Report: HuffPo Editor Nixed an Uber Story in Advance of Partnership (UPDATED)
In a column published in the Washington Post Thursday, Erik Wemple describes an incident earlier this month when a Huffington Post editor shot down a pitch to aggregate an article critical of Uber, lest it overshadow a partnership between the news and commentary site and the tech giant.
Wemple writes:
On April 6, reporter Sarah Digiulio sent a note to some colleagues apprising them of this story in the New York Times: “Uber Driver Napped as His Passenger Led Highway Chase, Policy Say.”
An editor replied: “Thanks, Sarah. Let’s hold on this one please as we’re partnering with Uber on our drowsy driving campaign.” That editor is Gregory Beyer, according to two Huffington Post sources and confirmed by spokeswoman Lena Auerbuch. Beyer is listed on the Huffington Post masthead as executive features editor. According to his LinkedIn profile, he formerly served as “senior editor to Arianna Huffington,” and a newsroom source says he’s still a top lieutenant of the boss
The “drowsy driving campaign” referred to a story co-authored by Huffington and Uber CEO and founder Travis Kalanick, and was timed to coincide with Huffington’s new book The Sleep Revolution. (Huffington has been touting the book in a variety of contexts, even suggesting in an interview with Katie Couric that Trump’s demeanor was due to him not getting enough sleep.)
It also came a few weeks before Kalanick announced that Huffington would be joining Uber’s board of directors, casting suspicion on whether or not the site would be able to report objectively on the controversial company.
The site nodded to the dubious optics in post written by labor reporter Dave Jamieson published the same day, cheekily entitled “Arianna Huffington Did Not Edit This Story About Uber”.
“According to media ethics experts, the newsroom will have to take precautions to keep readers’ trust,” Jamieson wrote. It’s a state of affairs not at all helped by the revelations in Wemple’s column, published just one day later.
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UPDATE 4/29/16, 2:25 p.m. ET:
Gregory Beyer, the editor who requested a reporter “hold” on the Uber driver napping story, apologized for the decision, saying it “gave off the wrong impression.” He continued: “Obviously our partnerships never affect our coverage, and I was moving quickly in the moment and sent the wrong message as I read it in hindsight. For any confusion or concern I caused with my note, I apologize.” HuffPo spokeswoman Lena Auerbuch referred to Beyer’s call as a “mistake,” and said that “no one, including [Beyer], knew that the board position was in the works when this email exchange occurred.”
Furthermore, the “nixed” story did appear on Huffington Post the same day in a video segment here, although the segment was produced by video content agency Geobeats, not HuffPo.
The site has argued that it has a proven track record of publishing stories critical of corporations that it is connected to. Both Auerbuch and labor reporter Dave Jamieson point to the site’s continuing coverage of Uber and to reporter Steven Brill’s extensive investigation into the malfeasance of Johnson & Johnson, even though the pharmaceutical giant has sponsored the HuffPo‘s Global Motherhood section since 2012.
Jamieson’s article also noted that the site would designate a special editor, Jo Confino, to “watchdog Uber coverage,” and that a disclosure of Huffington’s position with Uber would accompany every article about the company, its competitors, or the ride-sharing industry in general. “That disclosure is going to see a lot of action,” he wrote.
