On Tuesday, the made it to the national headlines for upholding birthright citizenship and quashing a Trump executive order that challenged the same. But as the landmark decision was announced, Justice Samuel Alito found himself in the news for a wholly different reason.
Justice Alito, along with fellow conservative justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch, dissented from Tuesday’s decision, even as the majority against it included both conservatives and liberals.
Reflecting the unity among the liberals and conservatives in the decision, if only slim, the majority opinion on the decision was written by Chief Justice John Roberts, a moderate conservative appointed by President George W Bush.
But as the decision was announced, NPR published a story saying that Justice Samuel Alito is. The story left many following the Supreme Court confused and in search for an authentic source to confirm the same. Soon after, other outlets like Forbes, The Washington Post, among others, reported that Justice Alito is not retiring. Within a few minutes, .
It read, “Editors Note: Earlier today we erroneously published a story saying that Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito was retiring. He has not announced his retirement and we have retracted the story.”
But why did NPR publish the story in the first place? What led to such a big fiasco even as the SCOTUS dominated headlines over the birthright citizenship? Let’s find out.
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Why did NPR first publish then retract Justice Alito’s retirement story?
Part of the reason why such a big fiasco happened is because of digital news websites’ common practice of early preparation for an anticipated event. Major websites (such as TMZ) keep obituaries, retirement and other similar anticipated news surrounding major celebrities prepared beforehand. When the actual announcement comes, they are able to break the story instantly.
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As the landmark birthright citizenship decision came, it was widely speculated that Justice Samuel Alito might retire. This comes from the common trend of US Supreme Court justices to announce their retirement at the end of the court’s term in June or July each year. Alito has not served over 20 years on the SCOTUS, and it seems NPR anticipated an announcement and had kept a story prepared for the occasion.
However, the story was published even though a decision was never announced, likely due to some internal error. NPR, however, did not say how the error occurred.
