Jeff Gerth
Encyclopedia
Jeff Gerth is a former investigative reporter for The New York Times
who has written lengthy, probing stories that drew both praise and criticism. He shared a Pulitzer Prize
in 1999 for his coverage of how American firms gave the Chinese access to sensitive technology related to satellite launches. He came under fire for stories about the Whitewater controversy
and Chinese scientist Wen Ho Lee
.
in Ohio
in the 1960s, where he was a member of the Junior Council on World Affairs and captain of the golf
team. He was a varsity golfer at Northwestern University
where he got a degree in business administration. Gerth began his career not in newspapers but in the marketing department of Standard Oil of Ohio
; he was assigned to write down license plates of vehicles pulling in and out of gas stations to find out why drivers were choosing Standard Oil's rivals.
presidential campaign, investigating some aspects of the Watergate scandal
. Then he did some freelance journalism, including an expose of the La Costa resort's ties to organized crime that ran in Penthouse
. Gerth, and his co-author, Lowell Bergman
, were sued, along with Penthouse, by the founders of the resort for more than half a billion dollars. Before trial, Gerth and Bergman both settled and apologized. Gerth also collaborated with Seymour Hersh
of The New York Times, who recommended that the Times hire him. Gerth joined the Times in 1976 and spent most of his career in the newspaper's Washington, D.C.
bureau.
In March 1992, Gerth revealed that beginning in 1978, while Bill Clinton
was Arkansas
attorney general, he and his wife, Hillary
, were partners in an Ozark real estate deal with James B. McDougal. When Clinton was governor, McDougal controlled a bank and Madison Guaranty, a savings and loan. Gerth's stories raised the question of whether it was appropriate for the then governor to be in partnership with those having immediate financial interests in an industry regulated by the state. Gerth's reporting was criticized by liberal columnist Gene Lyons
for "not particularly fair or balanced stories that combine a prosecutorial bias and the art of tactical omission." Other criticisms centered on the unclear time line - it was difficult to pick out that Bill Clinton was Attorney General, not Governor, at the time the partnership was created, and that Jim McDougal
did not own a business regulated by the state until passage of the Garn–St. Germain Depository Institutions Act in 1982, 4 years after creation of the partnership. (See The Hunting of the President
, particularly the book.)
Gerth reported a controversial Sunday meeting between Clinton and his personal secretary, Betty Currie
. At the meeting, according to Currie, Clinton asked her a number of sensitive questions, including whether she remembered his ever being alone with Monica Lewinsky
.
On March 6, 1999, Gerth reported that an unidentified Chinese American, later identified as Wen Ho Lee, stole secrets for U.S. nuclear bombs. A government official was quoted as saying the case was "going to be just as bad as the Rosenbergs." FBI investigators waved the story in front of Lee as they interrogated him. Judge James Parker eventually dropped all charges against Lee, stating, "I sincerely apologize to you, Dr. Lee, for the unfair manner you were held in captivity," describing Lee's nine months in solitary confinement as having "embarrassed our nation and all of its citizens."
Although he wrote some of the paper's most visible stories, Gerth himself kept a low profile. Balding and professorial, he shunned interviews, refused to give speeches and declined TV talk show appearances.
In 2004, Gerth was a visiting professor at Princeton University
, where he taught an undergraduate seminar on investigative reporting. He left the Times in 2005, and joined the staff of ProPublica
in February 2008.
With his former colleague at the Times, Don Van Natta, Jr.
, Gerth wrote an investigative biography about Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton entitled, Her Way: The Hopes and Ambitions of Hillary Rodham Clinton. It was published in June 2007 by Little, Brown and Company. Gerth and Van Natta were reportedly offered a $1 million advance.
, who, during the 1996 Presidential campaign, chaired the Democratic National Committee
. Gerth recused himself from any campaign coverage.
