Former New York Magazine writer and The Metropolitan Review editor-in-chief Ross Barkan apologized once again after several plagiarism allegations against him and revealed Wednesday that he plans to "self-reflect" with some time away.
"Let me first begin by saying I'm sorry. I truly am sorry for the mistakes I made," Barkan wrote on X. "None of them, genuinely, were willful or intentional. In the course of writing many columns a week, I did not use citations as aggressively as I should have and did not paraphrase well enough. I never intended to crib from anyone's work. I promise all of you that. I recognize, though, how I failed. I am sorry to the journalists whose work I did not properly cite."
"I'm going to take some time away and self-reflect," he added. "I promise to do a much better job going forward."
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Barkan originally hinted at an event in September through the Metropolitan Review in an X post last week but has not provided any updates since then beyond his new statement. He has not yet clarified whether he will retain his position at the Metropolitan Review.
Fox News Digital reached out to Barkan and The Metropolitan Review for comment but did not immediately receive a response.
The controversy originally began in May when Washington Post reporter Drew Harwell accused Barkan of lifting from his report about conservative commentator Ben Shapiro and his outlet, The Daily Wire, for one of his columns.
After Harwell highlighted the similarities between the two articles, New York Magazine updated its piece with an editor's note crediting to The Washington Post, though Harwell explained he wasn't "entirely sure what happened."
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NPR correspondent Bobby Allyn found additional examples of what appeared to be Barkan lifting similar phrases and descriptions from The Intercept and Compact Magazine in other reports.
Barkan initially denied these accusations, calling them "ridiculous," but New York Magazine announced Friday that it would be severing ties with Barkan after an investigation found that he "did not adhere" to editorial standards of proper citation.
"After an independent editorial review, New York found that Ross Barkan did not adhere to our editorial standards, and we have updated 67 columns that did not include proper attribution of language, information, and/or sourcing," the publication said in a statement obtained by Semafor.
"We have updated our archives to include proper attribution in all of the stories that our review found previously inadequate, noting that those updates were made, and are committed to addressing any other instances that come to light," the statement added.
In a statement to Fox News Digital at the time, Barkan wrote, "We've decided to end the column and I send all the best to New York Magazine. In the course of nearly 250 pieces, there were times I should have been more careful with citation. I'm sorry about these errors and will work to do better, more careful in the future."
