Daily Beast retracts story on Scott Walker

Another major media outlet has apologized after getting a story about Scott Walker wrong. Last week, it was the New York Times; now, it’s The Daily Beast.

The Daily Beast has retracted an article from one of its college columnists that claimed that the Wisconsin governor’s budget would cut sexual assault reporting from the state’s universities.


The post, published Friday, cited a report from Jezebel that wrongly interpreted a section of the state budget to mean that all assault reporting requirements were to get cut altogether.

In fact, the University of Wisconsin system requested the deletion of the requirements to get rid of redundancy, as it already provides similar information to the federal government, UW System spokesman Alex Hummel told The Associated Press on Friday.

The Daily Beast’s correction and retraction is posted in full below. The “USA Today” story it references, however, is actually an AP article posted on the site:

“A Daily Beast college columnist at the University of Wisconsin based this article off a Jezebel posting which was incorrectly reported. Jezebel updated their post on Saturday with the following after USA Today [sic] published a story debunking Jezebel’s account and clarifying Gov. Scott Walker’s position. ‘UPDATE: After Jezebel ran this item yesterday, a spokesman for the University of Wisconsin came forward—over two weeks after the budget was released—to clarify: the University requested that Gov. Walker delete the requirements because efforts were redundant with their compliance of the Cleary Act. Scott Walker’s camp assures that he’s committed to protecting victims.’

The Daily Beast is committed to covering the news fairly and accurately, and we should have checked this story more thoroughly. We deeply regret the error and apologize to Gov. Walker and our readers. This story should be considered retracted.”

The Daily Beast did not include the last two sentences of Jezebel’s ‘update’, which were added later:

“We reported this piece without full context, and while this piece conveys factual information, omission of that context for that information presents an unfair and misleading picture. We regret the error and apologize.”

Jezebel reporter Natasha Vargas-Cooper tweeted her own thoughts on the ‘update’:

Ran an update on the Walker piece. Find another thing to be outraged about sweet, sweet Walkerites. — Natasha VC (@natashavc) February 28, 2015

Also, I'm not gonna apologize for reporting what was in the budget. Because that was in the budget. Ask your gov. to apologize for bad optix — Natasha VC (@natashavc) February 28, 2015

At a time when there is HEAVY scrutiny on state/fed/colleges, a proposal to delete standing regulations, requires more tact. — Natasha VC (@natashavc) February 28, 2015

Vargas-Cooper apologized for the error Saturday afternoon:

(1) I realize now that it would have been worth a follow up phone call to Walker's office. — Natasha VC (@natashavc) February 28, 2015

(2) So, you guys, Walker folk and media pundits alike, I screwed up. — Natasha VC (@natashavc) February 28, 2015

(3) I know I said I wasn't going to say sorry but I hope you won't fault me for changing my mind. — Natasha VC (@natashavc) February 28, 2015