The former chief U.S. Supreme Court reporter for the New York Times admits in her new book to having made monthly donations to Planned Parenthood during the 40 years she worked at the paper, despite insisting her coverage always remained objective.
Linda Greenhouse writes in her new book, Just a Journalist: On the Press, Life, and the Spaces Between, about her support for Planned Parenthood during her tenure at the Times, the Washington Times reports.
"It was important to me to write a check every month and sign my name," Greenhouse writes about unequivocal support for Planned Parenthood. "It was the signature of a citizen. The stories that appeared under my byline, on abortion and all other subjects, were the work of a journalist."
Even as Greenhouse won the 1998 Pulitzer Prize and purported to always cover the issues objectively, conservatives read her journalism as biased.
A spokesperson for the pro-life Susan B. Anthony List recalled how Greenhouse wrote with a clear pro-abortion bias.
"There’s a clear pro-abortion bias throughout her writing," Mallory Quigley said. "It’s difficult to be objective when you not only lean a certain direction but when you are a contributing member to the pro-abortion movement."
In 1989, nine years before winning the Pulitzer Prize and during her time covering the Supreme Court, Greenhouse joined a march at the National Mall in Washington, D.C. with pro-abortion activists. She was not covering the event for the Times. After her association to the march became publicly known, Washington bureau chief Howell Raines forced the journalist to apologize.
In reality, Greenhouse was not sorry, writing in her book that she felt sorry only for Raines who was unwilling to defend her.
"The person I felt sorry for was Raines, who was unable to summon the will to defend me," she writes.