NPR business editor says it doesn’t have space for all perspectives
- Uri Berliner says NPR lost public trust due to left-leaning bias
- Berliner: NPR changed from open-minded curiosity to progressive groupthink
- Berliner said, 'I've had a lot of support from colleagues'
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(NewsNation) — Uri Berliner, a senior business editor at NPR, says the renowned organization doesn’t allow “enough spaciousness to consider all kinds of perspectives” after he published an insider account for The Free Press.
According to the veteran journalist, NPR has become stacked with like-minded people who cater to what he sees as an ever-narrowing, progressive worldview, appealing to a select audience and losing touch with the broader public.
In a Tuesday interview on NewsNation’s “CUOMO,” Berliner addressed the backlash from his NPR colleagues, who have publicly disagreed with his assertions.
“I’m not surprised by the response that came from management and the same managers that I’ve been making a lot of these points about,” Berliner said. “I will say, I’ve had a lot of support from colleagues … many of them unexpected, who say they agree with me. Some of them say this confidentially.”
Berliner also alleges that certain stories were ignored, mistakes were made, and corrections were never issued, all of which, he says, “shatters trust and engenders cynicism about the media.”
When Berliner examined voter registration at NPR’s Washington, D.C., office, he found 87 registered Democrats and not a single Republican.
The GOP under former President Donald Trump planned funding cuts to public media following allegations of bias, which resulted in a surge of donations to NPR.
Berliner, who described himself as a “lifer” at NPR, claimed the organization has evolved from a place guided by “curiosity, open-mindedness” to one characterized by a “much narrower kind of niche thinking, a groupthink that’s really clustered around very selective, progressive views.”
The veteran journalist acknowledged that his criticism of what he sees as a lack of political diversity at NPR and a failure to present balanced perspectives would likely be met with resistance from his colleagues.
“I think people want open dialogue. I think people want to have honest debates,” Berliner said. “Most people are not locked into ideologies. And I think many people are just sick of it. And that’s one of the reasons people distrust so much of the media.”
