Reporter Who Wrote NY Times Biden-Ukraine Piece Hired By Ukraine President (UPDATED)

Caleb EcarmaJun 3rd, 2019, 4:51 pm
 

The New York Times faced criticism on Monday after a reporter in Ukraine announced her new job as spokeswoman for the nation’s new president — just several weeks after authoring a controversial piece on Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden’s Ukrainian business dealings.

Iuliia Mendel, once a part-time Times reporter, announced her new communications job for the newly-elected Ukranian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Twitter Monday morning, which sparked scrutiny over her past reporting. In a piece last month, titled, “Biden Faces Conflict of Interest Questions That Are Being Promoted by Trump and Allies,” Mendel — along with a co-byline from Times investigative reporter Kenneth Vogel — detailed the Biden controversy that President Donald Trump has used to hit the former vice president.

The story focused on Hunter Biden’s directorship of a Ukrainian gas company called Burisma Holdings and the ethical questions raised by the relationship, as his father was serving in the Obama administration. Mainly, it focused on a spring 2016 case in which Biden called for the removal of a Ukraine prosecutor who was going after his son’s company — implying that the vice president acted unethically to help his son. However, the stance opposing the Ukrainian prosecutor was also held by the Obama administration and many allied foreign governments at the time.

The Times was subsequently criticized for the story by some in media and their liberal-leaning audience who argued covering the Ukraine controversy was playing into Trump’s hands and hurting Biden. They pointed out that some of the most salacious details alleged in the Biden-Ukraine controversy are false, as detailed by Politifact.

The Times did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Check out a few of the reactions to the former Times writer announcing her new job:

UPDATE: A New York Times spokesperson provided the following statement to Mediaite:

Iuliia Mendel was a freelance contributor to The New York Times based in Kiev, Ukraine.

Last week, The Times learned that she had applied for a job as spokesperson to the President of Ukraine on May 3 and has now accepted this position.

Ms. Mendel wrote one story for The Times in May while she was a candidate for the government position, about the dissolution of Parliament. Had she informed editors of her job application, they would not have given her that assignment and we would have stopped working with her immediately given this serious conflict of interest. All reporters, including freelance reporters, must abide by our ethical journalism guidelines.

Editors are confident that despite the conflict that should have been disclosed, her reporting — including her work on our recent Hunter Biden story — was fair and accurate.

[Photo by Don Emmert/AFP/Getty Images]

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Caleb Ecarma

Caleb Ecarma was a reporter at Mediaite. Email him here: caleb@mediaite.com Follow him on Twitter here: @calebecarma