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‘Voter Suppression’ or Just Good Journalism?

by richard01901

AP’s ‘Clinton Clinches’ Angers Sanders Backers

Latinos Missing in Discussions of Trump’s Slur

. . . For Media, It Could Be a Most Lucrative Election

4 Channels Plan Live Coverage of Ali Service

Delayed Mugshot Figures in Rape-Case Outrage

Latin America More ‘Comfortable’ About Race 

Short Takes

AP’s ‘Clinton Clinches’ Angers Sanders Backers

“The Associated Press on Tuesday advised staffers to ‘practice situational awareness’ at their bureaus and offices in the wake of social media pushback from supporters of Bernie Sanders who were angered by its decision to call the Democratic nomination for Hillary Clinton,” Benjamin Mullin reported for the Poynter Institute.

“Danny Spriggs, the AP’s vice president for global security, notified employees that their colleagues were receiving incensed phone calls, emails and social media messages from Sanders backers but noted that the news cooperative hadn’t ‘received any specific security threats.’

Mullin also wrote, “The wrath from Sanders supporters was prompted by the AP’s decision, made on Monday, to announce that Clinton had clinched the nomination for the Democratic Party ahead of her rival a day before the final primaries. The Sanders camp insists that superdelegates — individual voters who do not formally weigh in until the Democratic National Convention — should not be counted as they still have more than a month to change their allegiances. . . .”

As Margaret Sullivan wrote Wednesday in the Washington Post, “The chorus of criticism over the media’s coronation of Hillary Clinton as the presumptive Democratic nominee Monday night was ferocious in some corners and measured in others. But at its core the issue was: How dare they?

“Glenn Greenwald, never one to pull punches, described it on the Intercept as elitist and undemocratic. Michael Tracey, a columnist for Vice, tweeted: ‘The nomination was declared clinched based on unverifiable info that reporters obtained from operatives whose identities were concealed.’ ”

Some Sanders supporters mentioned the AP decision in the same breath as poll taxes and literacy tests.

“It’s just wholly inappropriate,” Gil Cedillo, Los Angeles city council member and former California state legislator, said Tuesday on “Democracy, Now!” “It’s a form of voter suppression. . . . we have six important races to take place. Every vote counts. Every vote should count. And it’s just wholly inappropriate for this agency to try to determine the outcome of an election. It’s voter suppression in the most rank and raw form. What’s next? A literacy test or a poll tax? This is not something that a legitimate news agency should be involved with. . . .”

Sullivan added, “I talked by phone with the AP’s executive editor, Kathleen Carroll. She told me that the decision was not an agonizing one. She emphasized that the AP has been tracking delegates and superdelegates successfully and in the same way for many years. And, she said, they are all known by name to AP reporters and editors. (A published explanation of how the AP does its tracking notes that no superdelegate — they are party operatives and elected officials — has flipped from Clinton to Sanders since the count began last year.)

“ ‘The number got to the number and we were gonna report it, just as we did with Trump,’ Carroll said. ‘When you have news, you report it.’

“That was the reasoning, too, at The Post, Managing Editor Cameron Barr told me. The only discussion was over how big to play the story; it ended up as a headline across the full front page on Tuesday.”

“At the Times, the large print headline attributed the information to the AP, in what looked like a cautionary note — and a highly unusual one. ‘I hadn’t seen that before,’ Carroll told me.”

Sullivan, formerly public editor at the New York Times, agreed with Carroll and Barr.

At most other news organizations, the issue was how to play the AP’s news, not whether it was “voter suppression,” Michael M. Grynbaum reported for the New York Times. “The A.P.’s call created a trigger effect in newsrooms around the country, which have long viewed the agency as an arbiter of election results,” Grynbaum wrote Tuesday.

“Pollsters at major television networks scrambled to confirm The A.P.’s math, with one official at CBS News hopping on a bicycle to quickly return to his office. CNN producers yanked an on-air promo teasing Tuesday’s races as Mrs. Clinton’s critical moment. NBC News, the first TV network to match the call, had its director of elections make a rare on-air appearance on MSNBC.

“Editors at major papers tore up their front pages, adding banner headlines for later editions, even as they debated exactly how to describe a historic milestone predicated on another news outlet’s delegate tally, rather than the results of Tuesday’s primary races in California and five other states. . . .”

As it turned out, Tuesday’s results left few superdelegates for Sanders to woo. “Mrs. Clinton has now won a majority of the 4,051 pledged delegates at stake in the Democratic primaries and caucuses, crossing what Mr. Sanders had long held up as a critical threshold,” Patrick Healy and Jonathan Martin reported for the Times Tuesday night. “She also has support from 571 superdelegates to Mr. Sanders’s 48; only about 100 uncommitted superdelegates remain. . . .”

