The New York Times declined to publish Republican Rep. Peter Roskam’s letter to the editor condemning its heavily criticized graphic that tracked members of Congress opposed to the Iran nuclear agreement, initially singling out Jewish lawmakers with a bold yellow highlight.
Roskam said he was “disappointed” the Times chose not to publish his letter, which he released in a statement Tuesday, calling the graphic’s publication “gross editorial negligence or shameful anti-Semitism.”
“If they want to have a robust argument and if they purport to be a venue for all perspectives they should have published the letter and it’s regrettable that they didn’t,” Roskam told The Daily Signal.
The graphic was “absolutely inappropriate,” he said, calling the Times’ singling out of Jewish lawmakers a “troubling” precursor to anti-Semitism that “feeds the canard of dual loyalty that legitimizes prejudice toward Jews worldwide.”
“The idea of people being categorized based on their faith and the implication that somehow their loyalty to the United States was put into question was absolutely jarring and historically it’s been a prelude to terrible things when those sort of categories are used,” he said.
The New York Times swiftly removed the “Jewish” column from the graphic following significant backlash across social media criticizing the list as an anti-semitic “Jew Tracker.” Editors initially made no mention of the omission other than a small note that the article was updated.
A day later, the Times ran an extensive correction at the bottom of the original feature headlined, “Lawmakers Against the Iran Nuclear Deal,” detailing reasons for the original inclusion of the Jewish categorization.
“A chart published on Thursday about Democrats in Congress who opposed the nuclear agreement with Iran oversimplified a complex aspect of the debate—the views of Jewish members of Congress and the divisions among American Jews over the deal,” the editor’s note said. “In one version, which ran in print and for part of the day online, a separate column in the chart noted which congressional Democrats who opposed the deal were Jewish and which were not.”
The note explained that under Times standards “the religion or ethnicity of someone in the news” may be included if the fact is “relevant and the relevance is clear to readers.”
“But the chart did not include this context, or make clear that Jewish voters and lawmakers, like other Americans, were sharply divided on the issue,” the note said. “Its emphasis may have left the impression that their Jewish identity was a decisive factor for Democrats who opposed the deal, an assumption that was not supported by reporting.”
Roskam, who opposed the Iran nuclear agreement, called the explanation “absurd” given that Jewish members fell on both sides of the accord.
“It’s completely unsatisfactory,” he said. ”Basically, they’re arguing, ‘We’re sorry our activities were offensive to you, but we’re not apologizing for the activity itself.’”
Times Public Editor Margaret Sullivan later published an op-ed commending the paper for changing the “insensitive and inappropriate” graphic.
