NPR Creates New Rule After They Quoted One ‘Expert’ In 77 Different Stories
Daily Caller | 12/24/2025 | Natalie Sandoval
NPR has a resolution for 2026: Stop quoting University of Richmond law professor Carl Tobias.
Tobias “appears 77 times on NPR’s website, and seems to be a dial-a-quote for NPR and numerous other media outlets on a very wide range of topics,” NPR’s standards chief, Tony Cavin, reportedly complained in an email sent to staff. That email — subject reading “GUIDANCE: Don’t I know you from somewhere?” — was shared with Semafor.
Tobias’ “hobby seems to be getting himself quoted about anything and everything in news stories,” the email reads. …
“Tobias casts his net far and wide, from California to the New York Island. And it’s not just on the coasts, he’s quoted by outlets across the country including The Minneapolis Star Tribune [,] The Fresno Bee, the Beaver County Times in Western PA, the Superior Telegram in Duluth MN, and even the Chronicle in the New York City suburb of Croton-on-Hudson, population 8,300,” the email continues, before proposing that “as a collective New Year’s resolution we give the professor some (well deserved) time off.”
…
Ann Coulter noted, in 2003, that a New York Times (NYT) piece on “Hillary-mania” hinged on the testimony of a Gregory F. Packer.
“It was easy for the Times to spell Packer’s name right because he is apparently the entire media’s designated ‘man’ on the street’ for all articles ever written. He has appeared in news stories more than 100 times as a random member of the public. Packer was quoted on his reaction to military strikes against Iraq; he was quoted at the St. Patrick’s Day Parade, the Thanksgiving Day Parade and the Veterans Day Parade. He was quoted at not one — but two — New Year’s Eve celebrations at Times Square. He was quoted at the opening of a new ‘Star Wars’ movie, at the opening of an H&M clothing store on Fifth Avenue and at the opening of the viewing stand at Ground Zero. He has been quoted at Yankees games, Mets games, Jets games — even getting tickets for the Brooklyn Cyclones. He was quoted at a Clinton fund-raiser at Alec Baldwins house in the Hamptons and the pope’s visit to Giants stadium.”
