Beginning on Monday afternoon, Democrat and former Mayor of New Orleans Ray Nagin began a 10 year prison sentence for corruption charges that were as result of his actions following the landfall of Hurricane Katrina and subsequent flooding of the city in August 2005. When it came to reporting on the story during their evening newscasts, ABC World News Tonight with David Muir refused to cover the story while NBC Nightly News offered only a 15-second news brief. Over on CBS, the CBS Evening News with Scott Pelley was preempted due to coverage of the men’s tennis final at the U.S. Open.
Ray Nagin
By Matthew Balan | July 9, 2014 | 9:00 PM EDT
On Wednesday, ABC and CBS's evening newscasts punted yet again on reporting Ray Nagin's Democratic affiliation, after the disgraced former New Orleans mayor was sentenced to 10 years in federal prison for corruption. World News and CBS Evening News previously omitted Nagin's party ID when he was indicted in January 2013, and after a jury convicted him in February 2014.
ABC's Diane Sawyer hyped that the politician's sentencing was "a staggering fall from grace for the man who rose to national fame leading his city through Hurricane Katrina," but failed to mention that the Democrat was widely criticized for his handling of the disaster. By contrast, Brian Williams mentioned both his political affiliation and the post-Katrina criticism on NBC Nightly News: [MP3 audio available here; video below the jump]
As He Gets 10-Year Sentence, Former New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin's Party Affiliation Disappears or Is Downplayed
By Tom Blumer | July 9, 2014 | 2:29 PM EDT Former New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin was sentenced to 10 years in prison today on fraud, bribery and related charges. In a January 2006 appearance on PBS's Tavis Smiley Show, Nagin, who in many several previous news reports had been described as a Republican who became a Democrat once he sought political office, told Smiley that he "never was a Republican" and he has been a "life-long Democrat."
As would be expected, several media outlets are failing to report Nagin's declared status as a "life-long Democrat." A particularly egregious example is at USA Today (saved here for future reference, fair use and discussion purposes, and in case USAT makes revisions; HT longtime NB commenter Gary Hall; bolds are mine):
By Paul Bremmer | May 28, 2014 | 2:08 PM EDT
On Wednesday, the Washington Post ran a news brief on page A3 about disgraced former New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin, but the paper conveniently forgot to mention that Nagin is a Democrat. The blurb began, “A federal judge says that former New Orleans mayor C. Ray Nagin will have to pay the government more than $501,000 as a result of his conviction on bribery and other charges.”
The brief went on to mention Nagin’s 20-count conviction in February that included bribery, fraud, money laundering, and conspiracy. However, the former mayor’s party ID was nowhere to be found.
By Jack Coleman | February 14, 2014 | 9:27 PM EST
Can MSNBC's Rachel Maddow go a single day without descending into laughable hackdom?
Any previous doubts about this were erased by her show last night. Mere seconds after she was introduced by colleague Chris Hayes, and after Maddow offered a chirpy "happy snow day" to viewers (this during one of the most brutal winters in memory), Maddow began her show with this -- "The administration of Republican North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory has just been subpoenaed in conjunction with a federal criminal investigation." (Video after the jump)
By Jack Coleman | February 13, 2014 | 5:03 PM EST
MSNBC's Rachel Maddow briefly departed from her Ahabesque obsession with Bridgegate last night to mention two relatively picayune matters -- a potentially "catastrophic" storm bearing down on the East Coast and two mayors getting convicted on corruption charges.
Anyone familiar with MSNBC's modus operandi knows what to expect from its, uh, "reporting" on political corruption -- if the politician is a Democrat, a viewer will wait in vain for any mention of party affiliation, while if said corrupt pol is a Republican, the affiliation will be cited repeatedly in the first sentence. (Video after the jump)
By Matt Hadro | February 12, 2014 | 7:33 PM EST
None of the network evening newscasts identified ex-New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin as a Democrat when reporting on his conviction of 20 counts of corruption on Wednesday.
The ABC World News called him "the face and voice of a city in ruins" post-Katrina, and joined CBS in simply labeling him the "former mayor" of New Orleans without the Democratic label. As NewsBusters reported last year, all the same evening newscasts dropped the Democratic label at Nagin's indictment.
By Tom Blumer | February 12, 2014 | 4:24 PM EST
Former New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin was convicted on 20 of 21 counts of corruption and bribery today.
USA Today reporter Rick Jervis did a bit of a profile of Nagin in the course of reporting on the convictions. It included a recounting of his time at the city's helm during Hurricane Katrina in 2005. But one thing his 2:39 p.m. report predictably did not include was Nagin's Democratic Party affiliation (bolds are mine):
By Tim Graham | February 7, 2014 | 2:14 PM EST
Friday’s New York Times led off the National section on A-11 with Campbell Robertson’s story “Taking Stand, Nagin Defends Acts as Mayor of New Orleans.” But the entire article on the Democrat’s corruption trial unspooled for 931 words without the word “Democrat.” Jurors have heard how Nagin enriched himself from contractors rebuilding the city after Hurricane Katrina.
The Times also couldn’t manage the party ID on January 31 in a 787-word Robertson story headlined “Prosecutors Lay Out List of Ex-Mayor’s Schemes.” There was no party ID for Nagin as his corruption trial discussed in a February 2 Robertson story on current Mayor Mitch Landrieu being re-elected.
Former New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin's Democratic Party Affiliation Disappears at AP As Bribery Trial Begins
By Tom Blumer | February 3, 2014 | 5:40 PM EST Though there were some exceptions (e.g., this one caught by Geoffrey Dickens at NewsBusters a few days ago), most press reports as the beginning of the trial of former New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin tagged him as a Democrat.
Apparently, there's a quota on "D" references at the Associated Press. A lengthy AP story by Kevin McGaill carried at Time.com and AP's national site has no reference to Nagin's party affiliation. Nagin was part of the odd couple of Democrats (former Governor Kathleen Blance is the other) who failed to do what they needed to do to prepare New Orleans and the Bayou State for Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Excerpts from the longer Time story follow the jump (bolds identifying opportunites to identify Nagin's party affiliation are mine):
By Geoffrey Dickens | January 30, 2014 | 9:05 AM EST
Within the span of 40 seconds, NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams reported on two politicians caught in scandals, one a Republican the other a Democrat, but he gave the party affiliation of only one of the troubled politicians. Can you guess which one?
On the January 27 Nightly News, Williams reported that “Florida Republican Congressman Trey Radel has resigned effective tonight. He pleaded guilty to misdemeanor cocaine possession.” In the very next news brief Williams announced: “A name from New Orleans’s recent past went on trial there today. Ray Nagin, mayor of the city during Katrina, in court on bribery charges.” Williams never noted Nagin was a Democrat. (video after the jump)
Former New Orleans Mayor Nagin, Arraigned on Bribery Charges, Not ID'd as a Democrat in 500-Word AP Story
By Tom Blumer | February 21, 2013 | 10:28 AM EST At the Associated Press yesterday, Michael Kunzelman managed to write a 500-word story about the arraignment of former New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin on bribery charges without once mentioning that Nagin is a Democrat.
That's probably not a "Name That Party" record for "Most Words Used in an AP Story about a Democratic Politician Tainted by Scandal and/or Corruption," but it's especially galling, given the mayor's culpability (along with then-Governor Kathleen Blanco) for failing to ensure that New Orleans was evacuated on a timely basis in anticipation of Hurricane Katrina, and given the national press's non-stop blaming of President George W. Bush for the death, destruction and mayhem which followed. Excerpts from Kunzelman's report follow the jump (bolds are mine):