POLITICO COLUMN: …”I feel obliged to put into context just how egregious an error this story was,” Palmieri continued. “The New York Times is arguably the most important news outlet in the world and it rushed to put an erroneous story on the front page charging that a major candidate for President of the United States was the target of a criminal referral to federal law enforcement. Literally hundreds of outlets followed your story, creating a firestorm that had a deep impact that cannot be unwound. This problem was compounded by the fact that the Times took an inexplicable, let alone indefensible, delay in correcting the story and removing ‘criminal’ from the headline and text of the story.”
The Times’ report, from July 23, claimed that two inspectors general had sought a criminal investigation “into whether Hillary Rodham Clinton mishandled sensitive government information on a private email account she used as secretary of state.” It later altered the language to eliminate the suggestion that Clinton was the target in the potential criminal probe. Then, on July 24, all parties involved in the story—the two inspectors general, the Justice Department, and the Clinton campaign—issued public statements saying that the sought-after investigation was not “criminal.” Despite the overwhelming evidence, the Times did not remove the word from its headline and its story, nor did it issue a correction, until the following day.
Baquet, the Times’ executive editor and the recipient of Palmieri’s letter, did not immediately respond to a request for comment late Thursday night. The Times has issued multiple corrections on the story and its public editor, Margaret Sullivan, has written an article examining the Times’ errors… (more)
