The New York Times admitted it made a mistake in letting a Yale law lecturer author a report about Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh and a bar fight in 1985.
The NYT reported on Monday night that Kavanaugh once threw ice at a man at a college bar, an incident that resulted in a bar fight involving the man and one of Kavanaugh’s Yale friends. One of the authors on the report was Emily Bazelon, a Yale law lecturer and occasional op-ed writer who previously denounced Kavanaugh’s nomination for the Supreme Court. (RELATED: NYT Reporter Is Yale Lawyer Who Denounced Kavanaugh)
When asked by The Daily Caller if Bazelon’s reporting was a conflict of interest, the NYT responded, “This is a straightforward story based on police reports, which are public documents.”
However, the NYT admitted in a later statement to Mediaite that they should not have let Bazelon, who is billed as a staff writer, contribute to the story.
“Emily Bazelon is a writer for The New York Times Magazine who occasionally writes op-eds for the opinion section. She is not a news reporter. Her role in this story was to help colleagues in the newsroom gather public documents in New Haven, where Emily is based. In retrospect, editors should have used a newsroom reporter for that assignment. To be clear, the story is straightforward, fact-based and we fully stand behind it.”