WTF?!: NYTimes Fails to Report Fed Judge Finding on ‘Unconstitutional’ ACORN Defunding Legislation

Guest blogged by Ernest A. Canning

On Wednesday, March 10, 2010 The BRAD BLOG posted breaking coverage about U.S. District Court Judge Nina Gershon’s finding that day, that the Congressional funding ban on ACORN was an unconstitutional bill of attainder. Her finding included an order to resume federal funding to the community group which has been targeted by a years-long GOP smear campaign.

A March 10 AP story covering Judge Gershon’s finding appeared in the March 11 edition of the Washington Post.

It’s now Wednesday, March 17 — a full week since the historic ruling was issued by a federal judge (in New York, of all places) yet, not one word about the ruling has appeared in the New York Times, America’s so-called “paper of record.”

What’s wrong with this picture?

[Update 3/19/2010: See “Correction/Clarification” at end of article. The Times appears to have run something on this, at least a version of the AP’s coverage, at least on their website, if not in their print editions, after all. See below for more details and one encouraging point to go with it. – BF]

As we now know, the NYTimes has misreported the ACORN “Pimp” Hoax story time and again since last fall, yet both their Senior Editor for Standards, Greg Brock, as seen in emails published by The BRAD BLOG, and their Public Editor (ombudsman) Clark Hoyt, as seen in emails also published by The BRAD BLOG, have both refused to issue or recommend corrections despite being shown the gross, factual inaccuracies in the paper’s coverage.

Furthermore, Gershon’s decision last week heavily referenced a report [PDF] by the former MA Attorney General Scott Harshbarger, released on December 7 of last year, finding no criminality by ACORN workers as seen in the highly-edited, heavily-overdubbed, secretly-taped videos released last year by James O’Keefe and Andrew Breitbart. The publication of those videos led to the unconstitutional legislation undone last week by Gershon. Yet the New York Times has never so much as mentioned the Harshbarger report in its pages either.

So, again, I ask: what’s wrong with this picture?

* * *

Correction/Clarification by Brad, 3/19/10: Two readers (“Dot” and “Sam Bogorad”) have posted links in comments to an AP story, posted at the NYTimes.com website covering Gershon’s decision.

That March 10 AP report did not show up in searches of the Times website, done separately by both Ernie and myself, at the time our article was published (a week after the decision). Nor did it show up as having been published in the Times up in a separate search of LexisNexis also done prior to publication of this article.

It remains unclear whether the AP report was actually published in the paper edition of the paper at all. A search of the March 11, 2010 print version at the Times website, the day it would have run in the paper, returns “0 results”. Similar searches for the subsequent day’s print versions also appear to return no results.

The AP report, said on the Times website to have been “Published: March 10, 2010 Filed at 9:02 p.m. ET”, is the same one that was run at the Washington Post site — credited there to Larry Neumeister of AP — as Ernie noted in his article above.

If I can learn more details on if the story was published in the print version and when it was actually posted to the NYTimes.com website, and why it hadn’t appeared in our separate, independent searches prior to publication, of course, I’ll share it here.

As to that AP report itself, eagle-eyed BRAD BLOG commenter “Lora” notes what appears to be new, and encouraging language on this story from the wire service [emphasis added]:

In one video, ACORN employees were shown apparently advising a couple posing as a prostitute and her boyfriend to lie about her profession and launder her earnings;

That’s a great improvement over AP’s previously inaccurate coverage in which they reported on many occasions — in stories published by the NYTimes, as we noted when we first began our weeks-long coverage of all of this, (eg. here, here, here and here) — that O’Keefe “posed as a pimp” in those videos.

It’s unclear whether or not AP has issued any corrections, to date, for their previously inaccurate reporting. I’m also trying to see what I can learn there as well. But their new language is certainly an improvement over the old at least! Perhaps, slowly but surely, we’re getting somewhere here.

For our part, Ernie’s story above was published on March 17th, and the first link to the Times/AP online story was posted yesterday March 18th when both Ernie and myself were separately on the road and off the grid entirely. We both just caught the comments this afternoon, and thus, our correction/clarification was not posted until this afternoon. We regret the unavoidable delay in that, and hope to offer more clarity on the entire situation as soon as (and if) I can find any.

18 Responses

  1. Thanks for keeping on this topic. Have others like the LA Times or others like NPR corrected this either?

  2. It’s very annoying that people will use “the paper of record” for research….Good article, Mr.Canning. The NYTimes mgmt has no shame.

  4. Some months ago there was a poll here on weather or not the print newspaper media should be allowed to die and I voted yes. This is just another reason; the ‘paper of record’ destroying its own reputation through censorship to cover its own a++ and protect its ideological masters. It can’t go out of business fast enough IMO.

  7. NPR has been informed of the lies behind the “Pimp and Ho” story. They have failed to address the issue, either in a Correction or an email to me explaining the lack of same.

  11. Adam (#5)

    GREAT suggestion. Needs to be done.

    I’ve never edited a Wiki – how does one do so? Are there imposed limitations?(length / posting rules and protocol / stuff you generally don’t do, etc.?)

    Ernest, if you could spare the time maybe you could help us write up a brief graph we can add to Hoyt’s wiki bio that includes his recent, egregious ACORN NYT scandal and his now infamous responses to The Bradblog’s requests for retraction – that’d be a nice little plug for The Truth.

    ..or maybe we can cobble something together from the wealth of material already here. If someone takes the time to (help) write it, I’ll figure out how to edit it.

  13. From DOT’s (#12) link (emphasis added):

    In one video, ACORN employees were shown apparently advising a couple posing as a prostitute and her boyfriend to lie about her profession and launder her earnings;

    Well, well, well. Will wonders never cease.

  14. Adam (#5)

    GREAT suggestion. Needs to be done.

    I’ve never edited a Wiki – how does one do so? Are there imposed limitations?(length / posting rules and protocol / stuff you generally don’t do, etc.?

    Hi, Jeannie

    It is pretty simple to edit in Wiki.

    Step 1: Just sign up for an account, providing a username of your choice (that is still available), and an email address. You’ll get an email asking you to confirm that you have indeed signup up for an account.

    Step 2: Go to the Wikipedia article that you want to edit and click the “edit” link below it.

    The main protocol for it is to provide a list of sources to back up every factual claim you make in your contribution to the article (sort of like what Clark Hoyt *didn’t* do in publishing the bogus and unverified anti-ACORN pimp hoax story).

  16. Dot and Sam Bogarad: I sincerely appreciate the link. I did not find this when I previously searched the Times site and Eric Boehlert did not find it when searching Lexis.

    Obviously, my article is in error. I am on the road; will post this as a retraction and apology to The New York Times for making a grievous error.

    I am pleased that the paper covered the Judge Gershon’s decision; still hopeful they will be as forthcoming with their past mistakes as I am with mine.

  17. Mr.Canning: Yes, that’s actually what I was getting at with the NYT link — though I should have been referring to you rather than to Brad.

    Of course a retraction and an apology is more than we’ll get out of the Times over the ACORN affair! Still, I suppose one must set a good example….