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New York Times Under Fire After Nearly 200 Contributors Blast Its Coverage of Transgender People in Damning Letter

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Nearly 200 past and present contributors to The New York Times have signed on to a damning letter detailing what they say is the paper of record’s “editorial bias” in “reporting on transgender, non⁠-⁠binary, and gender nonconforming people.” The letter follows months of what appears to be heightened criticism, born out of frustration over The Times’ reporting on transgender people.

Numerous, eye-opening examples of how the “Old Gray Lady,” as the paper is often called, positions and frames transgender people and the issues they and their families face are packed into the letter, which compares the paper’s coverage to “far-right hate groups.” Perhaps one of its most consequential call-outs is how The Times’ reporting is used by anti-LGBTQ state lawmakers and other officials to support anti-transgender legislation and policies.

“The natural destination of poor editorial judgment is the court of law. Last year, Arkansas’ attorney general filed an amicus brief in defense of Alabama’s Vulnerable Child Compassion and Protection Act, which would make it a felony, punishable by up to 10 years’ imprisonment, for any medical provider to administer certain gender⁠-⁠affirming medical care to a minor (including puberty blockers) that diverges from their sex assigned at birth,” it reads. “The brief cited three different New York Times articles to justify its support of the law: [Emily] Bazelon’s ‘The Battle Over Gender Therapy,’ Azeen Ghorayshi’s ‘Doctors Debate Whether Trans Teens Need Therapy Before Hormones,’ and Ross Douthat’s ‘How to Make Sense of the New L.G.B.T.Q. Culture War.’ As recently as February 8th, 2023, attorney David Begley’s invited testimony to the Nebraska state legislature in support of a similar bill approvingly cited the Times’ reporting and relied on its reputation as the ‘paper of record’ to justify criminalizing gender⁠-⁠affirming care.”

READ MORE: ‘Absolutely Sickening’: Arkansas Republican Asks Trans Woman About Her Genitals During Hearing on Anti-Trans Bill (Video)

The letter also packs a punch, using The Times’ long history of anti-LGBTQ reporting, going back decades, to show a pattern and prove its point.

“In 1963, the New York Times published a front⁠-⁠page story with the title ‘Growth of Overt Homosexuality in City Provokes Wide Concern,’ which stated that homosexuals saw their own sexuality as ‘an inborn, incurable disease’—one that scientists, the Times announced, now thought could be ‘cured.’ The word ‘gay’ started making its way into the paper. Then, in 1975, the Times published an article by Clifford Jahr about a queer cruise (the kind on a boat) featuring a ‘sadomasochistic fashion show.’ On the urging of his shocked mother, Times publisher Arthur Ochs Sulzberger sent down the order: Stop covering these people.”

The letter closes with another unfortunate observation: “There is no rapt reporting on the thousands of parents who simply love and support their children, or on the hardworking professionals at the New York Times enduring a workplace made hostile by bias—a period of forbearance that ends today.”

Many voiced their criticism of The Times on social media platforms like Twitter, where GLAAD CEO and President Sarah Kate Ellis noted, “our youth, and our community broadly, can no longer wait for the Times to do the right thing. We need to see action now: stop printing anti-trans stories, meet with trans leaders, and hire trans journalists.”

READ MORE: Majority of Republicans Support Christian Nationalism – Less Than Three in Ten Americans Overall Do: Report

“Misinformation about transgender people and issues isn’t just bad journalistic ethics, it is also dangerous and has real-world consequences,” she tweeted, adding, “irresponsible Times coverage contributes to the current anti-trans climate and gives cover to extremist politicians out to exploit and destroy trans lives.”

GLAAD has joined with over 100 organizations and leaders in publishing their own, similar letter to the paper, calling it “appalling that the Times would dedicate so many resources and pages to platforming the voices of extremist anti-LGBTQ activists who have built their careers on denigrating and dehumanizing LGBTQ people, especially transgender people.”

GLAAD, whose purpose is to work “through entertainment, news, and digital media to share stories from the LGBTQ community that accelerate acceptance,” detailed some of its efforts with The New York Times.

READ MORE: ‘Read the Room’: Nikki Haley’s Presidential Campaign Announcement Panned by Left and Right

“Article after article, page after page, day after day, we have tried to educate you and your colleagues. We have sent emails, made calls, tried to help reporters source stories, and in one case, after more than four months of trying, some of us were even able to sit down and talk with you,” GLAAD says. “It is clear that our behind-the-scenes outreach has had zero impact. What has had impact, however, is your irresponsible coverage.”

“The Science Desk decided to spend more than a year undermining support for transgender youth by writing ‘just asking questions’ stories about medically approved best practices for gender-affirming healthcare,” GLAAD continues. “The Opinion editors gave noted cisgender heterosexual Pamela Paul space for her unfounded thoughts about how LGBTQ people should describe themselves, as if the Times could not find anyone with lived experience in the LGBTQ community to write about our issues. Then the Times boasted about hiring David French, an attorney for the Alliance Defending Freedom, an organization that the Southern Poverty Law Center designated an anti-LGBTQ hate group that actively spreads misinformation about LGBTQ people and pushes baseless legislation and lawsuits to legalize discrimination.”

 

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‘Bad News’ for Sidney Powell as First Trump Co-Defendant in Georgia RICO Case Takes Plea Deal: Legal Expert

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September 29, 2023

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The first of 19 co-defendants in Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’ RICO and election interference case against Donald Trump has pleaded guilty in what is being described as a “plea deal.”

