Media

NYT editor takes stand in Palin defamation suit

A New York Times editor took the stand Wednesday​ in Sarah Palin’s defamation lawsuit against the​ newspaper.

Editorial page editor James Bennet said he didn’t intend to link one of Palin’s political action committee​ ​ad​s​ to the 2011 shooting of Arizona Congresswoman Gabby Giffords when he edited the editorial that ran June 14.
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“I had created an ambiguity that people were reading to say something I didn’t mean to say,” Bennet testified in Manhattan federal court. “I did not intend to imply that it was a causal link to this crime.”

In the controversial editorial, the newspaper said Palin incited the mass shooting through an ad her PAC put out that placed “Giffords and 19 other Democrats under stylized cross hairs” on a map, according to ​the former Alaska governor’s lawsuit.

“What I wasn’t trying to say was that there was a direct causal link between this map and the shooting,” Bennet told Judge Jed Rakoff during a hearing over whether to dismiss Palin’s suit.

In order for her suit to go forward, the former ​GOP vice presidential nominee must prove that the Times acted with “actual malice.”

Bennet said he had edited the piece, which was written by Times editorial board member Elizabeth Williamson, close to deadline and wound up doing an overhaul of it.

“It was late in the day and our deadline was looming. I just began plunging in and effectively rewriting the piece,” he said.

He couldn’t remember if he had read any stories from earlier in the day debunking the link between Palin’s ad and the deadly Tuscon shooting.

Times researchers had emailed Williamson editorial pieces the newspaper had run just after the Giffords shooting. Bennet was also copied on those emails – but admitted he didn’t review the previous editorials and also didn’t look at the map that was featured in the Palin ad.

When asked if he thought shooter Jared Lee Loughner acted because of the ad, Bennet responded, “I did not know one way or the other. I did not think Jared Loughner was acting because of this.”

Rakoff is expected to rule at a later date.

It’s not yet clear whether Williamson or other Times employees will take the stand.

Lawyers for both the Times and Palin declined to comment.