USA Today is doing damage control, deleting articles after it was discovered almost two dozen of its stories contained inaccurate information.
A journalist employed by USA Today has resigned in shame after she was caught fabricating sources for her stories. She has since deleted her LinkedIn account.
Gabriela Miranda, a “breaking news reporter,” was busted by an internal investigation, which concluded she invented quotes out of thin air.
USA Today has since deleted the articles she wrote, the links now lead to an editor’s note.
The articles featured sensational headlines such as “anti-vaxxer pushes urine therapy as ‘COVID antidote’ without scientific evidence.”
It is unclear whether USA Today vetted the articles before print. In response to Miranda’s habit of printing fake news, the company has pledged to strengthen its “reporting and editing diligence.”
This is not first time USA Today has had a problem with one of its journalists publishing blatant fake news.
In 2004, USA Today employee Jack Kelley was accused of “making up stories” and “plagiarizing work” from other outlets.
Kelley was found to have fabricated “substantial portions” of at least eight major stories while working for USA Today.
Kelley eventually apologized for his actions. Craig Moon, the president of USA Today at the time admitted that he failed his readers by not recognizing Jack Kelley’s problems. He also apologized.
USA Today works with Meta (formerly Facebook) to “fact-check” articles. The fact that USA Today failed to properly fact-check almost two dozen of its articles before print has lead to some questioning its credibility.
