NPR forced to apologize after boosting Media Matters' lie that National Review editor used 'racial slur'

NPR has apologized after boosting the Media Matters lie that National Review's Rich Lowry used a racial slur on Megyn Kelly's show when he fumbled over the words "migrants" and "immigrants," making some launch the false accusation that he said the n-word in a September 15 show with Kelly. 

The outlet came out with a story dedicated to apologizing for originally headlining, "Conservative editor-in-chief appears to use racial slur to refer to Haitian migrants" after Lowry, who even addressed the word mix-up prior to the story getting drafted. The outlet, after recognizing its mistake, changed the headline to "Conservative editor-in-chief says mispronunciation led to accusations of using slur." 

The reporter who wrote the original story, C. Mandler, was called out in the apology from NPR's public editor, Kelly McBride, in the apology. Mandler's LinkedIn indicates that the writer identifies as non-binary. 

One of the first to cite the clip and claim that Lowry was saying the slur was Madeline Peltz, the director of the rapid response team for Media Matters. She posted the clip, saying, "Having a hard time coming to any conclusion besides the obvious one about what Rich Lowry catches himself blurting out here.” 

NPR originally only changed the article and headline; however, the damage was done, and multiple other outlets ran with the story, boosting the claim that Lowry said the n-word when he spoke. This led to Lowry getting disinvited from multiple speaking events.  

In slowing down the audio and video, it is evident that Lowry began the word with an "M" pronunciation, per the apology from NPR.  

"Hearing the clip of Lowry speaking, it’s easy to see why people did a double-take. But we replayed it many times and heard what others eventually concluded: that Lowry bungled 'migrants' and 'immigrants' together," the apology article stated. NPR media correspondent David Folkenflik had even posted that same conclusion in response to the accusation from Media Matters towards Lowry prior to the story from NPR originally going out.

Lowry, for his part, wrote a response to the controversy, headlining, "Next time cancel me for something I actually said." 

He explained, "I began to say it with a short 'i,' the way you say 'immigrants,' instead of the long 'i' that you use for 'migrants.' I caught myself in the middle, before shifting to the correct pronunciation. So, I said what you might call the 'M-word.' You can try to look up the M-word, but you will fail — because it’s not a word, let alone a racial slur. It happens to rhyme with a racial slur, but that doesn’t make it one."