SATIRE (unless it isn't)
THE HOAX FILES · 11
The "Uterus Collector" Cost NBC a Settlement
The claim couldn't be backed up. The settlement could.
MSNBC / NBC
A whistleblower claim became a prime-time atrocity. The Senate found real abuse, just not the one that got sold.
As printed on the graphic:
Mass Hysterectomies Performed on Immigrants Hoax
What they sold
September 2020. A whistleblower complaint from Georgia's Irwin County Detention Center alleged that immigrant women were getting unnecessary hysterectomies. MSNBC hosts ran with "mass hysterectomies," and the story spread nationally. FNN found the loudest amplification at MSNBC/NBC, not CNN. So this page goes after the media in general.
What the record shows
On November 15, 2022, the bipartisan Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations released its 18-month report. It found that women detained at Irwin had been subjected to excessive, invasive and often unnecessary gynecological procedures, with repeated failures to get informed consent. That's serious, and FNN isn't downplaying it. But the investigation did not substantiate the "mass hysterectomies" claim (REPORTED via NPR).
The doctor at the center of the coverage sued NBCUniversal over the MSNBC segments. In February 2025, NPR reported, under the headline "NBC settles with doctor falsely called 'uterus collector,'" that NBC agreed to settle. No liability was admitted.
The damage
FNN analysis: when the real abuse (unnecessary procedures, no informed consent) gets swapped out for a bigger, false one (mass sterilization), the victims lose. The true story gets thrown out along with the fake. Gallup: 34% of Americans have no trust at all in the media (2025).
Closer
The real scandal was bad enough. They upgraded it to a lie and paid for it. Stick to the receipts.