Former NYT editor faces allegations of plagiarism

NEW YORK: Former New York Times executive editor Jill Abramson is facing allegations that she lifted material from other sources for her new book, Merchants of Truth.

A Twitter thread posted on Wednesday by Vice correspondent Michael Moynihan lists several examples of passages in Merchants of Truth: The Business of News and the Fight for Facts that closely resemble material in The New Yorker, Time Out and other publications.

Released this week, Merchants of Truth is a critique of the news business focused on two longrunning newspapers, The Times and The Washington Post, along with Vice and fellow digital company BuzzFeed.

Appearing on Wednesday night on Fox News, Abramson disputed the allegations, saying, “All I can tell you is I certainly didn’t plagiarise in my book and there are 70 pages of footnotes showing where I got the information.”

Writers are expected to credit their sources in the body of the text if the material is similar.

Abramson did not immediately return phone and email messages from AP seeking comment. A Simon & Schuster spokesman had no comment.

Abramson wrote for the Times and The Wall Street Journal among others before becoming The Times’ first female executive editor in 2011.