UPDATED: Why Mayor Sharon Tucker’s Women in Politics Forum is up in the air
Reporters from the Journal Gazette and 21Alive were scheduled to headline the Wednesday night fundraiser until both pulled out yesterday
Reporters Madelyn Kidd of the Journal Gazette and Emilia Miles of 21Alive were scheduled to be the featured guests tomorrow night at Mayor Sharon Tucker’s Women in Politics Forum at the Chateau on Broadway in Fort Wayne.
Late yesterday, however, I was told by a source involved in planning the event that both Kidd and Miles had dropped out and they would not be replaced, effectively canceling it.
The Women in Politics Forum is an annual gathering that Tucker has been hosting for the past several years. It is not open to the media and is meant to be a safe space for women to talk frankly about a relevant political issue. In 2023, the theme was Scales of Justice and the panelists — mostly attorneys — spoke about political influence in the criminal justice system. Tickets were $25 and the event sold out.
This year’s topic was to be Women in Media and tickets were $40. A digital flyer Tucker posted on Facebook (since deleted) included small print stating that the event was authorized and paid for by the Committee to Elect Sharon Tucker. In order to purchase tickets, individuals had to go to a page on ActBlue — a fundraising site for Democrats — that referred to the money used to buy a ticket as a “contribution.”
That means the dollars collected were technically donations to Tucker’s campaign committee, and any expenses — such as catering and venue rental — should be paid out of that campaign committee account.
Because of that, each Women in Politics Forum event is a political fundraiser, even if the overall expenses outweigh the funds donated via ticket sales and the event “loses” money.
Both Kidd and Miles report on local politics for their respective news outlets, including stories on Tucker and issues connected with her in her role as mayor. For example, earlier this month, Miles filed a story on what 6th District residents wanted in the person replacing Tucker on the Fort Wayne City Council. Kidd is the Journal Gazette’s primary reporter covering city government and has written multiple stories about Tucker since she won the mayoral caucus last month.
Over the weekend, I reached out to Kidd and Miles to find out whether they had been told, when they were asked to appear at the Women in Politics Forum, that it was a fundraiser for Tucker.
Miles said she hadn’t. Believing it was just a panel discussion, she received permission from her bosses at WPTA to appear as long as she didn’t “name-drop” 21Alive during the discussion.
It wasn’t until I interviewed her yesterday, Miles said, that she learned from me the event was a fundraiser. Hours after we spoke, I was told by a source directly involved with the event that Miles would no longer be participating. (Requests for comment from WPTA news leadership were not returned.)
Kidd was on vacation until today and unavailable for comment, but Journal Gazette publisher Sherry Skufca told me via email that when Kidd initially asked her for permission to appear at the event, Skufca did not know it was a fundraiser.
After discovering that fact, “we withdrew Madelyn’s participation and offered a substitute from our newsroom’s leadership team,” she wrote. According to Skufca, Tucker declined.
Nancy Nall Derringer, a former reporter and columnist for the Fort Wayne News-Sentinel, said that Kidd and Miles initially agreeing to participate in Tucker’s event was an unfortunate misjudgment.
“One rule has remained the same throughout my career, and it’s this: reporters don’t participate in political fundraisers. We cover them, of course, but we don’t offer ourselves as the entertainment, or the draw to sell tickets.”
Former WANE 15 anchor Liz Berry Schatzlein agreed with Nall Derringer that journalists appearing as featured speakers at a fundraiser crosses an ethical line.
“Politicians and reporters have always been friends (or enemies!) off-camera,” she wrote in an email. “Fraternizing with office-holders of every stripe at the local watering hole is how many big stories have been broken. But that’s very different than publicly linking arms with a politician.”
Had Kidd and Miles not withdrawn, Nall Derringer told me, the journalists’ involvement in Tucker’s fundraiser would have called into question their ability to fairly and accurately report on the mayor going forward.
“At a time when local news is suffering, we don’t need to give readers or viewers any more reason to turn their backs on us.”
UPDATE: It appears that Mayor Sharon Tucker’s Women in Politics Forum will happen after all.
Rachel Guin, a local attorney who was a panelist at last year’s event, posted as much on Facebook within the past hour. “Looking forward to watching Jama Ross speak about her experience with local journalism at Mayor Tucker’s Women in Politics Forum tomorrow night,” she wrote.
Ross is an unpaid monthly opinion columnist for the Journal Gazette and confirmed to me that she has agreed to appear on the panel.
So why did I report this morning that it was canceled? Because last night, Tucker called me and said she was going to have to cancel it due to local journalists Madelyn Kidd and Emilia Miles dropping out of the event.
Doing so, however, would have likely required her to refund the donations people had already made to attend. It’s also possible that, with less than 48 hours notice before the event, her campaign committee would have had to forfeit non-refundable deposits for venue rental and catering, though I have not been able to confirm that.
It appears that she and her team spent today working to replace Kidd and Miles on the panel in order to still hold the event. In addition to Ross, I’ve been told a journalist from outside Northeast Indiana has been asked to be a featured guest.
Tucker had already rescheduled this year’s Women in Politics Forum once. It was originally slated to happen April 24, but she postponed it after winning the April 20 caucus to replace the late Tom Henry as mayor of Fort Wayne. Tucker was sworn-in in front of a packed audience at the Clyde Theatre on April 23.