AP Photo/Danny Moloshok
A spokesperson for Los Angeles Times owner Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong abruptly ended an interview with Oliver Darcy after the “conversation grew combative” when the billionaire was asked about his efforts to bring CNN commentator Scott Jennings onto his paper’s editorial board.
Soon-Shiong was criticized after he blocked the Times from endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris for president, a move that led to three staffers resigning as members of the editorial board. The Washington Post, owned by Jeff Bezos, faced similar critiques when it also punted on issuing an endorsement in the final weeks of the election.
In the aftermath of the controversy, Soon-Shiong has posted on social media and spoken publicly about his intention to have a more “balanced” editorial board with a range of views — including specifically voicing his approval of Jennings, a conservative supporter of President-elect Donald Trump who has frequently made headlines for his on-air spats with fellow CNN panelists.
On Tuesday, Soon-Shiong tweeted about Jennings and cheered Jennings’ acceptance of his invitation to
In Tuesday’s edition of his newsletter Status, Darcy wrote about Soon-Shiong’s comments about Jennings, and how the above tweet led him to reach out to the paper for comment. His original attempt to get a statement from a Times representative ended up — to Darcy’s surprise — with Soon-Shiong’s personal spokesperson reaching out to see if Darcy wanted to interview the owner directly.
After establishing that the interview would be on the record and without restrictions, Soon-Shiong was on the phone with Darcy about an hour later.
“The interview began warmly enough,” wrote Darcy. “I thanked Soon-Shiong for his time and asked him what he intends to do with the Times’ editorial board.”
Soon-Shiong emphasized that he wanted the new board he was building “from scratch” to represent “all voices,” and he wanted “some truly critical thinkers, thoughtful people, onto the board,” who “can voice opinion, but I’m hopeful that people voice opinion based on the facts.”
The discussion turned to Jennings, with Soon-Shiong reiterating his past comments and telling Darcy that he likes Jennings’ “interactions” on CNN, how he battles “five to one” against “the left,” and saying that he thinks Jennings is “respectful” and “thoughtful” in how he presents his arguments.
These remarks
Whether or not you believe Jennings is respectful to his fellow panelists (and that is very debatable) is beside the point. The problem with Jennings is that his commentary is, at its core, dishonest. He may not outright blurt out lies, but he isn’t being truthful, either. His entire career hinges on defending a politician who subjects the populace to an endless stream of lies and conspiracy theories. Honest people are not in the line of work of defending dishonest people — especially when they are in such important positions of power.It was when I attempted to broach this topic with Soon-Shiong that our conversation grew combative. He told me it was merely my “opinion” that Trump lies more than other politicians. I pushed back, noting that the depths of his dishonesty have been well-documented by fact-based news organizations. Soon-Shiong didn’t apparently appreciate that. He scolded me for making “a statement.””If you want to talk about Donald Trump, that’s not the conversation I started with,” the billionaire said, clearly annoyed.Trying to steady the ship, I explained to him that I was only mentioning Trump because he had invited one of the president-elect’s staunchest defenders to be on his new editorial board. I wanted to ask
him how he grapples with the fact that defending Trump at every turn requires a person to engage in a high level of deceit. And, to be clear, defending Trump is primarily what Jennings gets paid to do. But when I told Soon-Shiong this, he accused me of harboring “bias” and added, “This is really what I think is the matter with the country.”
The interview continued along this pattern as Darcy described his efforts “to get things back on track,” despite how the interview “had without a doubt gone sideways,” but he was hoping to “reel it back in.”
According to Darcy, Soon-Shiong “interjected once more” as he attempted to ask a question, dunked on Darcy by calling him a “so-called reporter,” and said he had answered all of Darcy’s questions.
“In fact, he had not and so I conveyed that to him,” Darcy wrote, which then drew a “somewhat astonished” reply from Soon-Shiong of “What the heck?”
Darcy asked Soon-Shiong about how including “voices that are inherently dishonest” would fit with his new editorial board, and the Times owner “then accused me of arguing that his entire editorial board will be dishonest, pointing out that I do not know who — aside from Jennings — will sit on it.”
The interview was cut off right after that, when Darcy
“”Well then, what is your question?” Soon-Shiong replied — followed by his spokesperson interjecting, “I think we have pretty much answered all the questions that you have.”
Darcy wrote that he “candidly replied” to Soon-Shiong agreeing with his spokesperson, “No, to be honest, you haven’t answered all the questions I have,” but the spokesperson “ended the interview, signaling to Soon-Shiong to hang up the phone.”
Darcy concluded by noting that the Times owner “is not the only media boss grappling with the complex question of how to represent the views of Trump voters in the legacy press.” While it makes sense to incorporate the president-elect’s views in the conversation, Darcy continued, it did present the “challenge” of “platforming people who, like Trump, abuse the platforms they are given to mislead the greater public.”
Read the full story at Status.