Kaitlan Collins’ strong debut on CNN includes bizarre comments from a US senator

Kaitlan Collins’ new CNN prime-time show, “The Source,” debuted this week and it already has been a source … of headlines, controversy and a U.S. senator having to explain himself.

One of Collins’ guests in Monday’s inaugural show was Alabama Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville, who once again seemingly refused to acknowledge that white nationalists are racist. Collins asked Tuberville to clarify previous comments when he appeared to support the idea of white nationalists serving in the military.

Tuberville has insisted — and he did so again with Collins — that he is “totally against racism.”

When Collins asked him if white nationalists should not serve in the military, Tuberville said, “If people think that a white nationalist is racist? I agree with that. I would agree they shouldn’t.”

Collins then said, “But a white nationalist is someone who believes that the white race is superior to other races.”

Tuberville said, “Well, that’s some people’s opinion. And I don’t think, I mean a lot …”

Collins rightly cut him off and said, “It’s not opinion.”

Collins continued to push back while also giving Tuberville a chance to call white nationalists racist. He said at one point, “My opinion of a white nationalist, if someone wants to call them white nationalist, to me is an American.”

What?

Anyway, at one point, Collins said to Tuberville, “A white nationalist is racist, senator.”

To which Tuberville said, “Well that’s your opinion, that’s your opinion.”

At another point, Tuberville said of white nationalism, “Well that’s just a name that has been given.”

Collins responded with, “It’s a real definition.”

Tuberville kept insisting that he is against racism, but Monday’s exchange, as well as his previous comments, certainly brought into question Tuberville’s view of white nationalism. (Here is the entire interview — the part about white nationalism starts at the 7 minute, 29 second mark.)

After blowback from even other Republicans on Tuesday, Tuberville finally relented, and told reporters on Capitol Hill, “White nationalists are racists.”

Credit to Collins for her part in the interview. She asked the right questions, and pushed back when she needed to.

One Poynter Report reader noted that Collins, a University of Alabama grad, bested Tuberville, the former football coach at rival Auburn. Another Bama victory over Auburn.

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Superb work

One of the goals of this newsletter is to point you in the direction of terrific journalism. And I wanted to make a special recommendation for the work turned in by the San Francisco Chronicle about the San Francisco drug trade. It is stunningly good work that has been more than a year and a half in the making. Megan Cassidy and Gabrielle Lurie are the reporters.

Here are the four parts:

• “This is the hometown of San Francisco’s drug dealers.”
• “This is how San Francisco’s open-air drug dealers work.”
• “Meet the Honduran mom whose attempt at a better life led her to prison.”
• “He’s known as the ‘OG.’ This is the man Honduran drug dealers say ‘opened the path’ to S.F.”
• And here is a sidebar: “Why is it so hard to solve the drug crisis in San Francisco?”

In a piece about the project, Chronicle editor-in-chief Emilio Garcia-Ruiz wrote about Cassidy and Lurie’s work: “Despite concerns about their safety and the threat of contracting COVID, the two spent hundreds of hours in the open-air drug markets in the Tenderloin and SoMa over these past 18 months. They watched how the business was done, interacting with everyone they could: dealers, users, residents, community activists and the police.”

He added, “Good reporting requires establishing trust with those whose story you are telling. Part of that is taking the time to listen. The Honduran dealers have escaped villages with few educational and financial opportunities and a country with one of the world’s highest murder rates. The story of their journey ought to be heard.”

He also wrote, “So Gabrielle and Megan spent long stretches in the markets, including visiting at night, to build those relationships. They went into the homes of some of the dealers both here and in Honduras and spent time with them while they carried out deliveries. People struggling with addiction on the streets proved to be some of the best sources. All told, 25 former or current dealers spoke to us, despite the belief by some that they were putting themselves at risk by doing so. Because of this, we have limited the personal information we are publishing about them, and identified only those who gave us explicit permission to use their names.”

This is just a small part of Garcia-Ruiz’s riveting explanation of how this project came together.

It is phenomenal work.

Note: Readers may encounter a paywall after part one while reading this series.

Still surreal

It’s still surreal to comprehend that The New York Times dismantled its sports department, and will direct all of its sports coverage to The Athletic — the site the Times purchased in January 2022 for $550 million.

The reaction a day later is that the New York Times Guild is not going to make this an easy transition for the Times. Most of the sports staff is part of the union, while The Athletic does not have a union. The guild is arguing that it is a form of union busting.

