Last week, Philadelphia’s WURD radio host Andrea Lawful-Sanders quit after the CEO said she “violate[d] our practice of remaining an independent media outlet” by interviewing the President using questions that were pre-approved by the Biden campaign.
On Thursday, a Milwaukee, WI radio station came out and admitted their published interview with Biden was edited in agreement with his campaign. According to a statement from Civic Media, directly following the president’s interview with the station’s beloved host, Earl Ingram, “the Biden campaign called and asked for two edits to the recording before it aired.”
The interview occurred following the June 27 presidential debate, after many Americans began to question if Biden is truly fit for reelection. Last week, Ingram admitted to asking Biden pre-approved questions similar to Sanders during a CNN interview.
“I didn’t get a chance to ask him all the things I wanted to ask,” Ingram told ABC News. He continued to say he was simply grateful for the opportunity to speak with the president. “Certainly the fact that they gave me this opportunity ... meant a lot to me,” Ingram said.
According to the station, the two edits requested by the Biden campaign were the removal of:
1. “...and in addition to that, I have more Blacks in my administration than any other president, all other presidents combined, and in major positions, cabinet positions.”
2. “I don’t know if they even call for their hanging or not, but he–but they said [...] convicted of murder,” in reference to former President Trump calling for the death penalty of the Central Park Five.
The released statement also provided an unedited version of the full interview with Biden. Although the company says it stands by Ingram and his team, Civic Media did apologize to the public for failing to meet listeners’ expectations.
“With a high-profile interview comes a listener expectation that journalistic interview standards will be applied, even for non-news programming. We did not meet those expectations,” the statement said.
It’s important to note that Ingram is a longtime supporter of Biden, and he does not have a journalism background. With that being said, eyes are now on Biden and his campaign regarding efforts to seemingly underhand the media and its listeners.
After admitting to sending questions to two separate radio stations, a Biden campaign spokesman wrote in a statement last week: “It’s not at all an uncommon practice for interviewees to share topics they would prefer. These questions were relevant to the news of the day,” Lauren Hitt said. “Americans have had several opportunities to see him unscripted since the debate.” The Biden campaign also promised to stop sending pre-approved questions to media.
The Biden campaign has not said a word about the unedited version of Ingram’s interview.