NPR retracts comically specific article about Supreme Court's Samuel Alito retiring, after he doesn't

This morning, NPR published a long, detailed article about U.S. Supreme Court justice Samuel Alito retiring. Announced from the bench, wrote veteran court reporter Nina Totenberg. But he hasn't retired; he wasn't even there today. Oops!

"Earlier today, we erroneously published a story saying that Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito was retiring. Neither Alito nor the court's public information office has announced his retirement, and we have retracted the story." went an editor's note that replaced the erroneously published story.

The Supreme Court's public information office quickly denied the report after its publication. The original item may be read at the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine: Justice Samuel Alito, who wrote the opinion overturning Roe v. Wade, retires.

Justice Samuel Alito, who wrote the Supreme Court's opinion reversing Roe v. Wade, is retiring, the court announced Tuesday. …

It's clear from the sourcing, complete with dial-a-quote insider commentary, that this was an article prepared well in advance. So the assumption is that the false detail garnishes a story that will soon be true, and NPR jumped the gun and ruined it for him. Shame.

Alito has served his team on the bench since 2006, when he was nominated by President George W. Bush to replace Sandra Day O' Connor.