![]() ![]() ![]() Overcoming obstacles time and again, NPR has emerged as a preeminent news organization. And despite the embarrassment over this episode, NPR is justifiably proud of the achievements contained in This Is NPR: The First Forty Years. Juan now has a $2 million contract with Fox. When Williams was fired at NPR, Bonnie Erbe, a columnist for AOL's Politics Daily, recalled that, shortly after the Thomas episode, Williams himself acknowledged that "the newspaper had disciplined him for what he called 'wrong' and 'inappropriate' verbal conduct toward woman staffers and he apologized to his colleagues." Williams soon left the Washington Post. But at the Washington Post, where he wrote a column, Williams became controversial in 1991 because of his outspoken defense of Clarence Thomas at the height of the furor over the allegations that Thomas had sexually harassed Anita Hill. Williams was also the author of the companion book to Eyes on the Prize, the superb PBS history of the civil rights movement. As the publisher of Times Books, I contracted with him for the biography Thurgood Marshall: American Revolutionary, which was deservedly well received when it was published in 1998. That assignment must not have worked out, because Williams was handed an amorphous role as a senior correspondent and, over the years, seemed to be spending more time on Fox than on NPR itself. ![]() When he first joined in the early 1990s, he served as a host of Talk of the Nation. The fact is that Williams and NPR have long had an uneasy relationship. But the firing was abrupt and awkward, given the circumstances. Everyone seems to agree that what he said was sincere but inept, and contributed to an ugly strain of prejudice against Muslims that Williams, who is black, should have had the sense to avoid. Summarily terminating Williams on the grounds that he had "crossed the line" of what was acceptable for an NPR analyst was a blunder. MORE ON NPR: James Fallows: Why NPR Matters Alexis Madrigal: NPR CEO: We Want to Partner With Journalism Startups Derek Thompson: Could the Juan William Disaster Cost NPR Its Public Funding? ![]()
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