(PresidentialInsider.com)- The financial outlet Forbes dropped one of its longtime contributors after the National Institutes of Health sent an email demanding a “correction” to a report questioning Dr. Anthony Fauci’s financial disclosures.
The January 15 article, “Disclosures Show Dr. Fauci’s Household Made $1.7 Million in 2020, Including Income, Royalties, Travel Perks And Investment Gains,” was written by longtime contributor Adam Andrzejewski the CEO of the government transparency watchdog Open the Books.
Officials from the NIH emailed Forbes Chief Content Officer Randal Lane arguing there was a technical difference between receiving payment and accepting gifts. The email claimed Andrzejewski’s article falsely reported that Fauci “collected” $8,100 for attending three virtual galas and argued that Fauci “correctly reported the gifts of free attendance” on his disclosure form where he “noted the market value” of the gift.
The NIH officials also objected to the phrase “travel perks” to describe the reimbursement Fauci receives as a member of the McGraw-Hill editorial board to travel to meetings.
Forbes used the emailed complaint as a second and final strike against Adam Andrzejewski. Shortly before receiving the email from the NIH, Andrzejewski received an email from Forbes executive editor Caroline Howard warning him that his “reporting errors” in the article on Fauci put him on thin ice, claiming he was “straying into advocacy.”
But according to Andrzejewski, the “reporting errors” were quickly flagged by his editor, who also suggested some language and style edits, all of which Andrzejewski accepted.
Less than 24 hours after receiving the NIH’s email, Andrzejewski received a call from his editor letting him know that any future articles had to be preapproved and he was no longer to write anything about Dr. Anthony Fauci.
In a column at Open the Books’ Substack last week, Andrzejewski wrote in detail about the situation, including the emails from both Caroline Howard and the NIH. Andrzejewski wrote that the NIH wasn’t trying to “correct the record” about his article. Instead, he claimed, it was a message to Forbes for them to “do something about” his reporting.
Forbes dropped Andrzejewski on January 28 after nearly eight years of writing for them and four years after he was promoted to “senior policy contributor.”
