NPR published a scathing report exposing how the far-left Rolling Stone misled readers by covering up accusations of possession of inappropriate images of children against a prominent journalist whose home was raided.
The magazine implied that the raid carried out on April 2, 2022, targeted ABC News national security producer James Gordon Meek for political reasons. The reporter was roundly praised in the piece while the key storyline was apparently suppressed by the outlet.
The FBI raided a notable journalist’s home. Rolling Stone broke the news but didn’t say why.
My story for NPR on what happened inside the magazine: https://t.co/mbhIf7uWb1
— David Folkenflik (@davidfolkenflik) March 21, 2023
Now it is revealed that Meek was being investigated for the images, and NPR charges that Rolling Stone knowingly ignored that important detail.
Reporter David Folkenflik of NPR noted that the magazine ran with the “scoop” that law enforcement descended on a prominent journalist’s home and that he “disappeared from public view.” This viewpoint reportedly led to tensions in the Rolling Stone newsroom.
Some accused the magazine’s leadership of coddling the raided journalist due to personal connections. Reporter Tatiana Siegel, who penned the Meek story, left the publication for a rival just two months later, and her protests led to a review of the story by Rolling Stone’s parent company.
The raid on Meek was touted as “quite possibly the first” carried out by the Biden administration against a reporter. He was a former investigator for the U.S. House Homeland Security Committee and had been with ABC News since 2013.
The article said Meek may be “on the wrong side of the national security apparatus.”
Meek left ABC after the raid, and a publishing deal with Simon & Schuster fell through.
Seigel intended to include a key detail in the article — Meek was raided due to a federal investigation into images of children that were found. However, Folkenflik cited several sources pointing towards Rolling Stone editor-in-chief Noah Shachtman as the reason for the omission.
The NPR story said that Shachtman asked that a photo of Meek not accompany the article. In its place, he requested an image focusing on the FBI.
Further, when Siegel was pulled away to care for her dying mother, Folkenflik reported that Shachtman intervened. He apparently changed the story to appear that Meek was raided due to his journalistic endeavors and not the investigation into inappropriate images.
NPR reported that Siegel was outraged when she saw the edited results of her work. And a former writer for Rolling Stone, Marisa Kabas, called it “appalling” and “journalistic malpractice of the highest form.”
