Post Judged Unfair in Coverage of Moran

It was nice to see The Washington Post’s ombudsman agree with us that the paper’s coverage of the alleged anti-Semitic remarks by Cong. Jim Moran (D-Va.) was unfair.

But the paper’s editors were un repentant.

Metro's top editor, Jo-Ann Armao, says she is "frankly baffled by the suggestion that The Post should not have reported this story -- a longtime aide and political ally to one of the Washington area's most influential congressmen quits the campaign at a critical point in time and cites as reason his on-the-record allegation that the congressman, already under fire for previous comments deemed inappropriate, made an anti-Semitic remark. The story was thoroughly and diligently reported. We tried many times to get Secrest to say specifically what Moran said to him, telling him that it hurt the credibility of his charge. His refusal was a factor in how we played the story," Armao said.

"Many readers and voters have said they don't believe Secrest's charge. And every reason they cite -- that there was a financial dispute between the two, that Secrest is sometimes a hothead who has had breakups with other clients, that there was a dispute about campaign strategy, that Secrest wasn't specific, that others denied the charge -- they know because they read them in our stories. In other words, we reported everything we could and left readers to make the decision about whether to believe Secrest's allegation.

"Critics seem to be saying," Armao said, "that we should have decided whether the charge was true before deciding whether to write a story. I do think that we have to judge the credibility of the accuser, and in this case again, it was someone who has been a staunch backer of Moran for two decades, someone who has not been accused of lying, someone who has a national reputation he seemed to be risking."

"If Secrest had told us the alleged specific comment, and Moran denied saying it, would it have made a difference to those who feel we shouldn't have written the story?"

Michael Getler, the ombudsman, said Armao’s last point is a good one, but

My own view is that what The Post violated was a fundamental sense of fairness and common sense by airing and repeating this explosive, uncorroborated, unexplained -- and denied -- charge four days before an election. Because Moran is such an easy target is all the more reason to be careful.

Thanks to Paul Goldman of the Augusta Free Press who wrote a column a few days after our first post, concerned about the coverage. His column, which we forwarded on to The Post, was quoted in the ombudsman’s critique.