New York Times editorial page editor James Bennet says that a controversial column advancing a race-based theory of "Jewish genius" was fully edited and scrutinized prior to publication.
"All our columns are fact-checked and edited," he said in a statement to POLITICO.
Bennet did not discuss specifically how references to bogus claims about Ashkenazi Jews having superior intelligence made it through the Times's editing process, which has been called into question since the publication of Bret Stephens's much-criticized column and the subsequent addition of an editor's note.
In interviews with POLITICO, Times insiders described an ad hoc system, with veteran columnists typically not having a primary editor while newer hires are often assigned one. It also can vary greatly, they say, as to how closely columnists work with research assistants on fact-checking and with copy editors prior to publication.
"As we've added columnists in recent years, we've added a new layer of editing on top of our traditional practices, to help accustom them to writing for Times Opinion," Bennet said over email. "Longtime Times columnists, who have well-established relationships with particular editors, have continued with the approach they're used to."
Andrew Rosenthal, who served as Times editorial page editor from 2007 to 2016, said that columnists traditionally didn't have editors, though often consulted with one another while writing. Indeed, long-serving columnist Gail Collins has described not having to alert an editor about what she's writing, though she acknowledged that a research assistant and copy editor play key roles before publication.
Bennet took over for Rosenthal in 2016 and his first splashy hire was Stephens, who emerged during the presidential election as a fierce critic of Donald Trump in The Wall Street Journal's right-leaning opinion section. Stephens, a self-described "climate agnostic," ignited criticism with his debut Times column questioning climate science, prompting the paper's publisher, A.G. Sulzberger, to urge frustrated readers not to cancel their subscriptions.
Both Bennet and Sulzberger stressed how the hiring of Stephens, a conservative, would facilitate debate, yet recent controversies haven't been fueled by ideological disputes. Last August, Stephens faced a backlash online for his over-the-top reaction to a critic calling him a "bedbug" on Twitter, which included a Times column that seemed to compare the mild jab to Nazi rhetoric.
The columnist blow-ups have dogged Bennet, a former top Atlantic editor who has held several prominent reporting roles at the Times, and is seen as a contender to be the paper's next executive editor.
Bennet has drawn praise for expanding the opinion stable with writers such as Jamelle Bouie, Michelle Goldberg and Farhard Manjoo, while also launching the innovative Privacy Project, which published a jarring investigation on cell phone data on Dec. 20. But the publication days later of Stephens's column again brought a flood of criticism to the Opinion department.
John M. Broder, who has spent more than two decades at the Times, and currently serves on the paper's editorial board, confirmed in an email that he's Stephens's primary editor, though he declined to discuss the bungled column. "There was a mistake in this case, which is why the column now has an editors' note," a Times spokesperson said in an email.
In the past, Stephens has noted receiving Bennet's guidance on his writing, telling The Washington Post in October that Bennet helped edit the infamous "bedbug" column. "After that whole thing erupted, James and I went out for a very friendly drinking session," Stephens said of the August incident. "His line was: 'We seem to be approaching peak Twitter insanity.'"
