Dan GillmorDec 30, 2022

The Santos/fraud situation is bad news for journalism on two grounds, but the Washington Post noticed only one of them.

The Post's coverage highlights Big Journalism's utter failure to do its job in a timely way even when a smaller news org had blown the whistle on some of Santos' lies weeks before the election.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/media/2022/12/29/north-shore-leader-santos-scoop/

1/x

(Edited to remove errant apostrophe...)

A tiny paper broke the George Santos scandal but no one paid attention

The North Shore Leader was onto his lies months before he was elected in New York.

The Washington Post
Show threadDan GillmorDec 30, 2022

That was bad enough. But there's another journalistic aspect to this situation that may be even worse.

The small news org that did cover the Santos deceit didn't have enough clout in its own community to make a difference.

There was a time in local journalism when coverage of (and scathing anti-Santos editorial about) the candidate's lies would have been enough to ensure his defeat.

2/x

Show threadmjfuhlhageDec 30, 2022
@dangillmor Did that community news organization editorialize against Santos? Or did it adopt the "no more endorsements or editorials" stance that many papers are going with?
Show threadmjfuhlhage
@dangillmor Ah, there it is: "The Leader reluctantly endorsed Santos’s Democratic opponent the next month. “This newspaper would like to endorse a Republican,” it wrote, but Santos “is so bizarre, unprincipled and sketchy that we cannot. … He boasts like an insecure child — but he’s most likely just a fabulist — a fake.”"
Dec 30, 2022 at 4:22amMastodon for Android
Show threadMatthew NadlerDec 31, 2022
@mjfuhlhage @dangillmor one would have hoped a Republican leaning editorial page would have more away with Republicans.