Latinos Missing in Discussions of Trump’s Slur

“Federal Judge Gonzalo Curiel is white,” Felix Sanchez, chairman and co-founder of the National Hispanic Foundation for the Arts in Washington, wrote Tuesday for The Hill.

“It’s not his race that is at issue; it’s his ethnic heritage. Curiel is Mexican-American, or an American of Mexican descent. He’s not Mexican or ‘Spanish’ (for the completely uninformed). Trump has learned that describing someone as Mexican has a sub rosa pejorative meaning. . . .

Sanchez also wrote, “While all the major Sunday talk shows — ABC’s ‘This Week with George Stephanopoulos‘; CBS’s “Face the Nation”; CNN’s ‘Inside Politics,’ ‘State of the Union’ and ‘Reliable Sources’; ‘Fox News Sunday’; and NBC’s ‘Meet the Press’ — all tracked the Trump/Curiel controversy, not one Sunday news show included a Latino journalist or political analyst.

“Not even the gold standard of political reporting, the ‘Friday News Roundup’ on NPR’s ‘The Diane Rehm Show,’ proffered a Latino political analyst to discuss the Curiel issue. The lack of Latino representation on the Sunday morning talk shows has been well documented by Media Matters and others. The Curiel issue is damning primarily to Trump for his continued Latino bashing and to the major broadcast and cable news programs for their lack of basic understanding on how to report on U.S. Latinos and their virtual exclusion of Latino commentators on issues of direct concern to the U.S. Latino community.

“Frankly, I don’t know who is more irresponsible — Trump for the horrendous and unjust damage he has inflicted on the Latino community, or the news media, who have failed to accurately report on these events or provide Latino analysts to interpret them to the nation and the world. . . .”

The Daily News in New York tweeted an intended front page showing House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., pointing to Trump saying, “I’M WITH RACIST!”  However, after Tuesday’s results, that page was superseded by one with a victory photo of Clinton and the headline, “HER! Clinton makes history as first female Prez nominee.” [PDF]

Meanwhile, Angela Bronner-Helm, writing Wednesday for The Root, listed “five cool things you may not have known about Judge Gonzalo P. Curiel.”

Among them, “Judge Curiel pledged Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity at Indiana University in 1974. Not only is the judge a member of the historically black fraternity, but he pledged its Alpha chapter and is a charter member of the alumni chapter in Bloomington, Ind. His fraternity brothers have taken to social media in recent days to lend their support, including with the hashtag, #NupesAgainstTrump. . . .”

. . . For Media, It Could Be a Most Lucrative Election

“Early on, media executives in charge of much of America’s broadcasting industry were worried that Donald Trump, who eschewed traditional political advertising, might dampen prospects for a high-spending campaign season,” Lee Fang reported Monday for the Intercept.

“That fear is gone.

“The Intercept reviewed the past six months of investor earnings calls and presentations of major media companies. In the first few months of this year, some executives expressed concern that Trump might continue to rely on his extraordinary free media exposure and spend less money than traditional Republican candidates. But over the last two months, the concern has dissipated and transformed into excitement that this year is on track to be the most expensive election in history. . . .”

Fang also wrote, “Alfred Liggins, chief executive of Radio One, one of the largest broadcasting companies targeting the African-American community, told investors last month that ‘we’re actually really excited about the Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump matchup in the general election as we think our audience becomes pivotal for either candidate’s victory.’

“ ‘I know it sounds strange,’ Liggins continued, ‘because Donald Trump has actually insulted everybody, but I believe that he has more of an affinity — African-Americans have more of an affinity towards the Trump than they would a Mitt Romney. And I think that there is going to be a real battle for our audience and the back half of the year, Q4, is when we get the bulk of our political dollars.’ . . .”

The Courier-Journal in Louisville, Ky., is offering this poster of Muhammad Ali to those who subscribe.
The Courier-Journal in Louisville, Ky., is offering this poster of Muhammad Ali to those who subscribe.

4 Channels Plan Live Coverage of Ali Service

Three African American-oriented channels — BET, TV One and Bounce TV — and Fox News Channel plan live coverage Friday of the memorial service for Muhammad Ali in his Louisville, Ky., hometown, the broadcasters said Wednesday.

Other networks did not respond to inquiries from Journal-isms or said their plans were not set.

“BET Networks mourns the death of Muhammad Ali and commemorates his legacy with the BET News special, BET Remembers Muhammad Ali: The Memorial Service Friday, June 10 at 2 PM ET on BET and CENTRIC commercial-free and LIVE stream on BET.com and the BET Now App,” the network said in an announcement.

“BET News correspondent Marc Lamont Hill will anchor live coverage of the memorial service. Hill will be joined in studio by special guests to share reflections and provide cultural commentary. BET Networks will also broadcast and encore airing of BET News’ The Truth Series documentary ‘Muhammad Ali: The People’s Champ’ at 1PM ET on BET and Centric.

“BET Digital will celebrate and honor the global icon’s contributions to sports, music, pop culture and beyond on its digital and social platforms using the hashtags #BETRemembersAli and #CENTRICremembersAli. For more information please visit www.bet.com and www.CentricTV.com. . . .”

TV One said that “Beginning at 2 p.m. ET, Roland S. Martin, host of TV One’s News One Now, the only daily live news program dedicated to Black viewers, will report from the show’s Washington, D.C. studios. In addition, TV One will continue to celebrate the life of ‘The Greatest of All Time’ with a special encore presentation of the one-hour documentary, “Muhammad Ali: Fighting Spirit,” airing at 7 p.m. ET. . . .

The announcement also said, “Throughout ‘Muhammad Ali: Fighting Spirit,’ interviews and archival footage feature notable celebrities, athletes, family members and more . . . . In addition to TV One’s airing of ‘Muhammad Ali: Fighting Spirit,’ viewers can log on to TVOne.tv to watch four 5-minute feature segments, including interviews with Ali’s daughter Laila Ali, Boxing Promoter Don King, Cuban Boxer Teofilo Stevenson, as well as a brief overview of the boxing world.

“Bounce TV said it will carry Muhammad Ali’s farewell procession and his memorial service live, uninterrupted and commercial free on Friday,” Jon Lafayette reported Wednesday for Broadcasting & Cable. “Coverage will begin 9 a.m. ET with the procession, which will take the champ through the neighborhood in Louisville where he grew up. Bounce is working with its Louisville affiliate, Raycom’s WAVE-TV, which is covering the events locally. The memorial service is scheduled for 2 p.m. Eulogies are planned by President Clinton, Bryant Gumbel and Billy Crystal.

“Bounce plans to re-run the 1977 film The Greatest, starring Ali, in between the procession and the memorial. . . .”

Fox News Channel messaged Journal-isms, “On Friday, June 10th, FOX News Channel (FNC) will present special programming to cover the funeral services for the late boxing legend, Muhammad Ali, that are taking place in Louisville, Kentucky.

“Beginning at 2PM/ET, chief news anchor Shepard Smith will provide extensive wall-to-wall coverage from the ‘deck’ as the procession takes place and eulogies are said. Additionally, correspondents Jonathan Hunt and Mike Tobin will be on location in Louisville to cover the latest from the ground.”

[Additional responses received Thursday, June 9:

[ABC

[“Chief Anchor George Stephanopoulos will anchor special reports from New York on Muhammad Ali’s funeral for ABC. In Louisville ‘Nightline’ Anchor Byron Pitts and Correspondent Ryan Smith will report for the network from the Muhammad Ali Center and KFC YUM! Center, respectively. ABC News’ digital properties on desktop, mobile & OTT will have live anchored coverage of the proceedings starting at 9:00 a.m., ET. ABC News Radio will have Correspondent Aaron Katersky anchor coverage beginning at 2 p.m., ET with Correspondent Ryan Burrow at the KFC YUM! Center and Ali biographer Thomas Hauser. ABC News Radio will also provide one minute updates on the funeral during the afternoon. ABC NewsOne will have Correspondents Marci Gonzalez and Elizabeth Hur in Louisville all day, filing reports for more than 200 ABC affiliates and international partners.”

[C-SPAN

[“We’ll be covering it LIVE.

[“Not sure yet which C-SPAN TV network (has to do with Congress in/out times).

[“But will definitely be on our website.”

[CNN

[“CNN will have coverage throughout the day, and will also broadcast the service.”

[PBS

[“We plan to cover Muhammad Ali’s memorial service on PBS NewsHour’s rundown blog. . . .”]

Delayed Mugshot Figures in Rape-Case Outrage

“The mug shot of Brock Allen Turner, who was sentenced to 6 months in jail after raping a 23-year-old woman who was unconscious, has finally been released,” Amanda Chan wrote Monday for Teen Vogue.

Brock Turner, all-American.
Brock Turner, all-American

“Prior to Monday (June 4) afternoon, the media was largely running a smiling yearbook photo of Brock to illustrate stories regarding the case. However, many were quick to point out how problematic this was, considering many other news stories about people convicted of rape included the mug shots, or at least photographs of the person in court.

“Twitter user Kelly Ellis, for instance, pointed out that black men accused of sexual assault often have their mug shots posted with news articles, while the image used to accompany stories about Brock was a smiling photo of him.

“Twitter user Will Brooker also noted the use of a non-mugshot for Brock:

“The Cut reports that the mug shot was not released until this afternoon. Even though mug shots are taken for anyone who is taken in for booking, whether those mug shots are released is a different story  . . . .

January 2015 booking photo released by the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Office.
January 2015 booking photo released by the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Office

Chan also wrote, “Beyond the late mug shot release, though, Vox points out how the coverage of the whole case — particularly depictions by The Washington Post — have been problematic:

“But it’s not just the headlines and pictures. The Post’s article on Turner goes into a lot of detail about his life — even going as far as calling him ‘baby-faced’ and calling the sexual assault ‘a stunning fall from grace’ as it detailed his record as a swimmer. (The victim noted these types of details with disgust in a lengthy letter to her attacker.)

“Meanwhile, the other articles have few, if any, details about the black suspects’ lives beyond the crimes they were accused of. . . .”

Latin America More ‘Comfortable’ About Race

Nicholas Casey, Andes bureau chief for the New York Times, discussed growing up in a small trailer next to Highway 101 in Redwood City, Calif., Wednesday with Terry Gross on NPR’s “Fresh Air.” He also recalled transferring to a struggling, rough-and-tumble school from a middle-class white one because his parents thought he needed the experience, and then going to an elite private high school.

Nicholas Casey
Nicholas Casey

Casey joined the Times last year after covering the Israeli-Palestine conflict for the Wall Street Journal. He has been covering Venezuela’s economic crisis and the guerrilla group known as the FARC. Gross also asked him for his perspective on Latin America as an African American. From the transcript:

“GROSS: . . . Casey . . . was previously with The Wall Street Journal and led the paper’s coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and reported on the Arab Spring. And when he based in Mexico City for The Journal, he covered 12 Latin American countries.

“I’m wondering if, in covering Latin American countries, as an African-American, if you’ve faced any kind of racism. Race is different in Latin America than it is in the United States. Are there any stereotypes that you have to confront? And how do racial issues compare, in the countries you’ve been in there, to the United States?

“CASEY: Race is totally different in Latin America. People talk about it much more openly than they do in the U.S. As a black man in the U.S., it’s very hard, I think the, for people sometimes to even acknowledge that I’m black because they feel like if they mention it — I’m actually mixed. I identify as black. My mother is white. My dad was Cuban background. People are often curious about what my background was but can’t actually ask that because they feel like I might get offended.

“In Latin America, people don’t worry about that. People immediately ask where I came from, if I have Latino background. They’re very happy to hear when I tell them that my dad came from a Cuban background. They come up with nicknames for each other based on their race, things which would be considered offensive in the U.S. But there, people kind of laugh off — I don’t know how I feel about it myself.

“I’ll give you an example. There’s one of the candidates in Peru right now is Japanese descent, Keiko Fujimori. Her father used to be the dictator of Peru. Imagine a country that picked a dictator who was of Japanese descent. He originally was elected, and then he suspended the constitution. His daughter is running for president of Peru right now in a very tight race where they’re counting votes for. Anyway, they call her La Chinita. She’s not even Chinese. But that’s, like, a term of endearment there, which she totally accepts and has taken on herself. You see that it’s thought of in much less offensive terms, race.

“So if you’re someone that is sensitive, you might find Latin America to be a rough place to be. I’m not that sensitive. What I’m very sensitive to is when there is hate that comes across. And there’s not that much that you see in Latin America. There is discrimination in Latin America. You see it in a lot of these countries. You don’t see many black brown faces in their governments. But in a lot of countries, you do. Like, you go to Cuba and you do see that there are a number of people of different backgrounds that are in the government.

“The same goes for Venezuela. You have a indigenous president in Bolivia. You have a lot of countries that have had difficult racial histories — haven’t necessarily got past them, but have learned to kind of be comfortable with the racial mix that they have in their demographic in a way that, especially during this last election cycle, I realize coming back to the U.S., that the U.S. isn’t.

“GROSS: The U.S. isn’t what?

“CASEY: Isn’t comfortable. You don’t see in Latin America the way of stepping on eggshells when talking about race that you do in the U.S. And that’s a big difference.

“GROSS: Do you feel like you have to be more careful and self-protective as a black man in parts of the U.S. than you do traveling in Latin America?

“CASEY: People have asked me that before. And I’ve told them yeah, I think so. It’s a strange thing to say that sometimes I feel less comfortable, in those terms, in the U.S. than I do in other countries. But the stereotype that you see in the U.S. that a young black man — and I’m still in my early 30s — might be someone who is a criminal, might be someone in jail, might be someone that could attack you — that stereotype — I just don’t see it in some of these countries that I go to.

“I never felt it in Mexico. I never felt it when I was in Israel at that point. But it’s something that you do see is in the background of the U.S. in a way. And yeah, it’s something that I don’t feel when I travel abroad that much. . . .”

Short Takes

 

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