UPDATED: Bloomberg News has taken disciplinary action against staffers responsible for breaking an embargo on a complex prisoner swap plan that secured the release of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and others.
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In a memo to staffers, editor-in-chief John Micklethwait wrote that Bloomberg “prematurely published” the story on the planned release of Gershkovich and other prisoners on Thursday. Micklethwait wrote that the story “could have endangered the negotiated swap that set them free.”
“Even if our story mercifully ended up making no difference, it was a clear violation of the editorial standards which have made this newsroom so trusted around the world,” he wrote. The New York Times first published Micklethwait’s note.
In addition to disciplinary action, Micklethwait said that Bloomberg would be “reviewing our processes to ensure that failures like this don’t happen again.” He also said that he has written to the prisoners to apologize, and apologized on Thursday to Wall Street Journal editor in chief Emma Tucker.
“We publish thousands of stories every day, many of which break news,” he wrote. “We take accuracy very seriously. But we also have a responsibility to do the right thing. In this case we didn’t.”
A Bloomberg spokesperson declined to comment.
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The New York Times reported that one of the reporters whose byline was on the story, Jennifer Jacobs, has left the company.
Jacobs posted a statement on her X account, writing that “the idea that I would jeopardize the safety of a fellow report is deeply unsettling on a level that’s difficult to describe. I am so happy Evan Gershkovich and the others are home.”
“In reporting the story about Evan’s release, I worked hand in hand with my editors to adhere to editorial standards and guidelines. At no time did I do anything that was knowingly inconsistent with the administration’s embargo or that would put anyone involved at risk,” she wrote. She noted that reporters “don’t have the final say over when a story is published or with what headline.”
Bloomberg published the piece at 7:41 a.m. ET on Thursday, reporting on the release, but the story was later revised to explain that the exchange had yet to take place. Media organizations had been briefed on the prisoner exchange, but the information was under embargo for later in the morning.
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