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Welcome to Popular Information, a newsletter dedicated to accountability journalism.
You can learn more about our impact over the last eight years HERE.
Last week, CBS News New York falsely reported that “thousands of 9/11 victims’ families are asking New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani not to attend this year’s solemn remembrance ceremony.” The article appeared to be based on misinformation promoted by the New York Post.
After inquiries from Popular Information, CBS News New York changed their story, but failed to include an editor’s note about the correction. The main CBS News accounts on Instagram and X, which have millions of followers, also quietly removed posts based on CBS News New York’s reporting. “Once we were told that CBS News New York’s reporting was inaccurate, we took our post down,” a source inside CBS News told Popular Information.
This week, CBS News New York has radically changed their coverage. A segment that aired Monday highlighted that many people who lost a family member on 9/11 are “defending Mayor Mamdani’s inclusion in this year’s solemn remembrance ceremony.”
The story features an interview with Elizabeth Miller, who lost her father on 9/11, and serves as the project director of September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows. “Mayor Mamdani has assured 9/11 families that he wants to be there to honor our loved ones and I think he should be allowed to do that,” Miller told CBS News New York. Her group represents 250 individuals who lost family members during the terrorist attack.
CBS News New York notes that the petition seeking to ban Mamdani has attracted 72,000 signatures “from the public.” The network has spoken to “two petitioners” who lost family members on 9/11 and support the petition. The New York Post, which assigned ten reporters to the task after Popular Information exposed its errors, has now identified ten individuals who are family members of 9/11 victims and signed the petition.
In an interview with Popular Information last week, one of those individuals, Giovanni Galante, who organized the petition, described Mamdani as “a Muslim that has thoughts to get rid of all Jewish people, and to agree with 9/11.” A statement by September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows, aired in the new CBS News New York segment, said the group “strongly condemn[s] the anti-American accusations and Islamophobic sentiment underlying the effort seeking to prevent him from being at Ground Zero.”
Mamdani plans to attend the 25th anniversary ceremony. “I will proudly honor the families, the survivors, the first responders forever impacted by that horrific terror attack by standing alongside them,” Mamdani said.
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