NY Mag Places Star Journalist On Leave For Alleged ‘Personal Relationship’

New York Magazine has placed star journalist Olivia Nuzzi on leave, claiming she “had engaged in a personal relationship with a former subject relevant to the 2024 campaign.”

According to Status, New York Magazine had learned that “the star journalist had allegedly engaged in a romantic relationship with Robert F. Kennedy Jr.”

“Recently our Washington Correspondent Olivia Nuzzi acknowledged to the magazine’s editors that she had engaged in a personal relationship with a former subject relevant to the 2024 campaign while she was reporting on the campaign, a violation of the magazine’s standards around conflicts of interest and disclosures,” New York Magazine wrote in a note to its readers. “Had the magazine been aware of this relationship, she would not have continued to cover the presidential campaign. An internal review of her published work has found no inaccuracies nor evidence of bias. She is currently on leave from the magazine, and the magazine is conducting a more thorough third-party review. We regret this violation of our readers’ trust.”

A spokesman for Kennedy told Status, “Mr. Kennedy only met Olivia Nuzzi once in his life for an interview she requested, which yielded a hit piece.” The impact of RFK Jr.’s endorsement of former President Donald Trump has caused great concern among Democrats, so much so that efforts to keep him on the ballot and thus hinder Kennedy’s efforts to transfer his voters to Trump have been mounted in swing states such as Michigan and North Carolina.

Nuzzi told The New York Times that “some communication between myself and a former reporting subject turned personal” earlier in 2024, adding, “During that time, I did not directly report on the subject nor use them as a source. The relationship was never physical but should have been disclosed to prevent the appearance of a conflict. I deeply regret not doing so immediately and apologize to those I’ve disappointed, especially my colleagues at New York.”

In March, Nuzzi wrote a profile of RFK Jr. in which she quoted him saying, “I don’t hear Democrats ever say that we should vote for President Biden because he inspires them, or because he’s run the country with the kind of vigor or energy that we need in times of crisis. I hear them say that you should vote for Biden because you should be scared of Trump.”

Am I Racist? Is In Theaters NOW — Get Your Tickets Here!

“Since announcing in October that he would end his campaign for the Democratic nomination to officially become a problem for both major parties as an independent, fear — and denial — is what Kennedy seems to inspire among the staid Washington Establishment supporting the incumbent president and the gangland anti-Establishment Establishment supporting the former president,” she wrote. “Officials from both party apparatuses are certainly looking at metrics that confirm Kennedy is turning the presidential election upside down.”

“To weaken Biden ahead of the general election, his enemies would need a candidate more likely to generate the kind of spectacle and outrage that tends to draw eyeballs,” she continued. “A candidate with qualities that were more, well, Trumpian. They found their answer in the biggest brand name in American politics since Roosevelt. As a bonus, the candidate held a set of idiosyncratic populist beliefs that would challenge Biden from the dovish left and from the libertarian right. In the primary, Kennedy was a nuisance solely for Biden. Which made him a blessing for Trump.”

In addition to New York Magazine, Nuzzi has reported for GQ, Esquire, The Daily Beast, Glamour, The Washington Post, and POLITICO.