NPR suspends whistleblower who exposed taxpayer-funded network’s liberal bias – as CEO’s anti-Trump obsession is exposed in resurfaced tweets
NPR has suspended a whistleblower editor who exposed the network’s liberal bias, as the chief grapples with old tweets revealing her hatred of Donald Trump.
Editor Uri Berliner caused a storm last week when he wrote an open essay for it The free presswhere he dismissed the outlet because it was almost entirely made up of Democrats, who he said have “lost America’s trust.”
In response to the 25-year NPR veteran’s article, the network suspended him for five days starting Friday for violating its policy against working for another outlet without permission.
NPR CEO Katherine Maher emphasized in a statement that the company remains committed to “serving the entire American public,” but Berliner added in an interview that the emergence of Maher’s old tweets undermines her message.
The tweets in question include one veiled shot at Trump’s branding calling him a “deranged racist sociopath,” and shared her support for President Biden by sharing selfies while wearing his campaign hats.
NPR business editor Uri Berliner has been suspended after causing a firestorm last week by writing an open-ended essay denouncing the outlet’s liberal biases
Berlinger argued in his article that NPR has “lost America’s trust” because it was filled almost entirely by Democrats.
Berliner confirmed his suspension when he sat down for a follow-up interview NPRand the network said he would be fired if he overstepped again.
But the business editor pulled no punches when addressing Maher’s resurfaced tweets, which he said leave her unable to manage the taxpayer-funded company in a moderate and fair manner.
“We’re looking now for a leader who will unite and bring more people into the tent and have a broader perspective on what America roughly stands for,” he said.
“And this seems to be the opposite.”
The tweets also included Maher saying, “I wish Hillary wouldn’t use the language of ‘boy and girl’ – it erases language for non-binary people.”
In November 2020, she tweeted, “There’s a lot of jokes about leaving the US, and I get it. But as someone with cis-white mobility privilege, I think I will stay and invest in ridding this specter of tyranny.”
Amid the BLM riots, Maher also argued, “I mean sure, looting is counterproductive. But it’s hard to be angry about protests that don’t prioritize private property in a system of oppression based on treating people’s ancestors as private property.”
Katherine Maher is pictured on the first day of the Web Summit Qatar 2024
Before publishing his scathing essay on the state of NPR, Berliner said he repeatedly tried to express his concerns about its liberal side.
In particular, he said that coverage of issues that have dominated in recent years was tainted by NPR’s liberal biases, including the Israel-Hamas war, transgenderism and Covid-19.
Berliner added that he believes other stations have similar problems, but believes NPR’s public funding and emphasis on moderation mean it has a duty to remain impartial.
“I love NPR and think it’s a national trust,” he said. “We have great journalists here. If they would just drop their opinions and do the great journalism they are capable of, this would be a much more interesting and fulfilling organization for our listeners.”
In his article for The Free Press, a popular Substack site, Berliner said the rise of advocacy in journalism mainly increased around the same time as Donald Trump’s political career.
“Like many newsrooms, his 2016 election at NPR was greeted with a mixture of disbelief, anger and despair,” he wrote.
Berliner argued that the rise of “advocacy” in journalism particularly increased at the same time as Donald Trump’s political career, claiming that his election as president was met within the NPR newsroom with “a mixture of disbelief, anger and despair’.
Berliner also uncovered how NPR knowingly withheld information from its audiences during the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections.
He says NPR editors were quick to jump on claims that Donald Trump was a Russian asset, but were much more cautious in covering up their subsequent unmasking.
Berliner has since been slapped with 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 lose his job.
He wrote that when he examined the staffers’ voting records, he shockingly discovered that not a single Republican held a leadership position.
“Concerned about the lack of diversity in views, I looked at the voter registration for 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 zero Republicans. No.’