Wilson-Plame lawsuit ignored by ABC's World News Tonight and CBS Evening News

Neither ABC's World News Tonight nor the CBS Evening News reported in their July 13 broadcasts that former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV and his wife, ex-CIA officer Valerie Plame, had filed a lawsuit against Vice President Dick Cheney, Cheney's former chief of staff I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, and White House senior adviser Karl Rove. By contrast, NBC's Nightly News did report on the lawsuit.

While ignoring a lawsuit against the vice president of the United States and two top White House aides in connection with a matter that has been the subject of great media interest over the past three years, CBS featured a segment on the sale of an original printing of William Shakespeare's works, and both ABC and CBS devoted a segment to Kentucky Derby winner Barbaro's worsening health.

As Media Matters for America noted, Wilson and Plame are accusing Cheney, Rove, and Libby of leaking Plame's identity as a CIA operative and effectively ending her career. Wilson and Plame contend that the Bush administration officials were retaliating against Wilson for criticizing the administration's justifications for invading Iraq.

From the July 13 edition of NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams:

WILLIAMS: News out of Washington this evening, Valerie Plame Wilson, the ex-CIA agent whose cover was blown after her husband criticized the Bush administration claims about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, is suing Vice President Cheney, his former chief of staff Scooter Libby and presidential adviser Karl Rove. This lawsuit says they all conspired to discredit, punish, and seek revenge against the couple. It claims their constitutional and legal rights were violated. A spokesman for Karl Rove says the allegations are, quote, "absolutely and utterly without merit."

We'll take a break here this evening.

—K.D.