NEW YORK — Eason Jordan, CNN's chief news executive, who led much of the network's war coverage, resigned late Friday in the wake of contentious comments he recently made about journalists killed by U.S. troops in Iraq.
During a Jan. 27 panel discussion in Davos, Switzerland, Jordan alleged that some reporters and cameramen killed in the combat zones had, in fact, been targeted, according to some observers in the audience. The World Economic Forum, which sponsored the panel discussion, has declined to release the transcript or videotape of the off-the-record session, which was titled "Will Democracy Survive the Media?"
In a statement Jordan sent to his staff Friday, the CNN executive vice president cited "conflicting accounts" over his recent remarks as a threat to the news organization's credibility. In resigning, Jordan said he sought "to prevent CNN from being further tarnished by the controversy."
CNN resignation -- An article Saturday in Section A about the resignation of Eason Jordan, CNN's vice president and chief news executive, said that a website called Easongate.com offered a clearinghouse of criticism related to Jordan's statements about journalists killed by U.S. troops in Iraq, including a link to "mainstream columnists such as Roger L. Simon." In fact, one link is to a website and blog by Roger L. Simon, a mystery writer and screenwriter, not Roger Simon, the columnist for U.S. News & World Report. The article also said that in an April 2003 opinion piece in the New York Times, Jordan wrote that he did not allow his network to report all it had learned "during the intense early days of combat in Iraq, for fear that releasing certain confidential information would put lives in jeopardy." Jordan's essay was about his network's coverage in the years preceding the war as well as in the early days of the war.
CNN resignation -- An article in Saturday's Section A about the resignation of CNN executive Eason Jordan said that in an April 2003 opinion piece in the New York Times, Jordan wrote that he did not allow his network to report all it had learned "during the intense early days of combat in Iraq, for fear that releasing certain confidential information would put lives in jeopardy." Jordan's essay was about his network's coverage in the years and months preceding the war. A correction Tuesday erroneously said his essay referred also to his network's coverage during the early days of the war.
The announcement comes after a week when commentators and newspaper editorial writers joined the chorus of complaints among Internet bloggers that Jordan had made insupportable accusations.
In a commentary in Thursday's Wall Street Journal, Bret Stephens, a member of the paper's editorial board who had attended the session, described the exchange. "Mr. Jordan observed that of the 60-odd journalists killed in Iraq, 12 had been targeted and killed by U.S. forces," Stephens wrote.
U.S. Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), who had shared the Davos stage with Jordan as a panelist, told the Washington Post that the CNN executive at first implied "it was official military policy to take out journalists." After other panelists challenged him, Jordan then "modified" his remarks, Frank said, but did not remove the sense that U.S. soldiers intended to harm those they knew to be journalists.
Jordan has since sought to defend himself, saying he never believed that anyone from the U.S. military had tried to kill a journalist. But the furor grew beyond the reported mild gasps at the Davos session into a wider media discussion.
CNN drew scrutiny from on-air cable commentators, radio talk-show hosts and Internet petitioners, some of whom called for a release of Jordan's exact words. On the network's cable rivals, MSNBC and Fox News, talk-show hosts Joe Scarborough and Sean Hannity took Jordan to task.
