Reporter Olivia Nuzzi on leave after alleged personal relationship with RFK Jr revealed | US news

A prime politics author for New York journal has taken depart on the publication after it emerged that she allegedly had a private relationship with Robert F Kennedy Jr, a scion of the Kennedy dynasty who ran a high-profile impartial marketing campaign for the White Home earlier than endorsing Donald Trump.

Olivia Nuzzi, who has written intensive long-form items about US politics, together with RFK Jr, violated the journal’s requirements round disclosing conflicts of pursuits, the publication mentioned in a press release.

“Our Washington Correspondent Olivia Nuzzi acknowledged to the journal’s editors that she had engaged in a private relationship with a former topic related to the 2024 marketing campaign whereas she was reporting on the marketing campaign, a violation of the journal’s requirements round conflicts of curiosity and disclosures,” New York mentioned.

It added: “Had the journal been conscious of this relationship, she wouldn’t have continued to cowl the presidential marketing campaign. An inner overview of her revealed work has discovered no inaccuracies nor proof of bias. She is at the moment on depart from the journal, and the journal is conducting a extra thorough third-party overview. We remorse this violation of our readers’ belief.”

In a press release Nuzzi acknowledged the connection however mentioned it had not been a bodily one and that it had developed after Nuzzi had written a bit about Kennedy and his quixotic and in the end doomed run for the White Home.

Nuzzi mentioned that “the character of some communication between myself and a former reporting topic turned private” earlier this 12 months.

“Throughout that point, I didn’t instantly report on the topic nor use them as a supply,” she mentioned. “The connection was by no means bodily however ought to have been disclosed to forestall the looks of a battle. I deeply remorse not doing so instantly and apologize to these I’ve disenchanted, particularly my colleagues at New York.”

A spokesperson for RFK Jr informed CNN that Kennedy “solely met Olivia Nuzzi as soon as in his life for an interview she requested, which yielded a success piece”.

RFK Jr is the son of Robert Francis Kennedy, who was assassinated in 1968 whereas operating for the Democratic nomination for president, virtually 5 years after his brother and the US president, John F Kennedy, was assassinated.

RFK Jr’s 2024 impartial marketing campaign by no means actually took off to problem the Democrats or Republicans and his excessive stances on some points, particularly round vaccinations, did little to endear him to mainstream Individuals.

Nuzzi has change into a high-profile American journalist and tv pundit. One in every of her most up-to-date items included an interview with Donald Trump through which the previous US president invited her to look at his ear, injured in an assassination try at a Pennsylvania rally. Recounting the expertise, she wrote: “An ear had by no means appeared to have gone by much less.”