KIRO Radio Ran a Segment Attacking My Reporting. They Still Haven’t Responded to My Efforts to Correct the Record.
ericacbarnett
By Erica C. Barnett
Earlier this week, KIRO Radio’s “Gee and Ursula” show had a guest, Angela Rye, who spent most of a ten-minute segment accusing me of fabricating what she called an “unsourced” story on allegations made by city staff about Derrick Wheeler-Smith, the head of the city’s Office for Civil Rights. Rye belittled my work and this site repeatedly, making multiple false claims about my story.
One factual claim—that Mayor Katie Wilson did not put Wheeler-Smith and his deputy, Fahima Mohamed, on administrative leave—merits specific correction. As we reported, Wheeler-Smith has been on family and medical leave to care for his mother; the administrative leave is separate and unrelated.
Additionally, KIRO did not fact check or correct the false claim that Wilson had “been paid, by this gossip blog site, $30,000.” (Rye referred to me as a “gossip blogger” and PubliCola as a “gossip blog” no fewer than nine times—a standard, time-worn term used to dismiss and belittle female journalists and our work.)
As readers know, Wilson was an activist and writer for many years before she decided to run for mayor, and I solicited (and paid for) five pieces from her between 2023 and 2024. The total for those pieces, according to records from my payroll software, Gusto, was $3,900. It appears Rye looked at Wilson’s financial affairs statement and decided to interpret “less than $30,000” (the smallest category) as “$30,000.” The Stranger and the Urbanist also paid Wilson less than $30,000 for period columns in 2024, according to the report.
Here’s an edited version of the two statements I issued after KIRO aired its piece, which it then posted on social media and Youtube with various headlines belittling this website and my work. As of this morning, KIRO as well as the two radio hosts have not responded to any of the posts I have put up on social media, which tagged the hosts as well as the radio station; nor have they responded to comments I have made on the online versions of this segment.
KIRO Radio has still not reached out to me after running a ten-minute segment accusing me of fabricating my heavily reported story about allegations against a city department director by his staff, which their guest called “unsourced.”
They also referred to me as a “gossip blogger” nine times—a misogynistic term used to dismiss female writers since time immemorial. I have been working alongside KIRO Radio’s reporters for 25 years, and their decision to use their massive megaphone to run a 10-minute radio piece trashing me as a person and a journalist is outrageous and unacceptable.
The “Gee and Ursula” show never contacted me about my story before they handed the mic to someone whose apparent goal was to damage my professional reputation as an independent journalist. They have also ignored my comments about this on social media, on which I tagged them repeatedly and offered to come on their show to explain my reporting process for this story, including the reason whistleblowers who fear retaliation routinely speak to reporters on condition of anonymity.
PubliCola, in publication since 2009, is a fraction of the size of an outlet like KIRO Radio, so my ability to defend myself is dwarfed by KIRO’s ability to defame me as a “gossip blogger” and fabulist. It is appalling that this radio show spent ten minutes of airtime trashing me and my work without bothering to contact me or fact-check any of the false claims made about me by their guest, including the bizarre lie that I paid now-Mayor Katie Wilson $30,000.
Instead, they have shown they are proud of this segment by posting it on YouTube, KIRO’s own site, and elsewhere with splashy headlines like “Angela Rye Calls PubliCola Story a ‘Gossip Blog’ Amid Seattle Civil Rights Drama.” Wilson, who was a writer and activist for many years before she was mayor, wrote for me five times over two years, with the last piece in 2024, long before she ran for mayor. I paid her $3,900 total for those five pieces ($500 for one and between $1,000 and $1,200 for the others.)
I remain eager and willing to come on the “Gee and Ursula” show or any other KIRO show to correct the record about my work and explain my reporting process to their listeners. I realize this is less exciting than a personal and professional attack, but I believe any media outlet should be interested in speaking to the people they are talking about—especially when there is an opportunity to correct false claims they, perhaps unwittingly, led their listeners to believe were accurate.
