BBC Replaces 'Biased' Maitlis Over Dominic Cummings Rant

The BBC will replace Emily Maitlis on Wednesday’s edition of Newsnight after the anchor took to the nation’s airwaves to denounce Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s chief advisor Dominic Cummings in what has been ruled as a clear demonstration of bias.

The top brass at the United Kingdom’s taxpayer-funded news outlet said that BBC2 programme’s presenter would be replaced by reporter Katie Razzall after it was concluded that Maitlis had broken the impartiality rules in opening her programme with a tirade criticising Cummings, according to The Guardian.  It is currently unclear if the move to replace the embattled and outspoken anchor will be a permanent move.

The BBC said that the Newsnight monologue by Maitlis “did not meet our standards of due impartiality” after it deleted the then-viral clip from the BBC Politics Twitter feed.

In her monologue, Ms Maitlis said in a matter-of-fact fashion that: “Dominic Cummings broke the rules. The country can see that and it’s shocked the Government cannot.”

“He was the man, remember, who always ‘got’ the public mood, who tagged the lazy label of ‘elite’ on those who disagreed. He made those who struggled to keep to the rules feel like fools and has allowed many more to assume they can now flout them,” Maitlis went on.

The host of BBC 2’s Newsnight also accused Prime Minister Boris Johnson of having “blind loyalty” to Mr Cummings despite what she alleged to be “fury, contempt and anguish” from the public.

The public broadcaster has long been accused of inserting liberal and anit-Brexit bias into its reporting, with a 2018 report from the think tank Civtas and a report of News-Watch in 2017 finding that Eurosceptic opinions were systematically repressed on the Today programme, BBC Radio 4’s flagship news and currents affairs show.

In December, a poll conducted by Norstat found that nearly two-thirds of the British public believed that the BBC was biased.

After complaints from the British public, the broadcaster finally capitulated and admitted that it was wrong to air the monologue.

“The BBC must uphold the highest standards of due impartiality in its news output,” the Broadcaster said in a statement.

“As it was, we believe the introduction we broadcast did not meet our standards of due impartiality. Our staff have been reminded of the guidelines,” the BBC added, yet went on to claim that the program in its entirety was an example of “reasonable and rigorous journalism”.

The outburst by Maitlis was hailed by leftists throughout the country. Labour MP David Lammy applauded her monologue as an example of “public service broadcasting”.

Owen Jones, the self-proclaimed socialist writer for the British left-wing paper The Guardian, said: “Emily Maitlis’ opening isn’t biased against the government. The facts are biased against the government.

Conservative MP Andrew Bridgen, who was the lone supporter of Dominic Cummings on the program, told The Telegraph that “she said it as a statement of fact. There was no pretence of impartiality in any of that report. It was judge, jury and executioner.”

“All of the news now has become basically an op-ed. You have Piers Morgan on GMB… they’re all fighting for ratings against various media platforms and it’s a race to the bottom,” he said.

“The biggest thing I have always objected to with the BBC is that they don’t just report the news, they decide what the news is. Everything is slanted,” Bridgen added.

Follow Kurt on Twitter at @KurtZindulka