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Prose & Contradiction – NATIONAL PUBLIC RADIO

Maybe not reporting is the way to go here, folks.

Maybe not reporting is the way to go here, folks.

There continues to be fallout from yesterday’s debacle at NPR, where Nina Totenberg had erroneously broken the news that Justice Samuel Alito was retiring. The outlet quickly spiked that false report, and Nina has been on a mea culpa tour, but there is a curiosity behind how this even transpired.

By way of explanation, NPR described what happened, but then offered contradictions, and as a result, makes less sense about how this played out.

The article went through an extra layer of editing, known at NPR as “the backstop,” according to two people familiar with the process. NPR added that layer in 2024 as a final line of defense against errors. But because the article cited an announcement, rather than confidential sources, the network did not take additional steps to verify the accuracy of the information.  

The article went through an extra layer of editing, known at NPR as “the backstop,” according to two people familiar with the process. NPR added that layer in 2024 as a final line of defense against errors. But because the article cited an announcement, rather than confidential sources, the network did not take additional steps to verify the accuracy of the information.  

This means they have a newly added layer of editing to prevent false information from getting published, but they bypassed this new process, which led to false information being reported. And this was because they failed to verify the basic claim that an official announcement had been made about Alito retiring.

(We do not understand any of this either…)

NPR Makes Less Sense the More They Explain How a........

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