How #MeToo journalist Mark Halperin “found his way back” from oblivion
For some of the news cycle this campaign season, it’s almost like old times for Mark Halperin. The veteran political pundit has attacked the media, offering opinions on the presidential race on NewsNation, Newsmax, Fox News.com and Michael Smerconishsatellite radio program. He was on Megyn KellyExtremely popular podcast of and more Tucker Carlsonalso. When Halperin reported on his video platform in early October that “strong private polling” showed Kamala Harris‘s support is fading and Donald Trumprising, the media is friendly to Trump devour it upTreat his comments as if they were transmitted from Mount Olympus.
Overall, Halperin hasn’t been in the spotlight or taken this seriously since 2017. Back then, he was one of the nation’s most prominent political speech leaders — an NBC News analyst, a regular panelist on MSNBC’s Good morning Joe, and a Showtime’s host Circus. HBO turned his best-selling chronicle of the 2008 campaign, Change the game (written together with John Heilemann), into a dramatic television series starring Julianne Moore And Woody Harrelson. ONE another book and a television adaptation of it is in the process of being worked on.
All of that evaporated in the blink of an eye. As the #MeToo movement spread globally in late 2017, a dozen women accused Halperin of unwanted contact. The allegations include Halperin pressuring a subordinate to have sex, masturbating in front of a female co-worker, and repeatedly engaging in unwanted physical contact, such as grabbing a co-worker’s breasts and pressing his groin against the other person’s shoulder. The alleged conduct dates back to Halperin’s time as political director at ABC News from 1994 to 2004, during which time Halperin oversaw a team of passionate young journalists.
One of his accusers, Diana May, told me in 2017 that Halperin had asked her to sit on his lap during a routine office interaction one day in 1994. May, then a news researcher, approached him, confused and alarmed by his comments. his plea, and realized that he had an erection. The two women also described to me physical assaults – which Halperin claimed had long been in dispute.
At the time, Halperin apologized in a statement in which he acknowledged that his behavior was “inappropriate and caused pain” and that he had pursued “relationships with women who that I worked with, including some of my subordinates.” For this, he said, he was “deeply sorry.” He asserted that some of the allegations against him were untrue but did not mention specifics. His career immediately collapsed; list of reputable employers eliminated him.
Seven years have passed, and Halperin has still not fully recovered; No mainstream news program has ever given him a megaphone that invited him back. But many others were ready to give him a chance. Indeed, his extensive media appearances this fall appear to represent one of the more successful comebacks among news media figures fired by the scandals. #MeToo scandal, a hall of shame included Matt Lauer, Charlie Rose, And Bill O’Reilly, It should be noted that the person has dipped his hand back into the realm of political commentary through NewsNation.
Halperin’s reunion career reflects today’s fractured media environment, in which the power of traditional media gatekeepers has diminished in recent years as new platforms have proliferated. And it speaks to how quickly collective memory can fade. Today, when his name appears in news accounts, Halperin is often described as a “political analyst,” rather than by the phrase that once preceded his name: “disgraced journalist.”
Any account of Halperin’s return must credit his determination to boot and his perseverance to reclaim the microphone. After his expulsion, Halperin pressed on, spewing fiery opinions on Twitter and through a blog, clumsily branding himself “Mark Halperin’s Wide World of News.” Mark McKinnon, One Vanity fair Former collaborator and co-host of Halperin on circus, credited Halperin with “remarkable resilience.” Halperin, he told me in an email, had “made his way back to the surface from the depths of hell with public punishment, humiliation, and economic suffocation.”
Others believe that Halperin’s abusive past should disqualify him. “It seems like some in the media have lost their collective memory about Mark’s impact on many women,” May told me in a recent email. “Perhaps they don’t remember or don’t care that he has been credibly accused of serious misconduct. If I’m running a newsroom or booking guests for a podcast, I want guests with credibility and personality rather than someone with a tarnished reputation. In my opinion, that person does not deserve a platform of influence.”
Halperin declined multiple interview requests for this story through a spokesperson, Paul Wilke. At one point, Wilke issued a vague legal threat, writing in an email, “Our attorneys are deeply concerned about your ability and desire to report accurately and fairly about Mark.” He did not cite any inaccuracies in my previous report when given the opportunity.
