[themafia]

Their own words.

"Secret Service officials said, speaking on the condition of anonymity"

Their only stated source is "USSS officials" who bafflingly demand "anonymity." I would expect the reporter to tell those /officials/ they need to allow a direct quote or to provide another source; otherwise, their information simply won't be printed.

It's the difference between being a blind mouthpiece and being a reporter.

[enslavedrobot]

There could be multiple USSS officials. Also they don't have to tell you if they verified the story through other channels. In fact this is common practice in my experience (source: pillow talk).

[themafia]

They're USSS officials. Officials being the keyword. That a bunch of people who share meetings and prerogative in the organization are saying the same thing is not an indicator of information quality. In fact, I would take it as a negative signal, and would push _much_ harder to get actual detail or corroboration.

[enslavedrobot]

I agree. Like I say you have no idea who they talked to or verified the story with. Using the words in a story to justify an opinion, but at the same time saying the story is inaccurate is not logically consistent.

No well trained journalist would ever write a story like this without verifying the information in redundant ways. If they didn't do that then they probably already know it's fake and could literally write anything they wanted to support the narrative.

A) Well trained journalists and editors are not stupid. B) If they write something false they already know it's false 99% of the time and are doing it for other reasons.

In light of A + B it makes no sense to rely on what is written in the article to support the idea that it is false or undersourced.