NYT Editor Repeats That Standing Up For Journalistic Ethics in Trans Coverage Violated Policy
Jazmine Hughes, who resigne after signing a letter protesting Israel’s treatment of Palestinians in Gaza, also signed an earlier letter objecting to biased coverage of trans issues by the paper where she worked as a staff writer.
by Evan Urquhart
Last February, a diverse group of over 180 New York Times contributors wrote an open letter to the standards editor raising concerns that bias in the paper’s coverage of trans issues (particularly gender-affirming care for youth) was misleading NYT readers. At the time, the NYT conflated the letter journalists delivered to the standards office with another letter, by the advocacy group GLAAD, to cast the journalists raising standards issues as engaging in protest or issue activism (a violation of NYT policy).
Earlier reporting suggested that NYT leadership considered firing or suspending staff members who signed the letter, but settled on a strong warning, in effect saying that if signatories stepped out of line again there would be serious consequences. Now, it seems, those consequences have come for one of the signatories. Jazmine Hughes, an award-winning staff writer for the New York Times Magazine, resigned from the NYT on Friday, after signing a letter opposing the siege of Gaza by Israel. In the announcement of her resignation Jake Silverstein, the editor of the NYT Magazine, explicitly mentioned the earlier letter to the standards editor. Silverstein described both as having broken NYT policy over engaging in public protest.
screenshot from the New York Times
The writers of the contributors’ letter have long maintained that the letter concerned editorial standards around coverage of trans issues, and as such was not a political protest or issue advocacy. “Leadership has repeatedly and falsely claimed that our letter was delivered with a different letter from GLAAD in a cynical effort to dismiss its own contributors and staff as “advocates” and justify attempts to intimidate and retaliate against Times staff who share our concerns,” they wrote last April, in a follow up to the original letter.
The possibility of future retaliation against signatories was hinted at in reporting by Vanity Fair about the controversy, in a story that relied on anonymous sources in the NYT newsroom.
screenshot from Vanity Fair
The explicit mention of the earlier letter by Silverstein suggests that NYT senior leadership haven’t forgotten the attempt to bring attention to the NYT’s biased record in their trans coverage, and are going out of their way to make that clear to those both inside and outside the organization.