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
who has written lengthy, probing stories that drew both praise and criticism. He shared a Pulitzer Prize
Pulitzer Prize
The Pulitzer Prize is a U.S. award for achievements in newspaper and online journalism, literature and musical composition. It was established by American publisher Joseph Pulitzer and is administered by Columbia University in New York City...
in 1999 for his coverage of how American firms gave the Chinese access to sensitive technology related to satellite launches. He came under fire for stories about the Whitewater controversy
Whitewater controversy
The Whitewater controversy was an American politics controversy that began with the real estate investments of Bill and Hillary Clinton and their associates, Jim and Susan McDougal in the Whitewater Development Corporation, a failed business venture in the 1970s and 1980s.A New York...
and Chinese scientist Wen Ho Lee
Wen Ho Lee
Dr. Wen Ho Lee is a Taiwan-born Taiwanese American scientist who worked for the University of California at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. He created simulations of nuclear explosions for the purposes of scientific inquiry, as well as for improving the safety and reliability of the US nuclear...
.
Biography
Gerth attended affluent Shaker Heights High SchoolShaker Heights High School
Shaker Heights High School is a public high school located in Shaker Heights, Ohio, USA, in Greater Cleveland. The high school is the only public high school in the Shaker Heights City School District, which serves Shaker Heights and a small part of Cleveland...
in Ohio
Ohio
Ohio is a Midwestern state in the United States. The 34th largest state by area in the U.S.,it is the 7th‑most populous with over 11.5 million residents, containing several major American cities and seven metropolitan areas with populations of 500,000 or more.The state's capital is Columbus...
in the 1960s, where he was a member of the Junior Council on World Affairs and captain of the golf
Golf
Golf is a precision club and ball sport, in which competing players use many types of clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a golf course using the fewest number of strokes....
team. He was a varsity golfer at Northwestern University
Northwestern University
Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston and Chicago, Illinois, USA. Northwestern has eleven undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools offering 124 undergraduate degrees and 145 graduate and professional degrees....
where he got a degree in business administration. Gerth began his career not in newspapers but in the marketing department of Standard Oil of Ohio
Standard Oil of Ohio
Standard Oil of Ohio or Sohio was an American oil company that was acquired by British Petroleum, now called BP.It was one of the successor companies to Standard Oil after the antitrust breakup in 1911. Standard Oil of Ohio was the original Standard Oil company founded by John D. Rockefeller. It...
; he was assigned to write down license plates of vehicles pulling in and out of gas stations to find out why drivers were choosing Standard Oil's rivals.
Professional Career
Gerth worked for the 1972 George McGovernGeorge McGovern
George Stanley McGovern is an historian, author, and former U.S. Representative, U.S. Senator, and the Democratic Party nominee in the 1972 presidential election....
presidential campaign, investigating some aspects of the Watergate scandal
Watergate scandal
The Watergate scandal was a political scandal during the 1970s in the United States resulting from the break-in of the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate office complex in Washington, D.C., and the Nixon administration's attempted cover-up of its involvement...
. Then he did some freelance journalism, including an expose of the La Costa resort's ties to organized crime that ran in Penthouse
Penthouse (magazine)
Penthouse, a men's magazine founded by Bob Guccione, combines urban lifestyle articles and softcore pornographic pictorials that, in the 1990s, evolved into hardcore. Penthouse is owned by FriendFinder Network. formerly known as General Media, Inc. whose parent company was Penthouse International...
. Gerth, and his co-author, Lowell Bergman
Lowell Bergman
Lowell A. Bergman is an American investigative reporter with The New York Times and a producer/correspondent for the PBS documentary series Frontline...
, were sued, along with Penthouse, by the founders of the resort for more than half a billion dollars. Before trial, Gerth and Bergman both settled and apologized. Gerth also collaborated with Seymour Hersh
Seymour Hersh
Seymour Myron Hersh is an American Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist and author based in Washington, D.C. He is a regular contributor to The New Yorker magazine on military and security matters...
of The New York Times, who recommended that the Times hire him. Gerth joined the Times in 1976 and spent most of his career in the newspaper's Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
bureau.
In March 1992, Gerth revealed that beginning in 1978, while Bill Clinton
Bill Clinton
William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation...
was Arkansas
Arkansas
Arkansas is a state located in the southern region of the United States. Its name is an Algonquian name of the Quapaw Indians. Arkansas shares borders with six states , and its eastern border is largely defined by the Mississippi River...
attorney general, he and his wife, Hillary
Hillary Rodham Clinton
Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton is the 67th United States Secretary of State, serving in the administration of President Barack Obama. She was a United States Senator for New York from 2001 to 2009. As the wife of the 42nd President of the United States, Bill Clinton, she was the First Lady of the...
