March 3, 2021
Former New York Times top COVID-19 reporter Donald McNeil Jr. publicly responded to his ouster in early February following a report from The Daily Beast accusing him of making “racist and sexist remarks.” Notably, the accusations include using the n-word in a discussion about why not to say it on a 2019 student trip he helped guide through a Times partnership program. He believes the Daily Beast report to be a leak from inside the newsroom.
In a four-part series on Medium, McNeil, who was employed by the Times from 1976 until 2021, explains the story behind the incident as well as the internal fallout at the Times following the publication of the two-year-old story. While McNeil admits that he can be touchy and blunt, he clears up how a five-word response to a Washington Post reporter about the situation was misconstrued, causing him to take matters into his own hands and not give the privilege to a “jackal” journalist.
Rukmini Callimachi’s got a lot to be proud of:
An editor s note has been added today to another @nytimes story by @rcallimachi, this one from 2014 https://t.co/VwdRwjHeCVpic.twitter.com/tzAznleVHv
And to another story, this one from the end of 2019. The Times investigators were looking at a broader range of work than just Caliphate https://t.co/FULAJwCmMs
Don’t worry. We’re sure there’s still lots more where that came from.
Michael Barbaro, host of the New York Times’ podcast The Daily, also spoke to Dean Baquet about the issue:
My conversation with @deanbaquet and @MarkMazzettiNYT about the findings of an NYT investigation into Caliphate and it s central character.