August 25, 2020, Kenosha, Wisconsin. Kyle Rittenhouse, 17, shoots three people during riots, killing two. Within days, the story as told was that he was an armed outsider who carried an illegal gun across state lines to hunt protesters, and a white supremacist. Biden's 2020 campaign video put his image next to a line about Trump refusing to disavow white supremacists (Snopes: it suggested an association but didn't explicitly call him one).

November 19, 2021: a jury acquitted Rittenhouse on all charges. The night before the verdict, CNN published "Things we learned from Kyle Rittenhouse's trial that challenge assumptions about the case." CNN's own receipts:

• Outsider? His father lived in Kenosha, he had worked as a lifeguard there, and Antioch, Illinois, is just across the line.
• Gun across state lines? A friend testified he bought the rifle in Wisconsin, so it didn't come from Illinois.
• White supremacist? CNN wrote that there was no evidence presented at trial about this.
• The judge dismissed the under-18 weapons charge because of how Wisconsin's law is written.

CNN's piece also reported that he lied about being an EMT, which is fair, and two men are dead, which is not a talking point. Biden said "the jury system works" (CNN).

FNN analysis: if you need a trial to undo your own assumptions, you published too early. Gallup's 2021 trust: 36%. That year, 34% of Americans had no trust at all in the media.