AP
At issue is a Daily Caller piece from Nov. 1, in which two escorts were filmed on video saying that Menendez paid them for sex. Those claims have opened up scrutiny into the Senator's personal life, including his relationship with a Florida eye doctor under investigation by the FBI.
The Washington Post's Carol Leonnig and Ernesto Londoño cast doubt on the original Daily Caller report Monday with a story that claimed one of the escorts was paid to fabricate the claims and has never met Menendez.
Both the Post and the Miami Herald obtained court documents in which the woman, 23-year-old Nexis de los Santos Santana, and a Dominican lawyer, Miguel Galván, entered sworn statements alleging they were "duped as part of an elaborate plan ... under the guise of a divorce case involving Menendez’s longtime friend and donor, Dr. Salomon Melgen."
The Daily Caller fired back early Tuesday morning, accusing the Washington Post of printing a lie. Here's a tweet from editor-in-chief
The Washington Post piece today on Menendez and the Dominican hookers was completely, utterly wrong. Our story coming soon.
— Tucker Carlson (@TuckerCarlson) March 5, 2013
Daily Caller executive editor David Martosko later wrote that the Washington Post had "mistook one prostitute for another" and said that de los Santos was not one of the women with whom the Daily Caller spoke.
Martosko explained that both of the women in the video spelled out different names than the one given in the affidavit, and both said they were 24-years old. The DC's Martosko also wrote that both women consented to the interview; in the affidavit, de los Santos claimed that she was "surreptitiously taped."
As ABC reported Tuesday, multiple news organizations have received the same information about the escorts but were unable to verify the Daily Caller's reporting.
The WaPo reporters and the author of the original Daily Caller piece, Matthew Boyle, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.