Free Republic

On previous occasions, I’ve written about the blunt way legendary New York Times editor Abe Rosenthal dealt with a conflict of interest. The story bears repeating after the indictment of a top Senate official over his contacts with reporters, including one from the Times with whom he had a romantic relationship. The Rosenthal standard on conflicts was shaped by a remarkably similar case decades ago. Soon after a woman who had covered politics in Philadelphia was hired by the Times, a story from Philly said she had a secret affair with a politician she covered and accepted expensive gifts from...

Former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page was the primary target of a Senate Select Intelligence Committee (SSIC) staffer indicted for lying about his contacts with reporters, according to an indictment released on Thursday. James Wolfe, the former director of security for the SSIC panel, was in contact with at least three reporters at around the time they published articles about Page, an energy consultant who is a central player in the investigations into possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian government. Wolfe, 57, is charged with lying to the FBI during a Dec. 15, 2017 interview about whether he...

Shortened title. Full tile: Breaking: Feinstein’s Former Intel Staffer Daniel Jones is Also Connected to NY Times Reporter in Leak Investigation Former Senate Intel Committee aide, James A. Wolfe, 57, was arrested on Thursday after the DOJ conducted an investigation into classified information leaks to reporters.

New York Times reporter Ali Watkins' past tweets are raising eyebrows after revelations she had a three-year romantic relationship with a Senate Intelligence Committee aide now accused by federal prosecutors of leaking sensitive information to journalists, including herself. (Snip) In an April 2013 tweet, Watkins also tweeted about the fictional Netflix television show “House of Cards,” where a young reporter has an affair with an older member of Congress. “I wanted to be Zoe Barnes...until episode 4,” she tweeted. “Sleeping with your source- especially a vindictive congressman? #badlifechoice #HouseofCards”

The former security director for the Senate Intelligence Committee had been in three-year relationship with a New York Times reporter. WASHINGTON — A longtime staffer for the Senate Intelligence Committee has been arrested on charges of lying to investigators probing the potential leaking of classified information, the Justice Department announced Thursday night. A federal grand jury indicted the staffer, James A. Wolfe, 58, on three counts of making false statements in December about contacts with reporters, including providing sensitive information related to the work of the Senate Intelligence Committee, which he served as security director for 29 years. He was...

Wittes wrote on Twitter that the upcoming story could be published later Friday or on Monday. The heads-up comes a day after Trump revealed that he was bluffing last month when he suggested that he had recorded his conversations with Comey. May 16 appears to be his first time Wittes previewed Comey stories. Hours after Wittes posted the foreboding message that day, The Times published a shocking story: “Comey Memo Says Trump Asked Him To End Flynn Investigation.” The piece cited a memo that Comey filed just after a Feb. 14 meeting he had with Trump at the White House....

The New York Times reporter who called Melania Trump a “hooker” at a private event on Sunday has apologized, saying he wants to “take ownership of a mistake” he made. Jacob Bernstein, the son of Watergate reporter Carl Bernstein and the late writer-director Nora Ephron, came forward on Tuesday to identify himself as the journalist who repeated what he called “unfounded rumors” about the first lady in a conversation with model-actress Emily Ratajkowski. “Speaking at a party in what I thought was a personal conversation, I nevertheless made a stupid remark about the first lady,” he wrote in a series...

Michael Barbaro’s hit piece on Donald Trump in the New York Times Saturday started unraveling almost as soon as it was published. Even CNN anchors were astonished that Barbaro had no answer to charges of distortion from his story’s lead source. But for Barbaro this is just another embarrassing example of a failed attempt to take down a Republican. Barbaro’s article — “Crossing the Line: How Donald Trump Behaved With Women in Private” — includes several widely reported incidents that have been shown to be questionable, but the story really started to unravel when the woman featured most prominently in...