Complaint
This edition of the series, entitled How did Trump get into trouble with Ukraine?, set out to explore how President Trump’s personality and way of dealing with people led to his first impeachment.Ìý A listener complained that it was one-sided, and inaccurate in a particular respect.Ìý The ECU considered the complaint in the light of the ±«Óãtv’s standards of impartiality and accuracy.
Outcome
The programme followed its usual format of a sequence of interviews with speakers selected as “expert witnessesâ€, linked by the presenter.Ìý Although the four speakers who took part in the programme clearly had close knowledge of their subjects and represented legitimate viewpoints, they all analysed the impeachment as resulting from features of, or flaws in, the President’s conduct and character, and the presenter’s commentary gave no indication of alternative views and analyses (for example, the view that the political motivation of the President’s opponents played a significant role in the process which led to impeachment).ÌýÌý As a result, the programme fell short of the ±«Óãtv’s standards of impartiality.Ìý
The concern about accuracy related to a reference by the second contributor to Crowdstrike, an American cybersecurityÌýtechnology companyÌýhired to investigate hacking of the Democrat National Committee’s computers, which blamed Russian agencies before the US government investigated. President Trump had suspicions about the company and was known to have asked the government of Ukraine to investigate it. ÌýThe contributor suggested that this was because the President had a preference for conspiracy theories.Ìý The complainant argued the suggestion was inaccurate because the suspicions were well-founded, citing an investigation conducted by a journalist who was “no political friend of Mr Trumpâ€.Ìý However, the ECU did not consider this provided grounds for the suspicions in question such as to warrant discounting relevant US government intelligence agency assessments, and this aspect of the complaint was not upheld.
Partly upheld (impartiality)
Further action
The finding was reported to the senior management of World Service and discussed with the programme-makers concerned.Ìý The programme will not be re-broadcast in the same form.