Good morning. Today, the Poynter Report gives you media news, tidbits and interesting links for your weekend, starting with this bonkers story:
My colleague Rick Edmonds, Poynter’s media business analyst, is out with this must-read column: “Gannett fired an editor for talking to me.”
Edmonds was working on a story (“Gannett hits pause button on its promise to restaff its smallest papers”) and Sarah Leach, a veteran editor overseeing 26 Gannett community papers in four states, was a source for Edmonds, although her name did not appear in the story. But get this: Edmonds writes that Leach was fired by Gannett two days before Poynter published his original story. The reason Leach was fired, according to Leach, was for “sharing proprietary information with (a reporter for) a competing media company.”
Leach said her boss, Silas Lyons, told her, “We have documentary evidence you have been communicating with Poynter.”
Edmonds wrote his reaction to Leach’s dismissal: “Outrageous! Gannett is a news company, not a widget factory, though it often does seem to be run like a widget factory. Gannett employs several thousand journalists who go to work every day in pursuit of stories, some of them based on insider tips and information. To pillory a successful and basically loyal editor because she raised an issue mildly embarrassing to the company…? Gannett’s top management extols itself for its commitment to excellent journalism while deploying espionage on its own employees? What a bunch of phonies.”
Veteran media writer Paul Farhi summed it up perfectly in this tweet: “News organization that trades in people providing information to its journalists fires veteran editor for providing information to a news organization.”
Leach also put out a statement saying, in part, “Let’s use this moment as a catalyst for a critical conversation about local media outlets and the audiences they serve. There has been an unprecedented loss of journalists and community newspapers across the country, and news deserts are growing larger and more numerous.”
The Detroit News’ Melissa Nann Burke wrote about Leach’s situation, including some of the highlights of her career at Gannett. (The story is only available to Detroit News subscribers.) Burke writes, “Leach’s dismissal also comes as the Holland Sentinel, her home base, is covering what is probably one of the biggest local stories in the newspaper’s 127-year history — the rise of the conservative group Ottawa Impact, borne out of political ire over pandemic restrictions in Michigan’s fastest growing county, population 300,000.”
Edmonds’ story gets into great detail about how all this went down, so I encourage you to read it. But I’ll echo Edmonds’ commentary and add that firing a single mother of three who was speaking up in hopes of Gannett following through with assurances that more newsroom resources were on the way is a horrible look that deserves scrutiny and criticism.
And now to the other tidbits and links …
- Elizabeth Djinis has a Q&A for Poynter with former New York Times reporter Amy Chozick, the co-creator of an HBO Max show inspired by her memoir covering two Hillary Clinton presidential runs: “HBO Max’s new ‘Girls on the Bus’ set out to show a cool, fun side of journalism.”
- The best story I read this week comes from The New York Times’ Lindsay Zoladz. Many have heard the story that legendary singer Cass Elliot of The Mamas and the Papas died when she choked on a ham sandwich nearly 50 years ago when she was just 32 years old. But that wasn’t the real cause of death. Zoladz delves into that and more about Mama Cass in “Cass Elliot’s Death Spawned a Horrible Myth. She Deserves Better.”
- Actually, this story is as good as anything I’ve read this week, too: The Washington Post’s Andrea Sachs with “A beloved alley cat now lives in the Watergate. Was she kidnapped, or rescued?”
- The Los Angeles Times’ Christopher Goffard with “A young actress, an obsessed stalker and a Hollywood murder that changed America.”
- Here are the winners of the Peabody Awards, given to the “most compelling and empowering stories released in broadcasting and streaming media during 2023.”
- CNBC’s Lillian Rizzo and Alex Sherman with “Sinclair explores selling roughly 30% of its broadcast stations, sources say.”
- CNN’s Oliver Darcy with “How Rupert Murdoch quietly helped Mike Johnson survive Marjorie Taylor Greene’s ouster attempt.”
- Writing for Zeteo, former CNN White House correspondent John Harwood with “As a Veteran Reporter, I’ve Always Valued Neutrality. But Trump’s Threat To Democracy Should be the Biggest Political Story of 2024.”
Have feedback or a tip? Email Poynter senior media writer Tom Jones at tjones@poynter.org.
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