Regret the Error

It was incorrectly reported in Tuesday’s Tribune Chronicle that Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton answered questions from voters in a local congressman’s office.
Reporter John Goodall, who was assigned to the story, spoke by telephone with Hillary Wicai Viers, who is a communications director in U.S. Rep. Charlie Wilson’s staff. According to the reporter, when Viers answered the phone with ‘‘This is Hillary,’’ he believed he was speaking with the Democratic presidential candidate, who had made several previous visits to the Mahoning Valley.
The quotes from Viers were incorrectly attributed to Clinton.
Wilson, the 6th District representative, hosted the first of six ‘‘economic listening tours’’ in his office on Boardman Canfield Road Monday. The talks were for people living in Columbiana and Mahoning counties. Wilson’s district stretches from Mahoning County to Scioto on the Kentucky border.
‘‘We rely on reporters to gather accurate information, and in this case, that obviously did not happen,” said Frank Robinson, editor of the paper. He said the the newspaper takes the matter very seriously and the situation is being reviewed… Link

Thanks Jeff, Meranda and Romenesko!

Update March 25: Speaking of Romenesko, he followed up with a letter from Viers that explains her experience:

The actual conversation went like this:
my cell phone rings (the cell phone that’s listed on every press release I send out, along with my full name. Again, this is NOT the office phone. this is my cellphone. I give this number to reporters.)

I answer: This is Hillary
reporter: Hillary?
me: yes?
reporter:Oh, hi. I was calling to ask about Charlie Wilson’s Economic Tour.
me: Great, what can I tell you?

And then, all of his questions were about my boss’ econ tour. I had no inkling he thought I was anybody other than who I am. I am constantly sending this paper press releases. He never asked me about the presidential campaign. Had he, I would have been able to correct his misunderstanding. He did ask me if I would be with Charlie for the rest of Charlie’s economic tour. That’s a normal question - reporters often want to know if they can reach the press contact after an interview. “Yes,” I said. “I’ll be with Charlie all week, here in Ohio.”
The entire phoner lasted about 5 minutes.
What the reporter did was silly. But what the editors did - letting this through the pipeline and into print - was indefensible. Wouldn’t any editor wonder why Senator Hillary Clinton was back in town when the primary in Ohio was history? Wouldn’t they wonder what Clinton was doing spending four days with a freshman Congressman from OH? Wouldn’t they question why she wasn’t spending those four days in PA? When she regularly has thousands at her events, wouldn’t they wonder why she was so excited about 85 in an office? With a few keystrokes their suspicisions would have been confirmed if they had just gone to the Senator’s website. She was in Washington, D.C. on that day.
A lot of folks have picked up on this unbelievable error, and frankly, I can’t explain it either and I was one of two people involved in the phone conversation. The other was the reporter. Poor guy.