NPR News Senior Vice President Ellen Weiss has resigned in the wake of a review of Juan Williams’ firing, according to a series of memos posted on NPR’s The Two-Way.
However, the review found nothing illegal about Wiliams’ dismissal. The memo reads:
Williams’ contract was terminated in accordance with its terms. The contract gave both parties the right to terminate on 30 days’ notice for any reason. The facts gathered during the review revealed that the termination was not the result of special interest group or donor pressure. However, because of concerns regarding the speed and handling of the termination process, the Board additionally recommended that certain actions be taken with regard to management involved in Williams’ contract termination.
Did those “certain actions” include forcing Weiss to step down?
According to Current, Weiss fired Williams by telephone call two days after he appeared on The Bill O’Reilly Show and said that airplane passengers in Muslim garb make him worried. Williams told Current that Weiss declined his request to speak in person and told him the decision had been confirmed from above. NPR CEO Vivian Schiller later apologized to the public for the swifntess of the decision, but stood by NPR’s policy that expressing a strong opinion on a controversial subject had compromised his ability to provide news analysis on NPR.
Fox News immediately hired Williams full time.
kstoeffel@observer.com :: @kstoeffel
