A veteran National Public Radio journalist has slammed the left-leaning station for ignoring the Hunter Biden laptop scandal. That’s because it could help Donald Trump get re-elected.
Uli Berliner is an award-winning business editor and NPR reporter. Contributed a long essay to Bari Weiss’ online news site, The Free Press. In it, he accused bosses of turning the public radio station into an “openly polemical news outlet serving a niche audience.”
“This laptop was newsworthy,” Berliner wrote. “But the timeless journalistic instinct to follow the trailblazers of trending news was being suppressed.”
Weeks before the 2020 presidential election, the Post first revealed the existence of a laptop Hunter Biden left behind at a computer shop in Delaware.
The Post published the contents of emails obtained from the laptop that shed light on business dealings in Ukraine and China when Hunter Biden’s father, Joe Biden, was vice president in the Obama administration. Ta.
Initially, national security experts and former intelligence officials declared the laptop a hoax and the product of a Russian disinformation campaign.
Social media sites such as Twitter even banned users from sharing links to the Post’s reporting.
The authenticity of the email was later confirmed by independent experts and federal law enforcement officials.
According to Berliner, NPR’s news editor at the time said the station “[wast[ing] We don’t need to waste our time on stories that aren’t really stories, and we don’t want to waste our listeners’ and readers’ time on stories that are just a distraction. ”
Berliner wrote in the Free Press that a respected colleague at NPR told him he was glad the station wasn’t covering it because it would lead to Trump’s re-election. He did not reveal the journalist’s name.
After the contents of the laptop turned out to be genuine, NPR “may have admitted we made a mistake in judgment,” Berliner wrote.
“But like Russian collusion, [allegations against Trump that were debunked], we didn’t make the hard choice of transparency. ”
The Post has reached out to NPR for comment.
Berliner also assigned NPR to report on Russian collusion cases. The incident was fueled by allegations that the Trump campaign colluded with the Kremlin during the 2016 presidential campaign.
He said NPR “parked the wagon on President Trump’s most visible opponent, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.).”
Allegations against Hunter Biden
COUNT 1: False information when purchasing a firearm
He could be sentenced to up to 10 years in prison. Fine of $250,000. 3 years of supervised release. Special assessment is $100.
Count 2: False statements relating to information required to be maintained by a federal firearms licensee.
He could be sentenced to up to five years in prison. Fine of $250,000. 3 years of supervised release. Special assessment is $100.
Courtroom 3: Possession of a Firearm by an Illegal User or Addict of a Controlled Substance
He could be sentenced to up to 10 years in prison. Fine of $250,000. 3 years of supervised release. Special assessment is $100.
“By my count, NRP hosts interviewed Schiff 25 times about Trump and Russia,” Berliner said, adding that Schiff “enthusiastically voted against Trump twice; We felt we had an obligation to give him fair coverage.”
“NPR’s coverage was extremely thin,” Berliner wrote, when special counsel Robert Mueller, investigating allegations of collusion between President Trump and Russia, found no credible evidence to support the charges.
“It’s another thing to get swept up in a big story and miss it,” Berliner wrote, adding, “What’s even worse is to pretend it never happened and move on without any guilt or remorse.” he added.
Berliner also accused NPR of promoting other left-leaning causes, including imposing “unconscious bias training sessions” on staff in response to George Floyd’s death in May 2020.
Employees were told to “start talking about race,” she said.
NPR journalists also received updated language and style guidance from “journalism affinity groups” based on racial and ethnic identities, including “marginalized gender and intersex people of color” (MGIPOC). instructed to always keep it up to date. “NPR Noir” (NPR’s Black Employees). and “Women, gender-expansive, and transgender people in technology across public media.”
Berliner said the DEI Accountability Committee would resolve disputes if an NPR journalist’s language was “different from those organizations’ policies.”
