White House Squashes Kagan Rumor

CBS News on Thursday night deleted a post on one of its blogs that suggested Solicitor General Elena Kagan is gay. The move came after the White House criticized the network for making “false charges” about Kagan, widely believed to be a leading candidate for the Supreme Court, The Washington Post’s Howard Kurtz reports.

The blog post, written by former Bush aide Ben Domenech, said President Obama would “please” much of his base by nominating Kagan to be the “first openly gay justice.” Domenech clarified his post after the White House complaint: “I have to correct my text here to say that Kagain is apparently still closeted — odd, because her female partner is rather well known in Harvard circles.”

CBS decided to pull the story after Domenech acknowledged he was reporting on rumor. Dan Farber, editor in chief of CBSNews.com, said in a statement that “after looking at the facts we determined that [the post] was nothing but pure and irresponsible speculation on the blogger’s part.”

An administration official, who asked not to be identified, told the Post’s Kurtz that Kagan is not a lesbian.

Read Kurtz's full story here.