The New York Times faces questions for its handling of a new allegation against Justice Brett Kavanaugh.
Offensive tweet, revision overshadow new accusation
NEW YORK — Between an offensive tweet and a significant revision, The New York Times’ handling of a new sexual misconduct allegation against Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh attracted almost as much attention as the accusation itself.
The story also gave President Donald Trump and his allies fresh ammunition in his campaign against the media, where the Times was already a favorite target.
The revelation that led several Democratic presidential contenders to call for Kavanaugh’s impeachment came in the 11th paragraph of a story labeled “news analysis” that ran in the Sunday opinion section. The story is based on an upcoming book by Times reporters Robin Pogrebin and Kate Kelly, “The Education of Brett Kavanaugh: An Investigation,” about the junior justice’s brutal confirmation battle last year.
Headlined “Brett Kavanaugh Fit In With the Privileged Kids. She Did Not,” the story was primarily about Deborah Ramirez, a Connecticut woman who alleged that Kavanaugh, as a freshman at Yale in 1983, had pulled down his pants and thrust his penis at her. Kavanaugh has denied those claims.
Yet the authors said they’d uncovered a similar story involving Kavanaugh at another freshman year party, where he allegedly exposed himself and friends pushed his penis into the hands of a female student. The story said former classmate Max Stier reported the incident to the FBI and senators as Kavanaugh’s nomination was being discussed, but said Stier would not discuss it with the authors. Kavanaugh would not comment on the story, a court spokeswoman said on Monday.
After the story was posted online but before it was in the print edition, the Times revised the story to add that the book reported that the woman supposedly involved in the incident declined to be interviewed, and that her friends say she doesn’t recall the incident. While an editor’s note pointed out the revision, it did not say why those facts had been left out in the first place.
A Times spokeswoman said no one was available for an interview on Monday.
The failure to initially report that the woman did not remember the alleged incident “is one of the worst cases of journalistic malpractice in recent memory,” John McCormack wrote in the conservative magazine National Review.
The Washington Post reported Monday that Sen. Christopher Coons, D-Del., alerted the FBI of the allegation at issue but that it was not investigated.
Coons wrote to FBI director Christopher Wray on Oct. 2, requesting an “appropriate follow up” with one individual who had come to Coons with information about Kavanaugh. Although the person’s name was redacted in the one-page letter, a spokesman for Coons confirmed Monday that the individual was Stier, who now leads a prominent nonpartisan group in Washington.
In the letter obtained by The Washington Post, Coons said “several individuals” who wanted to share information with federal authorities had contacted his office, but they had “difficulty reaching anyone who will collect their information.”
The book’s authors wrote that they had corroborated the second misconduct allegation with two officials who said they had communicated with Stier. The newspaper did not identify them.
Placement of the accusation in the midst of an opinion section piece struck many in the journalism community as odd.
“How is this not a front-page story?” wrote Tom Jones of the journalism think tank the Poynter Institute.
In a statement, the Times said the opinion section frequently runs excerpts of books produced by the newspaper’s reporters. The new accusations were uncovered during the authors’ reporting process for the book, which is why they had not appeared in the newspaper before.
The Times also apologized for an offensive tweet sent out by the opinion section advertising its initial story. The tweet began “Having a penis thrust in your face at a drunken dorm party may seem like harmless fun.
The Times deleted the tweet and said it was “clearly inappropriate and offensive” and was looking into how it was sent.