by WorldTribune Staff, October 18, 2016
The assertion that journalists are in the tank for Hillary Clinton is reflected in campaign cash from media members to the candidates, which swings in the Democratic nominee’s favor by a 27-to-1 margin.
Journalists have given $382,000 to Clinton and just $14,000 to GOP nominee Donald Trump, according to an Oct. 17 report by the Center for Public Integrity.
Some 430 in the media business donated to Clinton compared to 50 to Trump, the report said.
Among the Clinton cash cows included representatives from ESPN, Vogue, Elle, the New Republic and Facebook. The Pulitzer Prize winning media critic for the New Yorker also wrote a check for the Democrat.
“New Yorker television critic Emily Nussbaum, a newly minted Pulitzer Prize winner, spent the Republican National Convention pen-pricking presidential nominee Donald Trump as a misogynist shyster running an ‘ugly and xenophobic campaign,’ ” reported the Center for Public Integrity’s David Levinthal and Michael Beckel.
“What Nussbaum didn’t disclose in her dispatches: she contributed $250 to Democrat Hillary Clinton in April,” added the investigators who themselves are prohibited by their employer from making political donations. They found that many other news organizations also bar donations.
“That journalists support Democrats like Clinton is no surprise, as several polls have showed their political bent. But the donations put on an added layer of bias,” Paul Bedard wrote for the Washington Examiner on Oct. 17. “And in some cases, the donations came from institutions that urge employees to stay out of the political process, such as ESPN.”
Levinthal and Beckel found an ESPN insider who gave money to Clinton. They wrote:
“At ESPN, baseball news editor Claire Smith has made numerous small-dollar contributions to Clinton’s campaign that add up to almost $600. Smith, who in a tweet last week described Trump as a ‘would-be dictator & sexual predator,’ did not return requests for comment, and ESPN spokesman Ben Cafardo declined to comment.
“But ESPN’s political advocacy policy states that employees such as Smith ‘must avoid being publicly identified with various sides of political issues’ and that the sports network ‘discourages public participation in matters of political advocacy or controversy among editorial employees.’ ”
And while not reporters, some media executives who work for companies that prohibit journalist donations give money, like the Washington Post comptroller, said the Center for Public Integrity’s report.