Days after right-wing bloggers found that a new documentary about gun violence produced by Katie Couric was edited to make it appear Couric’s question left pro-gun activists speechless, the Yahoo News anchor admitted the edit was “misleading.”
In “Under the Gun,” a documentary that made its TV debut on May 15, Couric asks members of the Virginia Citizens Defense League: “If there are no background checks for gun purchasers, how do you prevent felons or terrorists from walking into, say a licensed gun dealer and purchasing a gun?”
Director Stephanie Soechtig edited the segment to include about eight seconds of silence after the question as the activists avert their eyes and look at each other, CNN reported.
But in raw audio of the interview obtained by the Free Beacon, the activists respond without pausing. The edits were first reported by Ammoblog, a pro-gun site.
In a statement posted online Monday night, Couric said she raised concerns about the pause during a screening of the film with Soechtig, who told Couric the “beat” was added for “dramatic effect.”
“I regret that those eight seconds were misleading and that I did not raise my initial concerns more vigorously,” she wrote.
Amid the controversy, Soechtig said she “never intended to make anyone look bad” and said the pause was meant to provide viewers with “a moment to consider this important question.”
Watch the edited version of the clip via CNN:
AP photo: Soechtig and Couric