Linda Foley

Linda Foley was president of the Newspaper Guild and vice-president of the Communications Workers of America from 1995 through 2008.

She was a reporter for the Lexington Herald-Leader in Lexington, Kentucky before turning to full time work at the "Guild" in 1984. She was elected its secretary-treasurer in 1993 and its president in 1995. She received a bachelor of science in journalism degree from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill., in 1977.

In May 2008, Foley was defeated for re-election by Newspaper Guild Secretary-Treasurer Bernie Lunzer. [http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003804662]

Ms. Foley drew criticism after May 13, 2005 for stating that the U.S. military is responsible for journalists being targeted - "not just being targeted verbally or, politically. They are also being targeted for real, in places like Iraq. What outrages me as a representative of journalists is that there's not more outrage about the number, and the brutality and the cavalier nature of the US military toward the killing of journalists in Iraq. I think it's just a scandal. They target and kill journalists from other countries, particularly Arab countries like Al Jazeera, for example. They actually target them and blow up their studios with impunity." [http://www.freepress.net/conference/=sessions]

On May 19, 2005, in an article appearing in the newspaper industry trade publication Editor and Publisher, Foley is said to have claimed that her words were taken out of context, that her intent was to discuss the scapegoating of journalists. "This was almost an aside," she said. "But it is true that hundreds of journalists are killed around the world, and many have been killed in Iraq." [http://www.radiobs.net/mediaslander/archives/2005/05/a_linda_k_foley.php]

In August 2005 trade publication Columbia Journalism Review stated in an editorial: "Target and kill? Foley has been under attack since she said those words. And should be. Even the infamous killing of journalists by tank fire at the Palestine Hotel in Baghdad was found not to have been deliberate, in an extensive investigation by Reporters Without Borders. Some facts: according to The Committee to Protect Journalists, at least 36 journalists have been killed in action in Iraq since March 2003, along with 18 media support workers; insurgent actions account for 34 of those 54 deaths; U.S. military fire accounts for at least 11. The committee says the record shows that "the military seems indifferent and unwilling . . . to take steps to mitigate risk." But target and kill? The committee finds "no evidence to conclude that the U.S. military has deliberately targeted the press in Iraq. So on that subject here's what Foley should have said: nothing." [http://cjrarchives.org/issues/2005/4/editorial.asp]