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A PUBLICATION OF THE SILHA CENTER FOR THE STUDY OF MEDIA ETHICS AND LAW | WINTER/SPRING 2018 Special Series We devote the fi rst three articles of this issue of the Silha Bulletin to the ethics of covering President Donald Trump, President Trump’s supporters, and the “altright.” We examine the media ethics concerns that arise when news organizations cover a presidency that many individuals, from a variety of viewpoints, consider unconventional. The Ethics of Covering President Donald Trump n the winter and spring of 2017 and 2018, media “reveals what happened behindthescenes in the fi rst nine organizations and experts grappled with ethical and legal months of the most controversial presidency of our time.” questions regarding the coverage of President Donald The book covered several topics, including the fi ring of Trump and his administration. In early January 2018, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) director James Comey journalists and other observers raised ethical concerns and the White House staff’s thoughts and comments on Iabout author Michael Wolff’s methodology in his book Fire and President Trump. The book also contained several controversial Fury, which described behindthescenes details of President quotes attributed to Steve Bannon, the former White House Trump’s White House. The Trump administration’s cease and Chief Strategist, including that the Special Counsel investigation desist letter, and the publisher’s decision to publish the book led by Robert Mueller into possible collusion between President anyway, also raised legal concerns. On January 12, President Trump’s administration and Russia would “crack [Donald Trump Trump reportedly called Haiti, El Salvador, and African nations Jr.] like an egg on national TV.” “shithole countries,” leading media outlets to weigh whether to According to Politico on January 4, Wolff described himself publish or broadcast the word, again citing both ethical and legal in the book as a “constant interloper,” who was able to “observe issues. the chaos around him” because there was no one imposing order. He added, “Some of my sources spoke to me on socalled Book About the Trump Administration’s White House deep background, a convention of contemporary political books Raises Ethical and Legal Questions that allows for a disembodied description of events provided by On Jan. 3, 2018, The Guardian and New York magazine an unnamed witness to them.” published leaked portions of Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump After The Guardian and New York magazine leaked portions White House, a book describing behindthescenes details about of Fire and Fury, and following the publication of the book President Donald Trump’s White House and administration. The on January 5, observers raised ethical concerns about Wolff’s book raised several ethical concerns about the methodology methodology. First, several news organizations pointed out of the book’s author, Michael Wolff. Additionally, the Trump that Wolff’s credibility had been questioned in the past. Politico administration’s effort to stop the publication of the book in noted on January 4 that Michelle Cottle of The New Republic, a a January 4 cease and desist letter, and the publication of the liberal magazine, wrote in a 2004 profi le of Wolff that “the scenes book by publisher Henry Holt and Company despite the letter on in his columns aren’t recreated so much as created — springing January 5, led to several legal questions, including whether Wolff from Wolff’s imagination rather than from actual knowledge of had defamed President Trump. events.” She added that instead of using conventional reporting, On Jan. 3, 2018, The Guardian reported that author Michael Wolff “absorbs the atmosphere and gossip swirling around him Wolff, who previously contributed to USA Today, The Hollywood at cocktail parties, on the street, and especially during those Reporter, and other outlets, had reportedly conducted more long lunches at Michael’s.” than 200 interviews dating back to mid2016 with President In a 2008 review of Wolff’s biography of Fox News mogul Trump, his cabinet and inner circle, and several other individuals Rupert Murdoch, The Man Who Owns the News, the late New in and around the administration for his new book Fire and York Times media columnist David Carr wrote that “historically Fury. Henry Holt and Company is a subsidiary of Macmillan one of the problems with Wolff’s omniscience is that while Publishers, which stated on its website that Fire and Fury he may know all, he gets some of it wrong.” The full review is Inside This Issue Winter/Spring 2018: Volume 23, No. 2 1 The Ethics of Covering President Donald Trump 34 Judge Orders Certain Files from Wetterling Investigation Special Series Be Returned to FBI, Allows Release of Remaining State Documents 7 The Ethics of Covering President Trump’s Supporters Privacy Special Series 37 D.C. Circuit Finds FBI