EDITORIAL: Our response to Seth Bodnar’s attack on the Washington Reporter
As journalists, we prefer to report the news instead of being the news.
Unfortunately, Seth Bodnar, the Independent running for Senate in Montana in a three-way race, has forced our hand.
Earlier today, Bodnar made a vicious, hateful attack on this outlet, saying, “Republican dark money groups and their propaganda arm called the Washington Reporter.”
The Washington Reporter a propaganda arm? Bodnar says this about an outlet nominated for a Walter Cronkite Prize in Journalism Excellence? The Washington Reporter is widely known for its fearless, objective journalism, and no fair person would consider us a propaganda arm for anything but the truth.
Let’s review the facts.
The Reporter broke the news that Chuck Schumer and Jon Tester were recruiting Bodnar to run for Senate as an independent. We reported extensively on Bodnar’s Democratic ties.
We reported that Democratic operatives were trying to push Democrat Alani Bankhead out of the race to help Bodnar.
Then, when polling showed Bankhead performing better than Bodnar, we reported that too.
And when Bodnar’s allies launched attacks against Bankhead, including a vicious super PAC ad, we reported on those attacks.
While it might appear that all of our reporting made life more difficult for Bodnar, we follow the facts wherever they lead.
Bodnar’s real problem isn’t the Washington Reporter. His problem is Seth Bodnar.
He will forever be known as the Democrat who failed to pull off the fake independent role. Bodnar will be the cautionary tale political operatives discuss about when considering running this play.
We wish Seth Bodnar the best as he probably moves on to be an advisor to a Schumer super PAC, before losing to Sen. Tim Sheehy (R., Mont.) by 25 points.
In an abundance of caution to ensure that no one thinks the Washington Reporter is biased against Bodnar, we are pleased that our Editor in Chief Matthew Foldi is in Montana right now and has offered to interview Bodnar at any time.
