Lee Stranahan‘s ties to Andrew Breitbart run deep.
So much so that he agreed to return to the site that fired him in March 2014.
Before you move on to the happy ending, please see what led to Stranahan’s firing last year, including a fabulously angry collection of internal office emails obtained by The Mirror.
Fast forward to May 2015. Stranahan is just delighted to be back on board. Who doesn’t want to work at a place with such reasonable contracts?
“The short version is that there was never any good reason that I wasn’t working at Breitbart,” he told The Mirror by email. “I like them and they like me and because we share a bond with Andrew, that’s a connection that runs pretty deep.”
He explains his reuniting with Breitbart News like this: “A good reason for me not to be working there would be that my reporting was bad or I wasn’t productive, and that was never the case. When I initially quit in September 2013, I kept doing reporting on my own and continued to turn out solid, noteworthy work on topics like the Middle East and corruption.”
In no way is he forgetting the 2014 firing. But why dwell on yesterday?
“When I briefly went back to work for my friend Brandon Darby, his vertical Breitbart Texas had just started up and Brandon was obviously under a lot of pressure,” he wrote. “He talked to me a few months later, apologized and admitted that he had made a big mistake for firing me over reporting that was completely accurate and ethical. I accepted Brandon’s apology, renewed our friendship and I was busy working on other projects, most notably exposing corruption in the state of South Dakota.”
And then CPAC happened. And Uber.
“A couple of months ago at CPAC, I shared an Uber ride with Andrew’s lifelong best friend and CEO Larry Solov,” he wrote. “Larry and I had not talked in over year and we had a good conversation. Around the same time, Steve Bannon had me as a guest on his show to discuss the reporting I’ve been doing the last year in South Dakota.”
That led to a conversation about him being back on staff — “Week to week, at this point,” Stranahan explained.
To be sure, the new, old, fired reporter who once quit is excited.
“There are a lot of new faces at Breitbart,and I’m excited to be working with friends, both old and new,” he gushed. “I couldn’t be happier doing what I do best at the site that bears Andrew Breitbart’s name. Like everyone else there, I am working hard every day to preserve his journalistic legacy.”
Please forgive The Mirror‘s pessimistic tone.
Maybe three times really is a charm. All together now, let’s sing: Reunited and it feels so good. Reunited ’cause we understood. There’s one perfect fit. And, sugar, this one is it.
If not, Stranahan, you know how to reach me.