Failed to Conduct a “Reasonable” 9 The Ethics of Covering the “Alt-Right” Search of Records Regarding Media Impersonation Special Series FOIA 39 Minnesota Legislature Seeks to End Use of Cameras in 11 Federal Government Targets a Leaker and Backpage.com Courtrooms Federal Prosecutions Cameras in Courtroom 15 FCC Repeals Net Neutrality, Prompts Legal and Legislative 41 Jesse Ventura Reaches Settlement in American Sniper Responses Defamation Lawsuit Net Neutrality Defamation 19 Parkland Shooting Raises Ethical Questions about Covering 42 Minnesota Legislature Introduces an “Ag-Gag” Law; Federal Mass Shootings, Sparks Proliferation of Fake News and Appeals Courts Strike Down Two States’ Laws Conspiracy Theories Ag-Gag Laws Media Ethics 46 Special Report: Silha Center Interview with Panama Papers 23 Undercover Video Maker James O’Keefe Continues Attacks Journalist Kevin Hall on the News Media, Faces Setbacks in Some Legal Disputes Special Report Data Privacy 48 Spring Symposium Marks the 30th Anniversary of Hustler 28 Sinclair Broadcasting Group’s “Must-Run” Segment Raises Magazine, Inc. v. Falwell , Discusses History, Purpose, and Ethical Questions Impact of Political Cartoons Media Ethics Silha Center Events 30 Canada Passes Federal Shield Law; Courts Deny Requests to Compel a Journalist and Internet Media Company to Disclose Sources and Information Reporter’s Privilege SILHA C ENTER S TAFF JANE E. KIRTLEY SILHA C ENTER D IRECTOR AND S ILHA P ROFESSOR OF M EDIA E THICS AND L AW SCOTT M EMMEL SILHA BULLETIN E DITOR BRITTANY R OBB SILHA R ESEARCH A SSISTANT ELAINE H ARGROVE SILHA C ENTER S TAFF 2 Trump, continued from page 1 This is a very interesting read but in terms of the way he available online at: https://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/28/books/ processed them, he admits in the author’s note that he let review/Carrt.html. people tell their own stories and he printed them.” She added, In a January 9 Slate book review, staff writer Isaac Chotiner “[I]t sounds like Michael Wolff’s modus operandi was to let wrote that Wolff “has been known to make lazy mistakes; he the people he interviewed spin yarns.. And then he didn’t tells stories that prompt eyerolls because something about necessarily factcheck them.” them just doesn’t ring true.” On January 9, PolitiFact reported that it had found seven In an author’s note, Wolff acknowledged that some of the errors in Wolff’s book, such as its claim that thenSpeaker of the stories in his book may be inaccurate. “Many of the accounts House John Boehner resigned in 2011 when it was actually 2015. of what has happened in the Trump White House are in confl ict However, PolitiFact argued that the “bigger problem with Fire with one another; many, in Trumpian and Fury . is that by any standard of sound journalism it has SPECIAL fashion, are baldly untrue,” he wrote. big problems with transparency and sourcing” and that it “hardly seems a move in the right direction for wellsourced, evidence SERIES “Those confl icts, and that looseness with the truth, if not with reality itself, are an based journalism. Instead it’s a stew of mysteriously sourced elemental thread of the book. Sometimes I have let the players dramatic scenes.” For example, PolitiFact noted that it was offer their version, in turn allowing the reader to judge them. In unclear whether Wolff interviewed Jared Kushner and Ivanka other instances I have, through a consistency in accounts and Trump, and whether he was actually the witness to certain through sources I have come to trust, settled on a version of events, such as an alleged confrontation between Ivanka Trump events I believe to be true.” and Bannon. Second, several news outlets alleged that Wolff had used On January 4, Politico contended that Wolff “appear[ed] to interviews that were conducted “off the record” or that the have mastered a journalistic skill that allows him to suck up interviewee did not realize was a formal interview, according one moment and then, when seated at the keyboard, to spit to The Washington Post on January 7. The Post concluded that out.” The following day, CJR differentiated Wolff’s methodology “the lesson is there for the taking but certain to be ignored again from reporting by traditional outlets. According to CJR, Wolff and again: Let the speaker beware.” practiced “access journalism,” which “does not replace other Jim VandeHei and Mike Allen, the cofounders of the news forms of journalism—it augments it,” but requires “prioritizing website Axios, called Wolff's “liberties with offtherecord access over accountability.” Conversely, traditional outlets comments . ethically unacceptable to nearly all reporters” in a “[play] a different game. Yes, they occasionally produce gossipy January 5 story. They continued, “In the past year, we have had accounts of the president’s diet, both media and culinary, and many of the same conversations with the same sources Wolff they work to maintain relationships that will allow for sitdowns used.