Legendary progressive journalist resigns over censorship of Biden article
Daily News Article — Posted on October 30, 2020
(Compiled from the New York Post and Newsweek) — Progressive journalist Glenn Greenwald announced that he’s leaving The Intercept, a publication he co-founded, due to censorship of an article he wrote regarding corruption allegations surrounding Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden.
Greenwald posted a resignation letter on Twitter on Oct. 29, saying editors at the left-leaning publication refused to publish an article of his unless he deleted “all sections critical of Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, the candidate vehemently supported by all New-York-based Intercept editors involved in this effort at suppression.”
The journalist, who helped break news on classified NSA surveillance programs leaked by former contractor Edward Snowden about a decade ago, asserted that The Intercept’s decision and his choice to resign shows there is a trend of “repression, censorship and ideological homogeneity plaguing the national press generally have engulfed the media outlet I co-founded, culminating in censorship of my own articles.” He wrote,
“The censored article, based on recently revealed emails and witness testimony, raised critical questions about Biden’s conduct. Not content to simply prevent publication of this article at the media outlet I co-founded, these Intercept editors also demanded that I refrain from exercising a separate contractual right to publish this article with any other publication.”
Greenwald noted that he would be publishing the censored article, which is titled “Article on Joe and Hunter Biden Censored by The Intercept,” on Substack in full later on Thursday.
The week before he resigned from his own publication, Greenwald tweeted the following:
- “Is there a single journalist willing to say with a straight face they believe the emails relating to the Bidens are either fabricated or otherwise fraudulently altered, but the Bidens just aren’t saying so? There has to be some limits to your willingness to go to bat for them.”
- “When you report a huge archive, there’s no way to prove the negative that none of it is altered. You investigate & confirm as much as you can, then use your journalistic judgment. The only way you get confirmation is when the subjects of the reporting don’t deny the authenticity.”
- “As a journalist publishing private communications & docs that are incriminating, you know the subjects of the reporting will immediately claim they’re fake “if the[y] are.” Of course they will: that would kill the reporting! There’s a reason the Bidens aren’t claiming they’re fake.”
- “I don’t think that the emails — so far — reveal a huge scandal. They so far just establish standard sleaze and DC corruption. The huge scandal to me is the blatant rank-closing and cone of silence — a prohibition — erected “by journalists” around this story to defend Biden.”
On Tucker Carlson’s Fox News show that night, he elaborated:
“What makes it so much worse is that the reason the Bidens aren’t answering basic questions about this story — basic questions like: Did Hunter Biden drop that laptop off at that repair shop? Are the emails authentic? Do you deny that they are? Do you claim any have been altered or any of them fabricated? Did you in fact meet with Burisma executives as these emails suggest? . . . The reason that they don’t answer any questions is because the media has signaled that they don’t have to. That journalists will be attacked and vilified simply for asking.”
Watch the Oct 20th interview below:
Watch the Thursday Oct. 29 interview following his resignation from The Intercept: