The Note is a summary and analysis of political news stories and trends published every weekday morning by ABCNews.com.
Begun as an internal staff e-mail by then Political Director Mark Halperin, it was first published on January 14, 2002. The Note was edited by Senior Political Reporter Rick Klein from 2007 through 2010, by Michael Falcone from 2010 through 2016, and is now written again by Klein and deputy political director MaryAlice Parks.
In 2006 The Note's online podcast counterpart, AfterNote was frequently hosted by ABC News field producer Teddy Davis.
In April 2007, Halperin left his post as editor of The Note.[1] He was replaced by Rick Klein,[2] who began writing The Note on May 2, 2007.
The Note has been criticized for alleged pro-Republican bias. Left-wing journalist Eric Boehlert writes that "it never crosses over into actually being edgy. In fact, The Note doesn't mock conventional wisdom so much as idolize it" and says it "is enamored of Republican Party talking points". http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2006/0607.boehlert.html
The Note has also been criticized for alleged anti-Republican bias. In a memo dated October 8, 2004, Mark Halperin instructed ABC employees that while both the Kerry campaign and the Bush campaign were guilty of distorting facts, they should be willing to say that distortions coming from the Bush campaign were worse when, in Halperin's estimation, they were.https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A26227-2004Oct12.html
Another frequent criticism is that despite its blog-like style and the increasing popularity of feed readers (especially in the political world), The Note does not publish its content via RSS (except for its podcast). ABCNews.com offers a single RSS feed for all of its political content, of which The Note is only one part. This feed does not contain the full text of The Note, but instead only a headline and link.
The Note often employs jargon that may be incomprehensible to outsiders. Examples of this jargon include: