Nina Totenberg
Encyclopedia
Nina Totenberg (ˈniːnə ˈtoʊtənbɜrɡ; born January 14, 1944) is an American legal affairs correspondent for National Public Radio (NPR) focusing primarily on the activities and politics of the Supreme Court of the United States
. Her reports air regularly on NPR's newsmagazines All Things Considered
, Morning Edition
, and Weekend Edition
. She is also a panelist on the syndicated TV political commentary show Inside Washington
.
Newsweek Magazine calls her "the creme de la creme" of NPR, and Vanity Fair
refers to her as "Queen of the Leaks". She is the dean of the Supreme Court press corps and has won every major broadcast journalism award for both her explanatory pieces and her scoops.
Among her scoops was her groundbreaking report of sexual harassment allegations made against Clarence Thomas
by University of Oklahoma
law professor Anita Hill
, leading the Senate Judiciary Committee to re-open Thomas's Supreme Court confirmation hearings
. Previously, in 1986, she broke the story that Supreme Court nominee Douglas H. Ginsburg
had smoked marijuana, leading Ginsburg to withdraw his name. And in 1977, she reported on secret Supreme Court deliberations relating to the Watergate scandal
.
and Melanie Totenberg, who was a real estate broker. She is the widow of U.S. Senator Floyd K. Haskell
(D
-Colorado
), whom she married in 1979. She remarried in 2000 to H. David Reines, a trauma surgeon and Vice Chairman of Surgery at Inova Fairfax Hospital
. On their honeymoon, he treated her for severe injuries after she was hit by a boat propeller while swimming. In March 2010, Totenberg's sister Amy Totenberg
was nominated by President Barack Obama
to the U.S. District Court in Atlanta. Amy Totenberg was confirmed the next year.
in 1962, majoring in journalism, but dropped out less than three years later because, in her own words, she "wasn’t doing brilliantly". Soon after dropping out of college, Totenberg began her journalism career at the Boston Record American, where she worked on the Women's Page and learned breaking news journalism skills by volunteering in the news department. She moved on to the Peabody Times in Massachusetts and Roll Call
in Washington, D.C.
At the National Observer, Totenberg began covering legal affairs. In 1971 she broke a story about a secret list of candidates President Richard Nixon
was considering for the Supreme Court. All the candidates were later rejected as unqualified by the American Bar Association
and none was nominated.
After Totenberg wrote an Observer profile of FBI director J. Edgar Hoover
, the latter wrote a long letter to the paper's editor demanding she be fired. Instead, the editor printed the letter in the Observer along with a rebuttal of Hoover's complaints regarding the article.
She was fired from that paper for plagiarism
in 1972 regarding a profile she wrote of then-soon-to-be Speaker
Tip O'Neill
which included, without attribution, quotes from members of Congress that had previously appeared in The Washington Post
. Totenberg has said that the dismissal also related to her rebuffing of sexual overtures from an editor. She has not identified the editor. Such plagiarism has been called "one of the cardinal sins of journalism from which reporters can never recover their credibility" Many of Totenberg's colleagues have defended her, noting that this was a case of using previously reported quotes, a common journalistic practice in the 1970s. In 1995, Totenberg told the Columbia Journalism Review
, "I have a strong feeling that a young reporter is entitled to one mistake and to have the holy bejeezus scared out of her to never do it again."
She next worked for the New York based news magazine New Times
. At that publication, she wrote a celebrated article called "The Ten Dumbest Members of Congress", prompting the senator at the top of the list, William L. Scott
, to call a press conference to deny that he was the "dumbest member of Congress."
, and John D. Ehrlichman. Totenberg revealed the results of their secret 5–3 vote against reviewing the case and that the three dissenters were appointees of President Richard Nixon
. Nixon had then just resigned in the wake of Watergate. Totenberg also revealed that Nixon-appointed Chief Justice Warren Burger delayed announcing the results of the vote hoping to sway his fellow justices. Her reporting of private Supreme Court deliberations was a novel development in Supreme Court reporting and led to speculation about who on the Court gave her the information.
, had written a memo in 1970 opposing the Equal Rights Amendment
, in which he said that the amendment would "hasten the dissolution of the family" and that would "virtually abolish all legal distinctions between men and women". The memo was written when Rehnquist was head of the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel in the Nixon
administration.
, who had been nominated to the Supreme Court by Ronald Reagan
, had smoked marijuana "on a few occasions" during his student days in the 1960s and while an Assistant Professor in the 1970s, something that did not appear in Ginsburg's FBI background check. The revelations resulted in Ginsburg's withdrawing his name from consideration. Totenberg was awarded the 1988 Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Silver Baton award for outstanding broadcast journalism for the story.
George H. W. Bush
's Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas
, Totenberg disclosed allegations of sexual harassment lodged against Thomas by University of Oklahoma
law professor Anita Hill
. Totenberg's report about Hill's allegations led the Senate Judiciary Committee to re-open Thomas's Supreme Court confirmation hearings to consider Hill's charges.
Totenberg was criticized by many of Thomas' supporters, including Republican senators on the Judiciary Committee. The Senate appointed special counsel Peter E. Fleming Jr.
to investigate the leak. Totenberg and Newsday
s Timothy Phelps were subpoenaed by Fleming, but refused to answer questions about their confidential sources.
Totenberg was confronted by one Thomas supporter, Republican Senator Alan K. Simpson
, during and after the taping of an episode of Nightline. On the show, Simpson criticized Totenberg, saying "What politicians get tired of is bias in reporters. Let's not pretend your reporting is objective here. That would be absurd." After Totenberg defended her reporting and objectivity on the show, Simpson followed her out of the studio and continued to criticize her, even holding open the door of her limousine so she could not leave. "He was in a complete rage. He was out of control," Totenberg said. Accounts differ on Totenberg's response, but she used what she called "choice epithets" and said: "I think I told him to shut the fuck up."
Following Totenberg's allegation to The Washington Post
s Howard Kurtz
that she had been sexually harassed at the National Observer, Al Hunt
of The Wall Street Journal
brought up the plagiarism incident in a column about media coverage of and responses to the Thomas hearings. Some observers connected Hunt's rehashing of a then nearly 20-year-old incident to the stance of the Journal, whose conservative editorial pages had "editorially championed" Thomas and had previously criticized Totenberg, but Hunt denied any ideological motivation.
For the report and NPR's gavel-to-gavel coverage, Totenberg received the George Foster Peabody Award. The same year she won the George Polk Award for excellence in journalism and the Joan S. Barone Award for excellence in Washington-based national affairs/public policy reporting (the latter also in part for her coverage of the retirement of Justice Thurgood Marshall
). The American Library Association
presented her with their James Madison Award, given to those who "championed, protected, and promoted public access to government information and the public’s right to know". She also earned the Sigma Delta Chi Award
from the Society of Professional Journalists
for investigative reporting.
for excellence in legal reporting and won the first-ever Toni House award presented by the American Judicature Society
for a career body of work and was the first radio journalist to be honored by the National Press Foundation
as Broadcaster of the Year. She has written articles for the Harvard Law Review
(including tributes to Justices William J. Brennan, Jr.
and Lewis Powell when they retired); the New York Times Magazine, New York Magazine; the Christian Science Monitor; and numerous other legal and general circulation publications. She also contributed to the Jewish Women's Archive's online exhibit Jewish Women and the Feminist Revolution with regard to her reporting on Anita Hill's allegations against Clarence Thomas. In the 1990s Totenberg was a regular contributor to ABC's Nightline.
Totenberg played the part of an election anchor in the film The Distinguished Gentleman
, and also appeared briefly as herself in the Kevin Kline
film Dave
. Her image has also been used for an item produced for NPR called "The Nina Totin' Bag" — a play on her name and the stereotypical tote bag
offered as a thank-gift for donating to a public broadcasting pledge drive
.
, editor of the New York Times, attributed to sexism
since she was one of the few women working in a predominately male environment. Totenberg was criticized by some commentators for hugging her friend Lani Guinier
during a press conference announcing Guinier's nomination by Bill Clinton
to the post of Assistant Attorney General
for Civil Rights
. Media critic Howard Kurtz
reported that while Totenberg said she did not intend to give special treatment to Guinier in her reporting, she had hugged her because she had not seen her in some time. Then in 2000 some journalists expressed concern that Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg
officiating Totenberg's marriage could be seen as a conflict of interest. Totenberg responded she did not consider it a conflict of interest since her friendship with the jurist was established long before Ginsburg was nominated to the Supreme Court. She has made the same observation about her friendship with Justice Antonin Scalia
.
Wall Street Journal editorialist Paul Gigot
wrote in 1991 that Totenberg exhibits partisanship in her reporting. Washington Post reporter Thomas Edsall
said in 1995 that she was cited as an example of liberal bias in public broadcasting due to her reporting on two controversial Supreme Court nominations.
In 1995, responding to conservative Senator Jesse Helms
, who characterized AIDS
as a "disease transmitted by people deliberately engaging in unnatural acts" in his effort to cut government spending to combat it, Totenberg said: "I think he ought to be worried about what's going on in the good Lord's mind, because if there's retributive justice, he'll get AIDS from a transfusion or one of his grandchildren will." On the same show, conservative columnists Charles Krauthammer
and Tony Snow
also criticized Helms, with Krauthammer calling Helms's remarks "bigoted and cruel" and Snow accusing him of "hypocrisy". Totenberg subsequently expressed regret for her choice of words, saying: "It was a stupid remark. I'll pay for it for the rest of my life." Following his October 2010 firing from NPR for comments he made on FoxNews, Juan Williams
said the failure of NPR to discipline her for these statements was an example of NPR's double standard, a charge echoed by FoxNews and conservative pundits.
Supreme Court of the United States
The Supreme Court of the United States is the highest court in the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all state and federal courts, and original jurisdiction over a small range of cases...
. Her reports air regularly on NPR's newsmagazines All Things Considered
All Things Considered
All Things Considered is the flagship news program on the American network National Public Radio. It was the first news program on NPR, and is broadcast live worldwide through several outlets...
, Morning Edition
Morning Edition
Morning Edition is an American radio news program produced and distributed by National Public Radio . It airs weekday mornings and runs for two hours, and many stations repeat one or both hours. The show feeds live from 05:00 to 09:00 ET, with feeds and updates as required until noon...
, and Weekend Edition
Weekend Edition
Weekend Edition is the name given to a set of American radio news magazines produced and distributed by National Public Radio . It is the weekend counterpart to Morning Edition. It consists of Weekend Edition Saturday and Weekend Edition Sunday , each of which airs for two hours, from 8 a.m. to 10...
. She is also a panelist on the syndicated TV political commentary show Inside Washington
Inside Washington
Inside Washington is a political roundtable show hosted by WJLA news anchor and chief political reporter Gordon Peterson. It is produced by Allbritton, owner of WJLA, and distributed to PBS stations nationwide by American Public Television...
.
Newsweek Magazine calls her "the creme de la creme" of NPR, and Vanity Fair
Vanity Fair (magazine)
Vanity Fair is a magazine of pop culture, fashion, and current affairs published by Condé Nast. The present Vanity Fair has been published since 1983 and there have been editions for four European countries as well as the U.S. edition. This revived the title which had ceased publication in 1935...
refers to her as "Queen of the Leaks". She is the dean of the Supreme Court press corps and has won every major broadcast journalism award for both her explanatory pieces and her scoops.
Among her scoops was her groundbreaking report of sexual harassment allegations made against Clarence Thomas
Clarence Thomas
Clarence Thomas is an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. Succeeding Thurgood Marshall, Thomas is the second African American to serve on the Court....
by University of Oklahoma
University of Oklahoma
The University of Oklahoma is a coeducational public research university located in Norman, Oklahoma. Founded in 1890, it existed in Oklahoma Territory near Indian Territory for 17 years before the two became the state of Oklahoma. the university had 29,931 students enrolled, most located at its...
law professor Anita Hill
Anita Hill
Anita Faye Hill is an American attorney and academic—presently a professor of social policy, law and women's studies at Brandeis University's Heller School for Social Policy and Management. She became a national figure in 1991 when she alleged that U.S. Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas had...
, leading the Senate Judiciary Committee to re-open Thomas's Supreme Court confirmation hearings
Clarence Thomas Supreme Court nomination
On July 1, 1991, President George H. W. Bush nominated Clarence Thomas for the Supreme Court of the United States to replace Thurgood Marshall, who had announced his retirement...
. Previously, in 1986, she broke the story that Supreme Court nominee Douglas H. Ginsburg
Douglas H. Ginsburg
Douglas Howard Ginsburg is a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. He was appointed to this court in October 1986 by President Ronald Reagan. He served as its Chief Judge from July 16, 2001 until February 10, 2008...
had smoked marijuana, leading Ginsburg to withdraw his name. And in 1977, she reported on secret Supreme Court deliberations relating to 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...
.
Personal life and family
Nina Totenberg was born in New York, the eldest daughter of violinist Roman TotenbergRoman Totenberg
Roman Totenberg is a Polish-American violinist and educator.He is the father of National Public Radio journalist Nina Totenberg...
and Melanie Totenberg, who was a real estate broker. She is the widow of U.S. Senator Floyd K. Haskell
Floyd K. Haskell
Floyd Kirk Haskell was a United States Senator from Colorado, and a member of the Democratic Party. He graduated from Harvard University 1937; graduated from Harvard Law School 1941; admitted to the New York and Colorado bars in 1946 and commenced practice in Denver, Colorado.; served in the...
(D
Democratic Party (United States)
The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...
-Colorado
Colorado
Colorado is a U.S. state that encompasses much of the Rocky Mountains as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of the Great Plains...
), whom she married in 1979. She remarried in 2000 to H. David Reines, a trauma surgeon and Vice Chairman of Surgery at Inova Fairfax Hospital
Inova Fairfax Hospital
Inova Fairfax Hospital is the largest hospital in the Washington D.C. area. Located in Fairfax County, Virginia, Inova Fairfax Hospital is the flagship hospital of Inova Health System, one of the largest employers in Fairfax County...
. On their honeymoon, he treated her for severe injuries after she was hit by a boat propeller while swimming. In March 2010, Totenberg's sister Amy Totenberg
Amy Totenberg
Amy Mil Totenberg is a United States district judge on the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia. She previously had been in private practice in Atlanta and also formerly served as a Special Master for the United States District Court for the District of Maryland...
was nominated by President Barack Obama
Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II is the 44th and current President of the United States. He is the first African American to hold the office. Obama previously served as a United States Senator from Illinois, from January 2005 until he resigned following his victory in the 2008 presidential election.Born in...
to the U.S. District Court in Atlanta. Amy Totenberg was confirmed the next year.
Early career
Totenberg enrolled in Boston UniversityBoston University
Boston University is a private research university located in Boston, Massachusetts. With more than 4,000 faculty members and more than 31,000 students, Boston University is one of the largest private universities in the United States and one of Boston's largest employers...
in 1962, majoring in journalism, but dropped out less than three years later because, in her own words, she "wasn’t doing brilliantly". Soon after dropping out of college, Totenberg began her journalism career at the Boston Record American, where she worked on the Women's Page and learned breaking news journalism skills by volunteering in the news department. She moved on to the Peabody Times in Massachusetts and Roll Call
Roll Call
Roll Call is a newspaper published in Washington, D.C., United States, from Monday to Thursday when the United States Congress is in session and on Mondays only during recess. Roll Call reports news of legislative and political maneuverings on Capitol Hill, as well as political coverage of...
in Washington, D.C.
At the National Observer, Totenberg began covering legal affairs. In 1971 she broke a story about a secret list of candidates President Richard Nixon
Richard Nixon
Richard Milhous Nixon was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. The only president to resign the office, Nixon had previously served as a US representative and senator from California and as the 36th Vice President of the United States from 1953 to 1961 under...
was considering for the Supreme Court. All the candidates were later rejected as unqualified by the American Bar Association
American Bar Association
The American Bar Association , founded August 21, 1878, is a voluntary bar association of lawyers and law students, which is not specific to any jurisdiction in the United States. The ABA's most important stated activities are the setting of academic standards for law schools, and the formulation...
and none was nominated.
After Totenberg wrote an Observer profile of FBI director J. Edgar Hoover
J. Edgar Hoover
John Edgar Hoover was the first Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation of the United States. Appointed director of the Bureau of Investigation—predecessor to the FBI—in 1924, he was instrumental in founding the FBI in 1935, where he remained director until his death in 1972...
, the latter wrote a long letter to the paper's editor demanding she be fired. Instead, the editor printed the letter in the Observer along with a rebuttal of Hoover's complaints regarding the article.
She was fired from that paper for plagiarism
Plagiarism
Plagiarism is defined in dictionaries as the "wrongful appropriation," "close imitation," or "purloining and publication" of another author's "language, thoughts, ideas, or expressions," and the representation of them as one's own original work, but the notion remains problematic with nebulous...
in 1972 regarding a profile she wrote of then-soon-to-be Speaker
Speaker of the United States House of Representatives
The Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, or Speaker of the House, is the presiding officer of the United States House of Representatives...
Tip O'Neill
Tip O'Neill
Thomas Phillip "Tip" O'Neill, Jr. was an American politician. O'Neill was an outspoken liberal Democrat and influential member of the U.S. Congress, serving in the House of Representatives for 34 years and representing two congressional districts in Massachusetts...
which included, without attribution, quotes from members of Congress that had previously appeared in The Washington Post
The Washington Post
The Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
. Totenberg has said that the dismissal also related to her rebuffing of sexual overtures from an editor. She has not identified the editor. Such plagiarism has been called "one of the cardinal sins of journalism from which reporters can never recover their credibility" Many of Totenberg's colleagues have defended her, noting that this was a case of using previously reported quotes, a common journalistic practice in the 1970s. In 1995, Totenberg told the Columbia Journalism Review
Columbia Journalism Review
The Columbia Journalism Review is an American magazine for professional journalists published bimonthly by the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism since 1961....
, "I have a strong feeling that a young reporter is entitled to one mistake and to have the holy bejeezus scared out of her to never do it again."
She next worked for the New York based news magazine New Times
New Times Magazine
New Times was an American glossy bi-weekly national magazine published from 1973 to 1979 by George A. Hirsch. Hirsch had been publisher of New York magazine, but resigned after conflicts with founder/editor Clay Felker. New Times began as a bridge between the newsweeklies and the more reflective...
. At that publication, she wrote a celebrated article called "The Ten Dumbest Members of Congress", prompting the senator at the top of the list, William L. Scott
William L. Scott
William Lloyd Scott was a Republican politician from Virginia.Scott was born in Williamsburg, Virginia. He received a law degree from George Washington University, and was employed by the federal government 1934–1961, principally as trial attorney with Department of Justice...
, to call a press conference to deny that he was the "dumbest member of Congress."
National Public Radio
In 1975, Nina Totenberg was hired by Bob Zelnick to work at National Public Radio and has been there since.Watergate appeals
In 1977, Totenberg broke a story about the Supreme Court appeal of three men who had been convicted in the Watergate scandal: H.R. Haldeman, John N. MitchellJohn N. Mitchell
John Newton Mitchell was the Attorney General of the United States from 1969 to 1972 under President Richard Nixon...
, and John D. Ehrlichman. Totenberg revealed the results of their secret 5–3 vote against reviewing the case and that the three dissenters were appointees of President Richard Nixon
Richard Nixon
Richard Milhous Nixon was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. The only president to resign the office, Nixon had previously served as a US representative and senator from California and as the 36th Vice President of the United States from 1953 to 1961 under...
. Nixon had then just resigned in the wake of Watergate. Totenberg also revealed that Nixon-appointed Chief Justice Warren Burger delayed announcing the results of the vote hoping to sway his fellow justices. Her reporting of private Supreme Court deliberations was a novel development in Supreme Court reporting and led to speculation about who on the Court gave her the information.
William Rehnquist's Chief Justice nomination
In 1986, Totenberg broke the story that William H. Rehnquist, who was nominated for Chief Justice of the Supreme Court by Ronald ReaganRonald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....
, had written a memo in 1970 opposing the Equal Rights Amendment
Equal Rights Amendment
The Equal Rights Amendment was a proposed amendment to the United States Constitution. The ERA was originally written by Alice Paul and, in 1923, it was introduced in the Congress for the first time...
, in which he said that the amendment would "hasten the dissolution of the family" and that would "virtually abolish all legal distinctions between men and women". The memo was written when Rehnquist was head of the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel in the Nixon
Richard Nixon
Richard Milhous Nixon was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. The only president to resign the office, Nixon had previously served as a US representative and senator from California and as the 36th Vice President of the United States from 1953 to 1961 under...
administration.
Douglas Ginsburg's Supreme Court nomination
Totenberg broke the story that Douglas H. GinsburgDouglas H. Ginsburg
Douglas Howard Ginsburg is a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. He was appointed to this court in October 1986 by President Ronald Reagan. He served as its Chief Judge from July 16, 2001 until February 10, 2008...
, who had been nominated to the Supreme Court by Ronald Reagan
Ronald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....
, had smoked marijuana "on a few occasions" during his student days in the 1960s and while an Assistant Professor in the 1970s, something that did not appear in Ginsburg's FBI background check. The revelations resulted in Ginsburg's withdrawing his name from consideration. Totenberg was awarded the 1988 Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Silver Baton award for outstanding broadcast journalism for the story.
Clarence Thomas/Anita Hill hearings
In 1991, a few days before a confirmation vote was scheduled for RepublicanRepublican Party (United States)
The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...
George H. W. Bush
George H. W. Bush
George Herbert Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 41st President of the United States . He had previously served as the 43rd Vice President of the United States , a congressman, an ambassador, and Director of Central Intelligence.Bush was born in Milton, Massachusetts, to...
's Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas
Clarence Thomas
Clarence Thomas is an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. Succeeding Thurgood Marshall, Thomas is the second African American to serve on the Court....
, Totenberg disclosed allegations of sexual harassment lodged against Thomas by University of Oklahoma
University of Oklahoma
The University of Oklahoma is a coeducational public research university located in Norman, Oklahoma. Founded in 1890, it existed in Oklahoma Territory near Indian Territory for 17 years before the two became the state of Oklahoma. the university had 29,931 students enrolled, most located at its...
law professor Anita Hill
Anita Hill
Anita Faye Hill is an American attorney and academic—presently a professor of social policy, law and women's studies at Brandeis University's Heller School for Social Policy and Management. She became a national figure in 1991 when she alleged that U.S. Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas had...
. Totenberg's report about Hill's allegations led the Senate Judiciary Committee to re-open Thomas's Supreme Court confirmation hearings to consider Hill's charges.
Totenberg was criticized by many of Thomas' supporters, including Republican senators on the Judiciary Committee. The Senate appointed special counsel Peter E. Fleming Jr.
Peter E. Fleming Jr.
Peter E. Fleming Jr. was a criminal-defense lawyer known for his A-list roster of clients.-References:...
to investigate the leak. Totenberg and Newsday
Newsday
Newsday is a daily American newspaper that primarily serves Nassau and Suffolk counties and the New York City borough of Queens on Long Island, although it is sold throughout the New York metropolitan area...
s Timothy Phelps were subpoenaed by Fleming, but refused to answer questions about their confidential sources.
Totenberg was confronted by one Thomas supporter, Republican Senator Alan K. Simpson
Alan K. Simpson
Alan Kooi Simpson is an American politician who served from 1979 to 1997 as a United States Senator from Wyoming as a member of the Republican Party. His father, Milward L. Simpson, was also a member of the U.S...
, during and after the taping of an episode of Nightline. On the show, Simpson criticized Totenberg, saying "What politicians get tired of is bias in reporters. Let's not pretend your reporting is objective here. That would be absurd." After Totenberg defended her reporting and objectivity on the show, Simpson followed her out of the studio and continued to criticize her, even holding open the door of her limousine so she could not leave. "He was in a complete rage. He was out of control," Totenberg said. Accounts differ on Totenberg's response, but she used what she called "choice epithets" and said: "I think I told him to shut the fuck up."
Following Totenberg's allegation to The Washington Post
The Washington Post
The Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
s Howard Kurtz
Howard Kurtz
Howard "Howie" Alan Kurtz is an American journalist and author with a special focus on the media. He is host of CNN's Reliable Sources program, and Washington bureau chief for The Daily Beast. He is the former media writer for The Washington Post. He has written five books about the media...
that she had been sexually harassed at the National Observer, Al Hunt
Al Hunt
Albert R. Hunt Jr. is the executive Washington editor for Bloomberg News, a subsidiary of Bloomberg L.P. Hunt hosts the Sunday morning talk show Political Capital on Bloomberg Television, which airs on Friday night.-Personal life:...
of The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal is an American English-language international daily newspaper. It is published in New York City by Dow Jones & Company, a division of News Corporation, along with the Asian and European editions of the Journal....
brought up the plagiarism incident in a column about media coverage of and responses to the Thomas hearings. Some observers connected Hunt's rehashing of a then nearly 20-year-old incident to the stance of the Journal, whose conservative editorial pages had "editorially championed" Thomas and had previously criticized Totenberg, but Hunt denied any ideological motivation.
For the report and NPR's gavel-to-gavel coverage, Totenberg received the George Foster Peabody Award. The same year she won the George Polk Award for excellence in journalism and the Joan S. Barone Award for excellence in Washington-based national affairs/public policy reporting (the latter also in part for her coverage of the retirement of Justice Thurgood Marshall
Thurgood Marshall
Thurgood Marshall was an Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court, serving from October 1967 until October 1991...
). The American Library Association
American Library Association
The American Library Association is a non-profit organization based in the United States that promotes libraries and library education internationally. It is the oldest and largest library association in the world, with more than 62,000 members....
presented her with their James Madison Award, given to those who "championed, protected, and promoted public access to government information and the public’s right to know". She also earned the Sigma Delta Chi Award
Sigma Delta Chi Award
The Sigma Delta Chi Awards are presented annually by the Society of Professional Journalists for excellence in journalism.- History :The Awards, according to the SPJ, did not begin in 1932 when the society chose six individuals for their contributions to journalism. In 1939 the awards program began...
from the Society of Professional Journalists
Society of Professional Journalists
The Society of Professional Journalists , formerly known as Sigma Delta Chi, is one of the oldest organizations representing journalists in the United States. It was established in April 1909 at DePauw University, and its charter was designed by William Meharry Glenn. The ten founding members of...
for investigative reporting.
Distinction and acclaim
In addition to awards mentioned above, and among her other awards, Totenberg has been honored seven times by the American Bar AssociationAmerican Bar Association
The American Bar Association , founded August 21, 1878, is a voluntary bar association of lawyers and law students, which is not specific to any jurisdiction in the United States. The ABA's most important stated activities are the setting of academic standards for law schools, and the formulation...
for excellence in legal reporting and won the first-ever Toni House award presented by the American Judicature Society
American Judicature Society
The American Judicature Society is an independent, nonpartisan, national organization of judges, lawyers, and interested members of the public whose mission is to improve the American justice system - to "secure and promote an independent and qualified judiciary and fair system of justice." ...
for a career body of work and was the first radio journalist to be honored by the National Press Foundation
National Press Foundation
The National Press Foundation is a non-profit organization that provides training for journalists and awards excellence in journalism. The Foundation was established in Washington, D.C. in 1976.- Activities :...
as Broadcaster of the Year. She has written articles for the Harvard Law Review
Harvard Law Review
The Harvard Law Review is a journal of legal scholarship published by an independent student group at Harvard Law School.-Overview:According to the 2008 Journal Citation Reports, the Review is the most cited law review and has the second-highest impact factor in the category "law" after the...
(including tributes to Justices William J. Brennan, Jr.
William J. Brennan, Jr.
William Joseph Brennan, Jr. was an American jurist who served as an Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court from 1956 to 1990...
and Lewis Powell when they retired); the New York Times Magazine, New York Magazine; the Christian Science Monitor; and numerous other legal and general circulation publications. She also contributed to the Jewish Women's Archive's online exhibit Jewish Women and the Feminist Revolution with regard to her reporting on Anita Hill's allegations against Clarence Thomas. In the 1990s Totenberg was a regular contributor to ABC's Nightline.
Totenberg played the part of an election anchor in the film The Distinguished Gentleman
The Distinguished Gentleman
The Distinguished Gentleman is a comedy starring Eddie Murphy. The film was directed by Jonathan Lynn. In addition to Murphy, the film stars Lane Smith, Sheryl Lee Ralph, Joe Don Baker, Victoria Rowell, Grant Shaud, Kevin McCarthy, Charles S...
, and also appeared briefly as herself in the Kevin Kline
Kevin Kline
Kevin Delaney Kline is an American theatre, voice, film actor and comedian. He has won an Academy Award and two Tony Awards, and has been nominated for five Golden Globe Awards, two BAFTA Awards and an Emmy Award.- Early life :...
film Dave
Dave (film)
Dave is a 1993 comedy-drama film written by Gary Ross, directed by Ivan Reitman, and starring Kevin Kline and Sigourney Weaver. Co-stars include Frank Langella, Kevin Dunn, Ving Rhames, and Ben Kingsley. Ross was nominated for an Academy Award for his screenplay...
. Her image has also been used for an item produced for NPR called "The Nina Totin' Bag" — a play on her name and the stereotypical tote bag
Tote bag
A tote bag is large and open bag, with a handle centered atop each side. In the classic cloth version, arched straps form both handles. Straps' ends run down both sides, ending under the second fabric layer there, which shields the lower surfaces...
offered as a thank-gift for donating to a public broadcasting pledge drive
Pledge drive
A pledge drive is an extended period of fundraising activities, generally used by public broadcasting stations to increase contributions. The term "pledge" originates from the promise a contributor makes to send in funding at regular intervals for a certain amount of time...
.
Controversies and criticism
Totenberg has made friends with a number of politicians and lawyers in national politics, and her personal connections to these people have occasionally generated discussion. Allegations that Totenberg obtained her scoops by untoward means were prevalent early in her career, a fact Bill KovachBill Kovach
Bill Kovach is a US journalist, former Washington bureau chief of The New York Times, former editor of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, and co-author of the popular book, The Elements of Journalism: What Newspeople Should Know and The Public Should Expect.- Biography :Born in 1932 in East...
, editor of the New York Times, attributed to sexism
Sexism
Sexism, also known as gender discrimination or sex discrimination, is the application of the belief or attitude that there are characteristics implicit to one's gender that indirectly affect one's abilities in unrelated areas...
since she was one of the few women working in a predominately male environment. Totenberg was criticized by some commentators for hugging her friend Lani Guinier
Lani Guinier
Lani Guinier is an American lawyer, scholar and civil rights activist. The first African-American woman tenured professor at Harvard Law School, Guinier's work includes professional responsibilities of public lawyers, the relationship between democracy and the law, the role of race and gender in...
during a press conference announcing Guinier's nomination by 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...
to the post of Assistant Attorney General
United States Assistant Attorney General
Many of the divisions and offices of the United States Department of Justice are headed by an Assistant Attorney General.The President of the United States appoints individuals to the position of Assistant Attorney General with the advice and consent of the Senate...
for Civil Rights
United States Department of Justice Civil Rights Division
The U.S. Department of Justice Civil Rights Division is the institution within the federal government responsible for enforcing federal statutes prohibiting discrimination on the basis of race, sex, disability, religion, and national origin. The Division was established on December 9, 1957, by...
. Media critic Howard Kurtz
Howard Kurtz
Howard "Howie" Alan Kurtz is an American journalist and author with a special focus on the media. He is host of CNN's Reliable Sources program, and Washington bureau chief for The Daily Beast. He is the former media writer for The Washington Post. He has written five books about the media...
reported that while Totenberg said she did not intend to give special treatment to Guinier in her reporting, she had hugged her because she had not seen her in some time. Then in 2000 some journalists expressed concern that Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Ruth Joan Bader Ginsburg is an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. Ginsburg was appointed by President Bill Clinton and took the oath of office on August 10, 1993. She is the second female justice and the first Jewish female justice.She is generally viewed as belonging to...
officiating Totenberg's marriage could be seen as a conflict of interest. Totenberg responded she did not consider it a conflict of interest since her friendship with the jurist was established long before Ginsburg was nominated to the Supreme Court. She has made the same observation about her friendship with Justice Antonin Scalia
Antonin Scalia
Antonin Gregory Scalia is an American jurist who serves as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. As the longest-serving justice on the Court, Scalia is the Senior Associate Justice...
.
Wall Street Journal editorialist Paul Gigot
Paul Gigot
Paul A. Gigot is an American Pulitzer Prize-winning conservative political commentator and the editor of the editorial pages for The Wall Street Journal...
wrote in 1991 that Totenberg exhibits partisanship in her reporting. Washington Post reporter Thomas Edsall
Thomas Edsall
Thomas Byrne Edsall is an American journalist and academic, best known for his 25 years covering national politics for the Washington Post. He holds the Joseph Pulitzer II and Edith Pulitzer Moore Professorship in Public Affairs Journalism at Columbia University, and is a correspondent for The New...
said in 1995 that she was cited as an example of liberal bias in public broadcasting due to her reporting on two controversial Supreme Court nominations.
In 1995, responding to conservative Senator Jesse Helms
Jesse Helms
Jesse Alexander Helms, Jr. was a five-term Republican United States Senator from North Carolina who served as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee from 1995 to 2001...
, who characterized AIDS
AIDS
Acquired immune deficiency syndrome or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome is a disease of the human immune system caused by the human immunodeficiency virus...
as a "disease transmitted by people deliberately engaging in unnatural acts" in his effort to cut government spending to combat it, Totenberg said: "I think he ought to be worried about what's going on in the good Lord's mind, because if there's retributive justice, he'll get AIDS from a transfusion or one of his grandchildren will." On the same show, conservative columnists Charles Krauthammer
Charles Krauthammer
Charles Krauthammer, MD is an American Pulitzer Prize–winning syndicated columnist, political commentator, and physician. His weekly column appears in The Washington Post and is syndicated to more than 275 newspapers and media outlets. He is a contributing editor to the Weekly Standard and The New...
and Tony Snow
Tony Snow
Robert Anthony "Tony" Snow was an American journalist, political commentator, television news anchor, syndicated columnist, radio host, musician, and the third White House Press Secretary under President George W. Bush. Snow also worked for President George H. W. Bush as chief speechwriter and...
also criticized Helms, with Krauthammer calling Helms's remarks "bigoted and cruel" and Snow accusing him of "hypocrisy". Totenberg subsequently expressed regret for her choice of words, saying: "It was a stupid remark. I'll pay for it for the rest of my life." Following his October 2010 firing from NPR for comments he made on FoxNews, Juan Williams
Juan Williams
Juan Williams is an American journalist and political analyst for Fox News Channel, he was born in Panama on April 10, 1954. He also writes for several newspapers including The Washington Post, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal and has been published in magazines such as The Atlantic...
said the failure of NPR to discipline her for these statements was an example of NPR's double standard, a charge echoed by FoxNews and conservative pundits.