Alan White Adds Last-Minute “Debunks” And Says Positive CEN History Need Not Be Mentioned

This document is a 19 April 2015 BuzzFeed email chain with the subject “Re CEN Monday”, sent five days before publication of BuzzFeed’s article about Central European News. It records Alan White telling Heidi Blake, Robert Colvile, Luke Lewis, Tom Phillips and Craig Silverman that he had found “two more straight debunks” and what he described as “compelling evidence of made up quotes”, including the “dead kitten that wasn’t” and “cabbage walking” stories. The cabbage point is significant because BuzzFeed had itself covered the same cabbage-walking story in May 2014 as an amusing viral item, with the original BuzzFeed post apparently written by Kevin Tang and circulated internally as potentially shareable, while White later wrote that he had “completely forgotten about this one” and had “even laughed about it at the time” before saying it was the “most compelling evidence for making up quotes” he had seen so far. It is relevant because it shows BuzzFeed adding online “debunk” material in the final days before publication while not foregrounding its own earlier participation in treating the same CEN-linked story as entertaining viral content, and while also being aware of broader CEN or Michael Leidig history that White said did not “require mentioning”, including legal, copyright, investigative and public-interest material that did not fit the narrow fake-news narrative.

Source

Part of Central European News & Mike Leidig v BuzzFeed (US Second Circuit Libel Case) – BF Case Documents

Europe Media Published 1 May 2026 at 21:09 Source: 1 November 2016