Black Politico Reporter Suspended Over Romney Tweets and Comments
Williams’ comments “reflected a poor choice of words,” said his editors John Harris and Jim VandeHei in a widely circulated memo. The editors also pointed to Williams’ past Tweets, which were collected and posted by conservative reporter John Nolte of Breitbart.
The Politico editors’ memo:
“Politico journalists have a clear and inflexible responsibility to cover politics fairly and free of partisan bias. This expectation extends to all of the public platforms in which we and our reporting and analysis appears, including cable TV and social media platforms like Twitter.
Regrettably, an unacceptable number of Joe Williams’s public statements on cable and Twitter have called into question his commitment to this responsibility. His comment about Governor Romney earlier today on MSNBC fell short of our standards for fairness and judgment in an especially unfortunate way.
Joe has acknowledged that his appearance reflected a poor choice of words. This appearance came in the context of other remarks on Twitter that, cumulatively, require us to make clear that our standards are serious, and so are the consequences for disregarding them. This is true for all Politico journalists, including an experienced and well-respected voice like Joe Williams.
Following discussion of this matter with editors, Joe has been suspended while we review the matter.”
Do you think the suspension was fair?
