2nd Offensive Cartoon Leads NYT to Drastic Move

Newspaper will no longer run syndicated cartoons after publishing one deemed anti-Semitic
By Jenn Gidman,  Newser Staff
Posted Apr 30, 2019 7:31 AM CDT
NYT Makes Drastic Change After New Cartoon Complaints
This May 2, 2017, file photo shows the corporate signage on the headquarters building of the "New York Times" in New York.   (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews, File)

"How many New York Times editors looked at a cartoon that would not have looked out of place on a white supremacist website? ... What does this say about your processes or your decision makers?" That was the reaction of the American Jewish Committee after the publication of what the paper acknowledged was an anti-Semitic cartoon last week, and now it looks like those processes are getting an overhaul. The Daily Beast reports the Times will no longer run syndicated cartoons, including from the CartoonArts syndication service that provided the cartoon in question.

While the cartoon—which depicted Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu as a dog sporting a Star of David collar, leading a blind President Trump—spurred an apology by the paper and likely jump-started the conversation of nixing syndicated cartoons, it was a second questionable cartoon published over the weekend that drew further complaints and sealed the decision. "While we don't think this [second] cartoon falls into that category [of being anti-Semitic], for now, we've decided to suspend the future publication of syndicated cartoons," the Times' communications chief notes. Trump himself weighed in Monday. "The New York Times has apologized for the terrible Anti-Semitic Cartoon, but they haven't apologized to me for this or all of the Fake and Corrupt news they print on a daily basis," he tweeted. (More New York Times stories.)

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