Last week, the editor of the Cleveland Plain Dealer, Chris Quinn, published a “Letter from the Editor” concerning the paper’s coverage of news concerning Donald Trump (mentioned on PressWatch). He stated that they are receiving a fair amount of mail/email on this topic criticizing the paper. I think these three paragraphs hit the main point of his response:
The north star here is truth. We tell the truth, even when it offends some of the people who pay us for information.
The truth is that Donald Trump undermined faith in our elections in his false bid to retain the presidency. He sparked an insurrection intended to overthrow our government and keep himself in power. No president in our history has done worse.
The facts involving Trump are crystal clear, and as news people, we cannot pretend otherwise, as unpopular as that might be with a segment of our readers. There aren’t two sides to facts. People who say the earth is flat don’t get space on our platforms. If that offends them, so be it.
https://www.cleveland.com/news/2024/03/our-trump-reporting-upsets-some-readers-but-there-arent-two-sides-to-facts-letter-from-the-editor.html
After publishing this column, the Plain Dealer received over 2700 emails, mostly positive, thanking the editor for “…reporting as fact the threat Donald Trump presents to our democracy” (see new editor column on the response). The Plain Dealer also published a sampling of the responses. Perhaps there is hope for us yet…
💬
Andy