Here’s what we know: 1) Over the course of a number of years, George Stephanopoulos, the chief anchor at ABC News, contributed $75,000 to the Clinton Foundation. 2) Stephanopoulos did not disclose these donations, even when reporting on and defending the Clinton Foundation. 3) The donations were not revealed to the public until after Stephanopoulos had been caught. 4) ABC News is taking no disciplinary action against Stephanopoulos.
This begs some questions:
— What did ABC News know and when did ABC News know it?
— Did ABC News know all along, for years, that their chief anchor had an ongoing Big Money relationship with a likely presidential candidate?
— If ABC News did know, why didn’t the network demand Stephanopoulos immediately disclose his conflict of interest to viewers?
— If ABC didn’t know, how is it okay for their chief anchor to hide such a relationship and conflict of interest from them?
NBC News not only suspended anchor Brian Williams for lying, the network also suspended Keith Olbermann for not disclosing a donation much smaller than $75,000 ($2400).
If ABC News expects to salvage its reputation, only immediate and complete transparency will accomplish that.
John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC
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