Trevor Kavanagh
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Trevor Michael Thomas Kavanagh (born 19 January 1943) is a journalist and formerly the Political Editor of the Sun newspaper.
Trevor Kavanagh was educated at Reigate Grammar School before leaving school at 17 to work for newspapers in Surrey and later Hereford. In 1965 he emigrated to Australia, working on several newspapers. After a short stint back in the United Kingdom working for the Bristol Evening Post Kavanagh returned to Australia to work for the Sydney Daily Mirror (in Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. stable) on the political desk. In 1978 he returned to the UK more permanently, taking a job with The Sun.
Kavanagh became Political Editor in 1983. He is a staunch Thatcherite and strongly backed the newspaper's backing of Margaret Thatcher. In March 1997 the newspaper decided to drop its long-term support of the Conservative Party and throw its weight behind Tony Blair's revitalised Labour Party. Kavanagh has said he was against the move but accepted it as part of his job. He is however, against the reintroduction of the death penalty in Britain.
Kavanagh is a strong supporter of Israel and his newspaper "has consistently editorialized in favor of (the Iraq) war" [1]. There is no doubt Kavanagh also has contacts in high places within the British Government. He claimed an exclusive by reporting the date of the 2001 UK General Election before it had been official announced. Some claim (see the New Statesman article linked below, for example) that there was a deal between the Government and The Sun - the Government would have the newspapers continued support, as long as it gave the newspaper the date of the election first.
In January 2004, Kavanagh claimed another huge scoop, an unnamed source telephoned Kavanagh with details of the Hutton Inquiry the night before it was officially published. Kavanagh was provided with accurate details of the report and published them ahead of the official release. Shortly afterwards he was named as the 8th most influential individual in the British media - behind his proprietor Murdoch, but ahead of his editor, Rebekah Wade.
Kavanagh covered his last UK General Election as political editor in May 2005. In December 2005 it was announced that he was to "move upstairs" in the New Year to the post of associate editor, with the job of political editor going to his long-serving deputy, George Pascoe-Watson.
[edit] Inaccuracies
In a 2007 article [2] Kavannagh alleged that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad wishes to "wipe Israel off the map", which is a fabricated quote. The closest translation to what the Iranian President actually said is, "The regime occupying Jerusalem must vanish from the page of time.” In 2006, Iran’s ambassador was asked directly about Ahmadinejad's position towards Israel by Wolf Blitzer. The response from the ambassador was that "...if you are going to conclude that we have said the people there have to be removed or massacred, this is fabricated." [3]
In his 2003 article Paid To Be a Traitor [4], Kavannagh asserts that George Galloway was an "employee of Saddam’s sadistic state machine" and that he stole "£375,000-a-year from the impoverished Iraqi people." These allegations have been dismissed as either inaccurate or without proof when brought to court. [5]