, were partners in an Ozark real estate deal with James B. McDougal. When Clinton was governor, McDougal controlled a bank and Madison Guaranty, a savings and loan. Gerth's stories raised the question of whether it was appropriate for the then governor to be in partnership with those having immediate financial interests in an industry regulated by the state. Gerth's reporting was criticized by liberal columnist Gene Lyons
Gene Lyons
Gene Lyons is a liberal political columnist and co-author with Joe Conason of The Hunting of the President: The 10 Year Campaign to Destroy Bill and Hillary Clinton, a documentary book published in 2000, with a supporting film. The book outlines a purported right wing campaign waged against...
for "not particularly fair or balanced stories that combine a prosecutorial bias and the art of tactical omission." Other criticisms centered on the unclear time line - it was difficult to pick out that Bill Clinton was Attorney General, not Governor, at the time the partnership was created, and that Jim McDougal
Jim McDougal
James B. "Jim" McDougal , a native of White County, Arkansas, and his wife, Susan McDougal , were financial partners with Bill Clinton and Hillary Rodham Clinton in the real estate venture that led to the Whitewater political scandal of the 1990s...
did not own a business regulated by the state until passage of the Garn–St. Germain Depository Institutions Act in 1982, 4 years after creation of the partnership. (See The Hunting of the President
The Hunting of the President
The Hunting of the President is a 2004 English language documentary film about Bill Clinton. Clinton and his wife Hillary Clinton appear in archived footage...
, particularly the book.)
Gerth reported a controversial Sunday meeting between Clinton and his personal secretary, Betty Currie
Betty Currie
Betty Currie is the former personal secretary for Bill Clinton...
. At the meeting, according to Currie, Clinton asked her a number of sensitive questions, including whether she remembered his ever being alone with Monica Lewinsky
Monica Lewinsky
Monica Samille Lewinsky is an American woman with whom United States President Bill Clinton admitted to having had an "improper relationship" while she worked at the White House in 1995 and 1996...
.
On March 6, 1999, Gerth reported that an unidentified Chinese American, later identified as Wen Ho Lee, stole secrets for U.S. nuclear bombs. A government official was quoted as saying the case was "going to be just as bad as the Rosenbergs." FBI investigators waved the story in front of Lee as they interrogated him. Judge James Parker eventually dropped all charges against Lee, stating, "I sincerely apologize to you, Dr. Lee, for the unfair manner you were held in captivity," describing Lee's nine months in solitary confinement as having "embarrassed our nation and all of its citizens."
Although he wrote some of the paper's most visible stories, Gerth himself kept a low profile. Balding and professorial, he shunned interviews, refused to give speeches and declined TV talk show appearances.
In 2004, Gerth was a visiting professor at Princeton University
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
, where he taught an undergraduate seminar on investigative reporting. He left the Times in 2005, and joined the staff of ProPublica
ProPublica
ProPublica is a non-profit corporation based in New York City. It describes itself as an independent non-profit newsroom that produces investigative journalism in the public interest. In 2010 it became the first online news source to win a Pulitzer Prize, for a piece written by one of its...
in February 2008.
With his former colleague at the Times, Don Van Natta, Jr.
Don Van Natta, Jr.
Don Van Natta Jr. is an author and an investigative correspondent at The New York Times, where he was a member of two Pulitzer Prize-winning teams.-Life:...
, Gerth wrote an investigative biography about Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton entitled, Her Way: The Hopes and Ambitions of Hillary Rodham Clinton. It was published in June 2007 by Little, Brown and Company. Gerth and Van Natta were reportedly offered a $1 million advance.
Personal
Gerth married at thirty-nine and became a father a year later. His wife, Janice O'Connell, worked on the Foreign Relations Committee for Senator Christopher DoddChristopher Dodd
Christopher John "Chris" Dodd is an American lawyer, lobbyist, and Democratic Party politician who served as a United States Senator from Connecticut for a thirty-year period ending with the 111th United States Congress....
, who, during the 1996 Presidential campaign, chaired the Democratic National Committee
Democratic National Committee
The Democratic National Committee is the principal organization governing the United States Democratic Party on a day to day basis. While it is responsible for overseeing the process of writing a platform every four years, the DNC's central focus is on campaign and political activity in support...
. Gerth recused himself from any campaign coverage.