Statement From New Times About the Offensive Ad Published on Our Back Cover

As Axios reported yesterday, Miami New Times published an ad containing a racial slur on the back cover of our June 13 print issue.

New Times publisher Adam Simon explained to Axios that the ad came in after the press deadline and was not reviewed before publication. "Naturally, had I seen it, which I should have, I would not have let it run as is," Simon said. "The bottom line is that it was gross and unacceptable oversight by our local leadership and I take 100 percent responsibility for allowing that language to run in an ad."

To prevent anything like this from happening in the future, the advertising department is implementing a failsafe system to ensure that every ad is reviewed before publication.

New Times editor-in-chief Tom Finkel says that although his newsroom had nothing to do with the ad that ran, the editorial staff was appalled at its misleading and harmful language because it reflects on the paper as a whole.

"To put it bluntly, the ad is antithetical to who we are," Finkel says. "Mutual trust is at the core of our ethos. We believe that you trust us to dig into topics without an agenda and to share with you what we've learned — whether it's good news or bad. We, meanwhile, trust that you understand that our aim is not to tell you what or how to think, but rather to make you feel more connected to the place we all live — for better or for worse."

To that end, Finkel notes, "We don't publish a story — any story — unless we're prepared to stand behind it. Of course, everyone makes mistakes, and reporters and editors are no exception. When we get something wrong, we correct it."

The offensive ad was submitted by Blacks for Trump, a group whose exploits New Times has covered in the past.

"We want to assure you that New Times will no longer be accepting advertisements from this client," says Voice Media Group editorial director Chelsey Dequaine-Jerabek, adding that Miami's production team is going through its online flipbook archive to remove any other offensive advertising content from PDF versions of print editions.

"Through this experience, senior leadership across business and advertising departments have agreed on a shared commitment to raising standards and learning from these mistakes," Dequaine-Jerabek says. "We have rewritten protocols and strengthened proofing workflows and will continue to look deeply inside our organization to ensure these types of failures cease to exist."

On the heels of Juneteenth, Dequaine-Jerabek says she's deeply disappointed to be writing to readers about this topic. She says New Times always has a choice in running the ads it runs. It can choose not to work with clients who wish to run ads that contain racial slurs.

"We want to make it clear to our readers that this instance is the furthest from who New Times is and who we will be moving forward," she says. "We have a responsibility to our readers, our community, our clients, and our employees. This ad violated that responsibility."