Jenni Yan against Radio New Zealand (Trump)

Radio New Zealand (RNZ) published an article May 2, 2025, that was teased on its home page with the headline Trump sacks security advisor over scandal, moves him to top UN job.

The headline referred to an AFP news agency article on President Donald Trump’s decision to remove national security advisor Mike Waltz from his Cabinet and nominate him to be ambassador to the United Nations. The move followed the scandal over Mr Waltz’s use of an insecure commercial message system to discuss military attack plans and how he mistakenly invited a journalist into the officials chat group.

Jenni Yan complained that the headline was incorrect, misleading and a purposeful mischaracterisation.

“The headline claims overt causality (I.e. that Trump said he fired the security advisor because of the scandal, but he did not say that in his press release). The use of the word "over" in the headline is intended to show that Trump punished Waltz, for which there is no evidence (which must emanate from Trump himself).

“Similarly, there is no evidence that this was a "sacking" - that his employment was terminated. This was a lateral movement, made in the context that the former UN nominee needed to return back to the House because she was a Member and the Republican majority was slim (which the headline ignores entirely and takes the Signal scandal to be the sole factor).”

In her view it breached Media Council Principles (1) Accuracy, Fairness and Balance and (6) Headlines and Captions. 

In its response Radio New Zealand said the headline was a teaser to capture the reader’s attention and encourage them to click them through to the story which was carried under the “search engine optimisation” headline Top Trump official Mike Waltz off to UN after chat group scandal.

RNZ said the article clearly explained Mr Waltz’s move to a new role. It added there were many potential ways to describe the President’s decision, whether that be ‘removed’, ‘ousted’ or ‘sacked.’  Other organisations, including the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, The Irish Times, and the BBC had also used the verb “to sack” to describe the same situation, while The Guardian and CNN opted for ‘fires’.

“News organisations are not restricted to using the language of a government. It is clear from the story that Mr Waltz did not resign or request a transfer to a different position. Therefore, it is reasonable for RNZ to assess the information and write a headline that alerts its audience to the significance of the story.”

The Media Council was rather baffled and disappointed by RNZ’s response to this complaint. Initially it denied using the headline complained of. It was only after the Media Council sent it a copy of the homepage that it acknowledged using the teaser headline Ms Yan referred to.

RNZ seemed to be splitting hairs by suggesting the teaser was not to be regarded in the same way as the headline that readers saw when they clicked on the story. “Teasers” are like any other headline and should accurately and fairly cover the substance or a key element of the report they are designed to cover.

As for the article, the Media Council notes it was sourced from AFP, which is a reputable news agency, and its reportage was similar to all the other major new outlets who linked Waltz’ removal and reposting to the chat group scandal. It refers to Mr Waltz’s ousting following the chat group leak and also reported the President’s Truth Social announcement which did not give reasons for removing Mr Waltz from his cabinet.

The headline saying Mr Waltz was sacked because of the scandal may not reflect what was said by the President. However, most reporting on this story suggests that it was not demonstrably wrong or misleading to say that was why Mr Waltz lost his cabinet position. 

The Media Council does not believe a case has been made to show the article or the teaser headline are in breach of Principles (1) and (6).

Decision:  No grounds to proceed.