Factual correctness is not a defense against being misleading. It is quite easy to make factually correct statements that are also misleading.
"$Person has never denied $HorribleAct."
"$Person has never apologized for $HorribleAct."
"$Person has never presented any evidence showing they didn't do $HorribleAct."
You can effectively mad lib these with almost any combinations and it result in a technically true statement. But put a specific case in a news headline, and it would still be considered misleading. Why? Because we know when people read those sentences in a news headline, they will assume that there is an underlying accusation with enough credibility to be denied. Such an accusation doesn't exist. Factually, such a headline never stated such an accusation exists. But we know that is how people will read it, and thus to run such a headline knowing well the way it will be read would, at least to me, qualify as being misleading.
Did that happen in this case? I don't know enough to be sure. I just want to point out that factual correctness is not, by itself, enough to disqualify a charge of a headline being misleading.
Factual correctness is not a defense against being misleading. It is quite easy to make factually correct statements that are also misleading.
"$Person has never denied $HorribleAct."
"$Person has never apologized for $HorribleAct."
"$Person has never presented any evidence showing they didn't do $HorribleAct."
You can effectively mad lib these with almost any combinations and it result in a technically true statement. But put a specific case in a news headline, and it would still be considered misleading. Why? Because we know when people read those sentences in a news headline, they will assume that there is an underlying accusation with enough credibility to be denied. Such an accusation doesn't exist. Factually, such a headline never stated such an accusation exists. But we know that is how people will read it, and thus to run such a headline knowing well the way it will be read would, at least to me, qualify as being misleading.
Did that happen in this case? I don't know enough to be sure. I just want to point out that factual correctness is not, by itself, enough to disqualify a charge of a headline being misleading.