“Under the terms of an agreement with Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’s office, Hall pleaded guilty to two counts of conspiracy to commit election fraud, conspiracy to commit computer theft, conspiracy to commit computer trespass, conspiracy to commit computer invasion of privacy, and conspiracy to defraud the state,” NBC News reports. “Under the terms of the deal, he’s being sentenced to five years probation.”

CNN previously reported “Hall, a bail bondsman and pro-Trump poll-watcher in Atlanta, spent hours inside a restricted area of the Coffee County elections office when voting systems were breached in January 2021. The breach was connected to efforts by pro-Trump conspiracy theorists to find voter fraud. Hall was captured on surveillance video at the office, on the day of the breach. He testified before the grand jury in Fulton County case and acknowledged that he gained access to a voting machine.”

READ MORE: Will McConnell and Senate Republicans Use Feinstein’s Passing to Grind Biden’s Judicial Confirmations to a Halt?

Former U.S. Attorney Joyce Vance, a professor of law and frequent MSNBC contributor, says Hall “was in the thick of things with Sidney Powell on Jan 7 for the Coffee County scheme involving voting machines. If he’s cooperating, it’s a bad sign for her.”

Hall’s plea deal “spells bad news for, among others, Sidney Powell,” says former Dept. of Defense Special Counsel Ryan Goodman, an NYU Law professor of law. Goodman posted a graphic showing the overlap in charges against Hall and Powell, which he called “alleged joint actions.”

See the graphic above or at this link.

 

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Far-Right Republicans Kill GOP Bill to Keep Government Running in ‘Embarrassing Failure’ for McCarthy: Report

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September 29, 2023

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With a shutdown less than 36 hours away, far-right Republicans in the House of Representatives Friday afternoon voted against their party’s own legislation to kept the federal government running. Democrats opposed the content of the bill and voted against it. Just 21 far-right members of the GOP conference were able to effectively force what appears to be an all but inevitable shutdown at midnight on Saturday.

“HARDLINE HOUSE RS take down stopgap funding bill. 21 GOP no votes. 232-198,” reported Punchbowl News’ Jake Sherman just before 2 PM Friday.

NBC News reported that a “band of conservative rebels on Friday revolted and blocked House Republicans’ short-term funding bill to keep the government open, delivering a political blow to Speaker Kevin McCarthy and likely cementing the chances of a painful government shutdown that is less than 48 hours away.”

READ MORE: Will McConnell and Senate Republicans Use Feinstein’s Passing to Grind Biden’s Judicial Confirmations to a Halt?

“Twenty-one rebels, led by Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., a conservative bomb-thrower and a top Donald Trump ally, voted Friday afternoon to scuttle the 30-day funding bill, known as a continuing resolution or CR, leaving Republicans without a game plan to avert a shutdown. The vote failed,” NBC added. “The embarrassing failure of the GOP measure once again highlights the dilemma for McCarthy as his hard-liners strongly oppose a short-term bill even if it includes conservative priorities. It leaves Congress on a path to a shutdown, with no apparent offramp to avoiding it — or to quickly reopen the government.”

A bipartisan group of at least 75 U.S. Senators has passed two bills this week that would keep the government running. Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy has refused to allow it to come to the floor for a vote.

 

 

 

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‘Wannabe Dictator’: Milley Appears to Slam Trump After Ex-President Suggested He Should Be Executed

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24 hours ago

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September 29, 2023

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General Mark Milley, the outgoing Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the top military advisor to the President, during his retirement speech Friday appeared to deliver strong criticism of former President Donald Trump, who appointed him to that post but since has waged war against him.

One week ago the ex-president had said that “in times gone by” General Milley would have been executed for treason. Trump in 2021 had called for General Milley to be “tried for treason.”

“Trump’s rhetoric is dangerous, not just because it is the exact sort that incites violence against public officials,” professor of global politics and political scientist Brian Klass wrote at The Atlantic after Trump’s most recent attack on the Chairman, “but also because it shows just how numb the country has grown toward threats more typical of broken, authoritarian regimes.”

READ MORE: Trump Goes on Wild Rant Targeting Judge and Attorney General After Being Found Liable for Fraud

Trump had written, “if the Fake News reporting is correct,” General Milley “was actually dealing with China to give them a heads up on the thinking of the President of the United States. This is an act so egregious that, in times gone by, the punishment would have been DEATH! A war between China and the United States could have been the result of this treasonous act.”

Milley was acting within his duties in a White House approved conversation, according to Klass.

On Friday, Milley appeared to blast Trump.

“We don’t take an oath to a tribe. We don’t take an oath to a religion. We don’t take an oath to a king, or queen, or a tyrant, or dictator. We don’t take an oath to a wannabe dictator,” Milley declared. “We don’t take an oath to an individual. We take an oath to the Constitution, and we take an oath to the idea that is America, and we’re willing to die to protect it.”

“Every soldier, sailor, airman, Marine, Guardian and Coast Guardsmen, each of us, emits our very life to protect and defend that document, regardless of personal price to a country.”

READ MORE: ‘He Knows I’m Right’: Democrat Mocks ‘Scared’ McCarthy and Blows Off Chairman Comer in ‘Very Unserious’ Hearing

Vanity Fair on Thursday reported General Milley “said he has taken security precautions to protect himself and his family after Donald Trump all but called for his execution last week.”

Watch Milley’s remarks below or at this link.

 

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