Bartiromo Update
It starts with President Trump’s primetime address in July on the 2020 election, in which he laid out allegations of Chinese interference and calling on Congress to tighten voting rules before the midterms. Seeing as how it was a big primetime speech, Bartiromo naturally planned to cover it on her show.
. . . However, the night before the speech, Ralph Giordano, Fox Business Network's senior vice president of programming, texted Bartiromo's production team, instructing them not to cover the speech.
When Bartiromo renewed her Fox News Media contract in February of last year, she reportedly negotiated language specifically barring Giordano from having any say over her show. He kept meddling anyway.
Navarro told Byers in a Friday interview that Bartiromo sent him a screenshot of Giordano's instructions to prove management was blocking her coverage, which he described as "censoring" it. Navarro said he passed the information "up the chain" to senior administration officials. An unnamed high-ranking White House official then called Fox News leadership to complain, effectively outing Bartiromo as the source of the leaked guidance.
It came on the heels of a report from the outlet Status claiming Bartiromo had shared internal editorial guidance with the administration, a report both Fox News and a representative for Bartiromo declined to comment on. Fox News Media CEO Suzanne Scott and President Jay Wallace were reportedly furious, though they let her show continue through the summer before pulling her off the air on August 9.
Bartiromo was named as a defendant in the Dominion and Smartmatic defamation lawsuits, both stemming from 2020 election coverage. Puck also noted that Giordano and Bartiromo already had a tense relationship at the network.
In Friday's post, I tied this to what is simply standard corporate policy, that if anyone reveals internal company documents to anyone outside the company without going througn corporate PR, it can be a terminable offense. This is something whistleblowers have to reconcile with their consciences, but even if they have e-mails that tie the company to murdering toddlers or something, they've got to understand they can be fired for releasing them fair and square.This is where, on Friday, I couldn't understand why Maria Bartiromo didn't ask Askalawyer.com about it, or failing that, simply talk to her own lawyer about this. Based on the link above, it sounds like she had already anticipated that Ralph Giordano, Fox's Senior VP for programming, would try to meddle in her reporting, and her contract, at least based on the story, already barred him from this.
So as far as I can surmise, Bartiromo did what YouTube lawyer Bruce Rivers advises people against, she turned a misdemeanor into a felony. What was basically a contract dispute that she could have just referred to her agent and her lawyer became a terminable offense. At least, this is what I speculate is the case based on this timeline: (1) She wants to do a story on the 2020 election; (2) Giordano sends her staff a text or e-mail telling them not to; (3) Bartiromo forwards this e-mail to the White house.
Prudence and temperance would have inserted a step (2.5), Bartiromo talks to her agent and attorney and suggests they discuss her contract with Fox's legal. Now, even if Giordano had done something to get Bartiromo's dander up, and she was really, really, really done with Fox, it would have enhanced her value in looking for different work if she'd done this all quietly. Now she's controversial. Walter Cronkite and Edward R Murrow both fully understood they had brands to protect. They didn't let themselves become controversial, at least beyond certain limits, and they were never petty in public.
So even if the Giordano spat was the straw that broke the camel's back for Bartiromo with Fox, her response has damaged her value on the post-Fox job market. Living well is the best revenge, and she seems to have blocked that avenue off.
