NYT walks back on controversial Tom Cotton op-ed after widespread outrage

Climb-down comes after widespread condemnation over Tom Cotton’s comments

Republican senator Tom Cotton has accused The New York Times of “surrendering to the mindless woke mob” after the paper admitted his op-ed, entitled “Send in the troops”, did not meet its own editorial standards.

Mr Cotton used the opinion article to echo Donald Trump’s threats about using the US military against crowds protesting police brutality and institutionalised racism after George Floyd was killed in Minneapolis police custody last week.

“One thing above all else will restore order to our streets: an overwhelming show of force to disperse, detain and ultimately deter lawbreakers,” wrote Mr Cotton in the op-ed published on Wednesday.

Numerous Times journalists and commentators soon criticised the piece amid concerns that Mr Cotton was calling on troops to escalate encounters between law enforcement and demonstrators.

Others wrote amid the backlash on Twitter that “Running this put Black @nytimes staffers in danger”.

In a statement issued on Thursday, the paper admitted that the publication of Mr Cotton’s op-ed did not meet its own editorial standards.

“We’ve examined the piece and the process leading up to its publication,” said Eileen Murphy, a Times’s spokeswoman. “This review made clear that a rushed editorial process led to the publication of an op-ed that did not meet our standards.

The spokeswoman added that The Times would examine its publication process, and reduce the amount of opinion pieces it publishes.

The climb-down comes after James Bennet, the newspaper’s editorial page editor, said that the Op-eds publication meant “debating influential ideas openly”.

He said on Thursday: “Readers who might be inclined to oppose Cotton’s positions need to be fully aware of it, and reckon with it, if they were to defeat it.”

According to The Time’s statement, it admitted that Mr Bennet had not read Mr Cotton’s piece prior to publication.