It probably will get contentious, but it’s also hard to believe that the Times would make this move if they thought the union could nix it.

Meanwhile, a couple of updates.

Tyler Kepner joined the Times in 2000 and has been its national baseball writer — and an excellent one at that — since 2010. He tweeted on Monday, “And on a programming note, the NYT says we will still have Sports coverage until some point in September. So I'll keep writing baseball, which is all I've ever wanted to do. And, of course, I'll let you all know what comes next.”

Well, now we know what’s next. New York Post sports media columnist Andrew Marchand reported Kepner has been assigned to the national desk. Hopefully, Kepner will find a rewarding chapter to his career there, but it just seems flat-out wrong that he won’t be writing baseball full time after September.

For now, enjoy his latest: “At the All-Star Game, Learning Opportunities Abound.”

And here are a few other noteworthy pieces:

• Nieman Lab’s Joshua Benton with “The Athletic finally shut down a newspaper’s sports desk — just not the one people expected.”
• The Boston Globe’s Chad Finn with “The warning came in the New York Times. Nearly six years later, its sports department is gone, and the Athletic is here to stay.”
• For Defector, Ray Ratto with “The Slow Hemorrhage Of The American Sports Desk.”

Correction and clarification

I wanted to fix a couple of things I mentioned in my Tuesday newsletter about changes with the Los Angeles Times sports section. First, I mistyped the title of Iliana Limón Romero. She is the assistant managing editor for sports.

I had written that the new deadlines for the Times sports section were 3 p.m. That is not accurate. That’s what time most sportswriters’ copy is due, but the actual deadlines are later in the day.

Still, the new deadlines make it difficult, if not impossible, for the Times to have most game stories and other live-event coverage from the day before in the print section. Of course, the Times’ website will continue to have that coverage. And the Times is hardly the first or only paper to have difficulty getting live games into its print sections because of earlier deadlines.

Instead of looking at the downside of the Los Angeles Times not having live game coverage in the print edition, it might be intriguing to see what it does by bringing a magazine-type philosophy to the print edition.

Media tidbits

• This is troubling. The Texas Tribune’s Kate McGee with “Texas A&M recruited a UT professor to revive its journalism program, then watered down the offer after ‘DEI hysteria.’”
• Politico’s Jesse Naranjo with “She Broke the News That the U.S. Catholic Church Sold Enslaved People. She’s Still Going to Mass.”
• The New York Times’ Mike Isaac with “Why the Early Success of Threads May Crash Into Reality.”
• The Daily Beast’s Justin Baragona with “Mike Lindell Floats Nutty ’My Cousin Vinny’ Scenario Where He Beats Dominion.”
• Thursday night's “Cuomo” on NewsNation will have host Chris Cuomo interviewing Republican presidential candidate Chris Christie, as well as former TV host Geraldo Rivera, who recently left Fox News. “Cuomo” is on at 8 p.m. Eastern.
• The Washington Post’s Sophia Nguyen interviews CNN anchor Jake Tapper about his latest fiction novel: “Jake Tapper imagines what would happen if Evel Knievel ran for president.”
• The Washington Post has named Alex MacCallum as chief revenue officer. The Post says MacCallum will drive its “revenue across advertising, partnerships and subscriptions.” MacCallum has previously worked at CNN Worldwide, The New York Times and The Huffington Post.

Hot type

• For Esquire, Robert Spangle with “The Last Train Stop Before Heading to Ukraine's War.”
• In an op-ed for Teen Vogue, news and politics editor Lexi McMenamin writes about the recent trend of fans throwing objects at musicians during live concerts in “Bebe Rexha. Harry Styles. Drake. How Did Concert Etiquette Get Here?”

More resources for journalists

• Subscribe to Poynter’s Friday newsletter, Open Tabs with Poynter managing editor Ren LaForme, and get behind-the-scenes stories only available to subscribers.
• Executive Leadership Summit (Oct. 2023) (Seminar) — Apply by Aug. 14.
• Covering Climate Change Science and Policy in a Polarized World (Seminar, Washington D.C.) — Apply Aug. 14.
• Power of Diverse Voices: Writing Workshop for Journalists of Color (Nov. 15-18) (Seminar) — Apply by Sept. 15.

Have feedback or a tip? Email Poynter senior media writer Tom Jones at [email protected].