An editor from conservative news site Breitbart and the co-director of USC’s Center for the Political Future clashed recently over media accuracy during a panel focused on the news media.
Joel Pollak, Senior-Editor-at-Large at Breitbart, argued that the mainstream media largely failed to portray all perspectives.
When asked about biases, Pollak referenced a New York Times article, and leveled the fault of tribalism, or maintaining loyalty to a specific social group, on mainstream media for saying that there can only be one set of facts and that conservative media dismisses many of them. He called for readers to be more discerning of bias because “whenever you’re getting a piece of information you’re also getting it with someone’s perspective.”
Panelist Brian Goldsmith, a former political journalist for national outlets, was quick to disagree.
“It’s a tactic of opinion journalists to say ‘we’re all biased, we’re all opinionated, there is no objective truth, there are no facts, but at least I’m admitting it,” Goldsmith said. "Whereas people in the middle are hiding their secret agenda.’”
Mike Murphy, the co-director of the Center for Political Future, criticized Breitbart and cited an instance when he said Breitbart had misreported facts about him during a panel called "’Alternative Facts:’ The News Media as Contributor and Victim,” a portion of the day-long conference “The Dis-United States of America: Tribalism in American Politics.”
While sitting in the audience of the event, which took place on campus Sept. 27, Murphy searched his own name on Breitbart’s website and found a 2017 article that stated Murphy “pocketed millions of dollars” from the Jeb Bush PAC that Murphy ran during the 2016 election.
Murphy denied the article’s claim and asked Pollak why the author did not bother contacting him for a statement.
“You can claim a lot of things at Breitbart, and you have every right to do what you do, but accuracy, with this cut and paste stuff, I don’t think is true,” he said.
Pollak did not respond to the questions concerning the of accuracy in Breitbart’s reporting and instead questioned Murphy’s motivations in sharing with MSNBC that “there were 30 Republican votes in the Senate for impeachment.”
Murphy quipped, “That’s not what I said, you’re back to your tricks.”
What Murphy actually told MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell was that “One Republican senator told me if it was a secret vote, 30 Republican senators would vote to impeach Trump.”
The interview in question was with MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell, where Murphy actually said that “one Republican senator told [him] if it was a secret vote, 30 Republicans would vote to impeach Trump.”
When Times reporter Eric Nagourney asked Pollak if he believed Murphy’s statement, he said the information was not accurate.
“No, it’s not true, I think your source is wrong because I think your source has an axe to grind.”
Pollack even spared with audience members when one woman told panelists that “laughing [at impeachment] undermines democracy.”
“No it doesn’t,” Pollak forcefully responded. “I’m not laughing at democracy...I’m laughing at the people telling you this stuff. I actually care about democracy. They reject democracy.”
The people Pollak referred to included his fellow panelist.
“Mike’s a player in the political arena. He’s a member of the Republican establishment and has advised several establishment candidates. Breitbart has three editorial policies. One is that we fight with Hollywood elites, institutional left and the Republican establishment. And we take them on because we see them as immensely powerful,” Pollak said in a follow-up interview.
The full panel video can be found here.