NPR has suspended a whistleblowing editor who exposed the network’s liberal bias, while her boss grapples with old tweets that reveal her hatred of Donald Trump.
Editor Uri Berliner caused a storm last week when he wrote an open essay for The free presswhere he criticized the outlet for being almost entirely composed of Democrats and, according to him, “lost the trust of the United States.”
In response to the 25-year NPR veteran’s article, the network suspended him for five days for violating its policy of working to report for another outlet without permission, effective Friday.
NPR CEO Katherine Maher insisted in a statement that the company remains committed to “serving the entire American public,” but Berliner added in an interview that the emergence of old tweets from Maher undermines her message.
The tweets in question included a Veiled shot at the Trump brand. him a ‘deranged racist sociopath’, and shares his support for President Biden by sharing selfies in his campaign hats.
NPR business editor Uri Berliner has been suspended after he caused a firestorm last week, writing an outspoken essay criticizing the outlet’s liberal bias.
Berlinger argued in his article that NPR has “lost America’s trust” because it was staffed almost entirely by Democrats.
Berliner confirmed his suspension while sitting down for a follow-up interview with NPRand the network said he would be fired if he overstepped again.
But the business editor pulled no punches when discussing Maher’s resurfaced tweets, which he says make her unable to run the taxpayer-funded company in a moderate and fair manner.
“We’re looking for a leader right now who will unify and bring more people into the tent and who will have a broader perspective on, sort of, what America means,” he said.
“And this seems to be the opposite of that.”
The tweets also included Maher saying, “I wish Hillary wouldn’t use the ‘boy and girl’ language; she’s erasing the language for non-binary people.”
In November 2020, he tweeted: ‘There are a lot of jokes about leaving America, and I get it. But as someone with cis white mobility privileges, I’m thinking about staying and investing in getting rid of this specter of tyranny.”
Amid the BLM riots, Maher also stated: ‘I mean, of course, looting is counterproductive. But it’s hard to get angry because the protests don’t prioritize private property over a system of oppression based on treating people’s ancestors as private property.’
Katherine Maher pictured on the first day of the Web Summit Qatar 2024
Before publishing his scathing essay on the state of NPR, Berliner said he tried numerous times to raise concerns about his liberal leanings.
In particular, he said coverage of the issues that dominated recent years had been tainted by NPR’s liberal bias, including the war between Israel and Hamas, transgenderism and Covid-19.
Berliner added that he believes other media outlets have similar problems, but he believes NPR’s public funding and its insistence that it is moderate means it has an obligation to remain impartial.
“I love NPR and feel like it’s a national trust,” he said. ‘We have great journalists here. If they would get rid of their opinions and do the great journalism they are capable of, this would be a much more interesting and satisfying organization for our listeners.’
Writing for The Free Press, a popular Substack site, Berliner said the rise of “advocacy” in journalism emerged especially at the same time as Donald Trump’s political career.
“As in many newsrooms, his election in 2016 was greeted at NPR with a mix of disbelief, anger and despair,” he wrote.
Berliner argued that the rise of “advocacy” in journalism emerged especially at the same time as Donald Trump’s political career, and stated that his election to the presidency was greeted within the NPR newsroom with “a mix of disbelief, anger and despair.
Berliner also uncovered how NPR deliberately withheld information from its audience during the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections.
He says NPR editors were quick to accept claims that Donald Trump was a Russian asset, but much more reluctant to cover his subsequent debunking.
Berliner has since received what NPR called a “final warning,” suspending him for five days but warning him that if he worked for another outlet without permission, he would be out of a job.
He wrote that when he researched staff voting records, he surprisingly discovered that not a single Republican held a leadership position.
“Concerned about the lack of viewpoint diversity, I looked up voter registration in our newsroom,” he wrote.
‘In DC, where NPR is headquartered and where many of us live, I found 87 registered Democrats working in editorial positions and no Republicans. None.’