Did CBS fake a line of cars in Michigan in order to make it seem like COVID-19 testing was even more difficult? That’s what Project Veritas creator James O’Keefe asserts in a new video. Footage of the May 1 CBS This Morning shows a long line of vehicles waiting for drive-by testing in Michigan.

According to O’Keefe, “A CBS News crew pulled medical professionals off the floor at the Cherry Medical Center in Grand Rapids, Michigan, to line up in their vehicles so a CBS film crew would have a long line for their COVID-19 coverage.”

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O’Keefe talked to an anonymous witness in Grand Rapids who alleged that CBS “told us that medical personnel were taken away from treating patients and making the line longer for actual patients wait for the COVID-19 test.” . . .

In the segment, co-host Anthony Mason tinged it all with politics, chiding, “Michigan’s Republican-led legislature has voted to sue the state’s Democratic governor to stop her extending the coronavirus state of emergency there. Hundreds of protesters, some of them with guns, gathered at the state capitol yesterday demanding an end to emergency restrictions.”

Co-host Gayle King added, “Only six states have reported more cases than Michigan, but fewer than two percent of its people have been tested for the virus.”

On his website, O’Keefe explained:

Nick Ross, a corporate cleaning site supervisor at the Cherry Health facility, said he was there when the CBS News crew arrived and set up the video shoot at the COVID-19 testing site in the parking lot, “Apparently the news crew wanted more people in the line because they knew it was scheduled.”. . .

“It’s just annoying cause we could have done other stuff,” said one registered nurse there recorded with a hidden camera by a Project Veritas insider. . .

CBS News President Susan Zirinsky gave a statement to O’Keefe and is denying any attempt at fakery. But the network is removing a portion of the video.

“CBS News did not stage anything at the Cherry Health facility. Any suggestion to the contrary is 100% false. These allegations are alarming. We reached out to Cherry Health to address them immediately. They informed us for the first time that one of their chief officers told at least one staffer to get in the testing line along with real patients. No one from CBS News had any knowledge of this before tonight. They also said that their actions did not prevent any actual patients from being tested. We take the accuracy of our reporting very seriously and we are removing the Cherry Health portion from the piece.”. . .

(Excerpt from MRC Newsbusters. Article by Scott Whitlock.)