators of the debate between Biden and Donald Trump last June, saying he intentionally kept his coverage “vanilla” to avoid appearing biased. But he conceded that this approach may have contributed to the media’s failure to confront Biden’s decline head-on.

In the 10-minute clip of Kelly’s interview with Tapper below, you can see why media accountability, bias, and the role journalists play in holding leaders accountable — especially when those leaders are on their side of the aisle — is on fire in the public sphere right now.

We should applaud Tapper for being willing to admit his flaws and personal role in this debacle. Hopefully he will remember the shame he feels now, and it will spur him to become a more reliable journalist who has some integrity.

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Dominion, Defamation, and Tina Peters

A bombshell revelation has rocked Arapahoe County, Colorado, where election officials have been caught altering critical election records from the 2020 election. The scandal, first reported earlier this week, centers on a Cast Vote Record (CVR) — a detailed log of every vote on every ballot in the county.

Expert witness and mathematician Edward Solomon, who last November submitted the Arapahoe County CVR as evidence in a lawsuit against Nevada’s secretary of state, identified a statistical anomaly known as “parallel partisan behavior.” The original CVR from 2020 showed Republicans and Democrats voting in perfect alignment on Proposition B, a controversial measure to significantly raise property taxes in Colorado. Solomon argues this uniformity is statistically impossible, as partisan voters rarely agree so precisely on divisive issues like tax hikes. His findings bolster allegations of manipulated election data, giving the case in Nevada significant traction.

However, in a stunning development yesterday, it appeared that someone in the Arapahoe County Clerk and Recorder’s office attempted to cover up the fraud sometime after Solomon submitted his evidence to the Nevada court. Between last November and March 21, an altered CVR which conveniently removed the telltale “parallel partisan behavior” on Proposition B was uploaded to the county website, seemingly to undermine Solomon’s claims and potentially frame him for perjury.

This clumsy attempt to rewrite history has only deepened suspicions about a broader conspiracy to rig elections and conceal the evidence. The scandal draws parallels to the case of Tina Peters, a Colorado election official who was convicted last August for exposing similar issues in a different county, as detailed in a related report published on JoeHoft.com. We should all be demanding accountability and transparency, and an investigation of the full extent of election fraud in Colorado and beyond.

Farewell to Gerry Connolly

U.S. Representative Gerry Connolly of Virginia, a longtime Democrat and ranking member of the House Oversight Committee, passed away at his home in Fairfax yesterday morning at the age of 75 after a brief battle with esophageal cancer. Last November, Connolly announced that he was being treated for throat cancer, which briefly went into remission. Last month, he announced that his cancer had returned despite treatments, and that he planned to retire at the end of his term in 2026.

Known for his fiery presence in congressional hearings and his advocacy for federal workers, Connolly served in Congress for more than 16 years and had been a fixture in Virginia politics for decades. Before his time in Washington, he led the transformation of Tysons Corner, a premier shopping destination in Virginia, into a major business hub, and championed the expansion of the Silver Line rail system to Dulles International Airport.

Connolly leaves behind a legacy of public service marked by infrastructure development, environmental advocacy, and a commitment to government accountability. His death leaves a vacancy in Virginia’s 11th Congressional District, which will be filled through a special election. In the meantime, House Republicans hold a 220-212 majority; Connolly’s absence may impact key committee dynamics, particularly on the Oversight Committee where he was a leading Democratic voice.

Along The Stream…

Later this morning, listen to the issues raised in online debate when bestselling Christian author Max Lucado got a tattoo.

Meanwhile, longtime Stream contributor Alex Chediak will bring another inspiring piece that’s sure to get you to say, “Amen”: “Gen Z Goes to Church.”

 

Gayle McQueary is The Stream’s social media specialist. She has a background in production and is a scary judge of journalistic hypocrisy.