Civic Media, a Wisconsin-based left-sing talk-radio station, admitted earlier today [Press Release Here] they agreed to make edits to an interview with President Joe Biden at the request of the White House before the broadcast aired. The radio station now says it was a decision that fell short of “journalistic interview standards.”
PRESS RELEASE – The Earl Ingram Show was one of two radio programs contacted by the Biden campaign following the June 27th debate to speak with President Biden. The interview was recorded on July 3rd and aired on July 4th on Civic Media radio stations across Wisconsin. On Monday, July 8th, it was reported to Civic Media management that immediately after the phone interview was recorded, the Biden campaign called and asked for two edits to the recording before it aired. Civic Media management immediately undertook an investigation and determined that the production team at the time viewed the edits as non-substantive and broadcast and published the interview with two short segments removed.
In the interest of transparency, and consistent with Civic Media’s mission and core values, we are sharing the edited segments now, and making the full, unedited interview available. Given the gravity of the current political moment, the stakes in this election, and the importance of public scrutiny of public officials in the highest office, we believe it is important to share this information.
The two edits were:
1. At time 5:20, the removal of “…and in addition to that, I have more Blacks in my administration than any other president, all other presidents combined, and in major positions, cabinet positions.”
2. At time 14:15, in reference to Donald Trump’s call for the death penalty for the Central Park Five, the removal of “I don’t know if they even call for their hanging or not, but he–but they said […] convicted of murder.”
With a high-profile interview comes a listener expectation that journalistic interview standards will be applied, even for non-news programming. We did not meet those expectations. (LINK)
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