What happened: Politico did not win a Pulitzer Prize for publishing a leaked draft of the Supreme Court's decision overturning the landmark abortion case Roe v. Wade. Journalists are upset about it.
What they're saying (publicly): "Congratulations to everyone who won a Pulitzer," one former Politico reporter wrote. "But the fact that Politico [and Senior Legal Affairs Reporter Josh Gerstein] didn't win is a travesty. It’s absolutely ridiculous. I can’t believe it. Come on."
"Does anyone think that if the Washington Post or NY Times had gotten an early draft of the most important SCOTUS opinion in a generation, they would NOT have won?" wrote another former Politico journalist. "[Politico] and [Josh Gerstein] and team deserved better."
"[Politico] should have won [the Pulitzer]," wrote Jim Manley, a former aide to notorious sex pest Ted Kennedy.
What they're saying (anonymously): Vanity Fair reports there have been "behind-the-scenes whispers that Politico was judged unfairly," as well as questions about why the Pulitzer overlords had moved Politico's submission from the National Reporting category to the Breaking News category.
The Washington Post, owned by billionaire Jeff Bezos, won the National News category for its own abortion-themed coverage. In the Breaking News category, the Los Angeles Times won for reporting on L.A. City Council members saying racist things in leaked conversations.
At least one "dispirited" (and anonymous) New York Times reporter slammed the Pulitzer board's decision. "This is exactly what we want journalism to be, and for the biggest and most important journalism prizes to not recognize this story—it's just awful," the journalist told Vanity Fair. "That Politico story was a wake-up call for everybody to sort of say, one body of these three branches of government is not getting equal scrutiny to the other two, and we need to do something about that."
Bottom line: How is it possible we still don't know who the leaker was?
