Bloomberg News apologized and chastised employees on Monday for prematurely publishing a story last week that revealed a exchange of prisoners involving the United States and Russia that led to the release of detained American journalist Evan Gershkovich.
Bloomberg’s story, released before the prisoners were released, violated the company’s ethical standards, John Micklethwait, Bloomberg’s editor in chief, said in a memo to his staff.
The company did not say how many employees were disciplined and did not identify them. The story was written by Jennifer Jacobs, senior White House reporter for Bloomberg News, and Cagan Koc, Amsterdam bureau chief.
“We take accuracy very seriously,” Micklethwait said in the memo. “But we also have a responsibility to do the right thing. In this case, we didn’t.”
In addition to Wall Street Journal reporter Gershkovich, the swap freed Paul Whelan, a Michigan corporate security executive imprisoned since 2018, and Alsu Kurmasheva, a journalist with dual US-Russian citizenship. In return, the US and other countries gave up Russians who had been accused or convicted of serious crimes.
Gershkovich’s arrest on espionage charges, denied by his family and the newspaper, attracted special attention from the journalistic community, and the Journal campaigned vigorously for his release. Word of the settlement began to spread among people familiar with the cases, and the White House briefed reporters on the matter on an embargo basis — meaning journalists agreed not to release the information until they received the official green light.
Authorities wanted to keep the news secret until the prisoners were safely released from U.S. custody, for fear that public knowledge could jeopardize the deal, and the Bloomberg story was published as a plane carrying them flew to a point Of delivery.
“This was not a broken embargo,” the Wall Street Journal said in a statement on Monday. “It was news that Evan had been released when in fact he hadn’t been released yet. We’re glad Bloomberg fixed this.”
Bloomberg’s initial story, released at 7:41 a.m. Thursday, said Russia was releasing Gershkovich and Whelan as part of a major prison swap, “according to people familiar with the situation.” It was updated more than an hour later to say the prisoners had not yet been released.
The White House officially lifted the embargo at 11:33 a.m.
Bloomberg’s story put pressure on other media outlets to try to match it through other sources without violating the terms of embargo agreements. The Associated Press, for example, sent out an alert at 10:41 a.m. that Gershkovich and Whelan were being released, citing Turkish authorities.
Shortly after the initial story changed, a Bloomberg editor wrote on X that “it is one of the greatest honors of my career to have helped break this news. I love my job and my colleagues,” according to New York magazine. This post did not please other journalists who were aware of what was happening but were prevented from reporting it.
Micklethwait said he apologized to Wall Street Journal editor Emma Tucker on Thursday, which the Journal confirmed. “Given the Wall Street Journal’s tireless efforts on behalf of its reporters, this was clearly its story to lead the way,” he said.
He said he was also personally writing to each of the released prisoners to apologize.
Wall Street Journal reporter Dustin Volz, who covers the world of intelligence, thanked Bloomberg for the apology in a post on X.
“Their premature story on Thursday caused many people to panic and could have caused real harm,” Volz wrote. “Fortunately it didn’t happen, but it’s good to see they owned up to their mistake.”
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David Bauder writes about media for the AP. Follow him on http://twitter.com/dbauder.
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