WRAL: When Words and Visuals Collide

WRAL did a pretty decent albeit brief job with their coverage of the work session, pointing out a number of important points, based on the web version of their story:

• The second paragraph notes that the 2003 resolution "prohibits police from targeting people solely on their immigration status," and notes that status is checked if someone is involved in a "serious crime."
• The article notes that "[m]ost police departments have the same policy" in other cities.
• The article also quotes Stith with words more or less saying this is not about on-the-street profiling, which is consistent with his clarification statement earlier this week.

So, on the facts, good coverage. But check out the visual on the story, copied at right. What jumps out at you? The headline: "Councilman: Policy Makes Durham 'Sanctuary' for Illegal Immigrants." Nicely bolstered, of course, by an image directly to the right of a Latino family.

Ahh, you can just see the red blood oozing from the raw meat. Intentionally or unintentionally, a person new to the story looks at this and says, "Wow, Durham's a sanctuary for illegal immigration. Hey, this Councilman Stith guy says so."

Don't believe me? Read the comments section at the bottom of the story. The vast majority of comments are of a strongly anti-illegal immigration bent, and demonstrate an appalling, but completely unsurprising, lack of knowledge about the entire topic:

"I think after the murders in Jersey by the illegal immigrant, Durham Mayor Bill Bell said Durham was not a sanctuary city and he want to change that image. I don’t see that happing, do you? In my opinion I think he (Durham Mayor Bill Bell) broke federal law. Durham Mayor Bill Bell doesn’t know if he has once departed immigrants living in his city or other types of criminal. Is he running again for mayor, does he need the illegal immigrants vote, can illegal immigrants vote in Durham? I have email the governor and the mayor of Raleigh with question about where are the sanitary cities, no response. I bet the illegal are voting in North Carolina. This is a federal crime."

    ...or my favorite...

"IF THE DURHAM POLICE CHIEF AND THE MAYOR, AND THE TOWN COUNCIL APPROVES THIS SANTUARY FOR THE ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS, THEY SHOULD BE REMOVED FROM OFFICE FOR BREAKING THE LAW OF THE UNITED STATES, AND SHOULD HAVE THERE CITIZENSHIP REVOKED, AND KICK OUT OF THE USA."

Ahh yes. Durham is trying to become a sanctuary and apparently Thomas Stith is fighting it.

Of course, he never said this. But he's created a media firestorm with visuals and themes that play to the right-wing base. They appear to have turned off many old hands at Durham politics, but how will this play north of the Eno? In South Durham? To the Victoria Peterson fans, who seem attracted in part by her anti-immigrant stand?

WTVD: Why No One Respects TV Newsers, Exhibit #1,429

Now mind you, WRAL's coverage wasn't all that bad per se -- it actually crammed a great deal of facts into a short piece -- but the mere coverage of it attracted the proverbial flies around a dead carcass.

WTVD ABC 11's piece, on the other hand... well, this is just bad reporting. First, the headline: Lopez, Stith Differ on Immigrant Policy. Great -- now we've set this up as a mano a mano debate against two people (titles not cited), and one of them's a Hispanic name?

Folks, this is about as good as the article gets.  Let's continue; my comments are in-line in bold/italics.

The Durham mayor's race continues to heat up. One candidate has raised immigration as a campaign issue, calling the Bull City a "sanctuary city" for illegal immigrants. But Thursday the city council and the new police chief rebuffed Thomas Stith's hope for change. The last sentence in the lede sets up "rebuffed" against "hope for change" -- rather loaded language.

When Durham police holds a license checkpoint or question someone on the street, should they ask people to prove legal residency in the U.S.?

"No, I don't see a reason why," Chief Police Chief Jose Lopez.

The above two paragraphs set this up as a debate as to whether the Durham P.D. should or should not ask about immigration status during pre-arrest stops. Stith never proposed changing this practice. The rest of the Council never proposed changing this practice. But apparently, Durham's new Latino police chief has an opinion all his own on the subject that's more important than those facts. And remember, we know from the headline this is all Stith v. Lopez. So, I'm sure Stith would support such checkpoints. Right?

Lopez, the new police chief, agrees with a city council resolution passed four years ago. But council member Thomas Stith has said that rule brands Durham as a "sanctuary city" for illegal immigrants.  There's no information about what that resolution states. No mention of the fact that Stith voted for that resolution and doesn't want to change current practice. As read here, Stith seems opposed to the current practice. Again, inaccurate.

"We needed to modify it for lack of a better word, for clarity," Lopez said.  Needed to modify what? Lopez, according to every other press account, opposed 'modifying' anything in the policy.

Stith wanted the policy changed and a deputy police chief agreed on Monday. But in front of dozens of immigration activists who flooded City Hall Thursday the new police chief did not agree.   Again, here we are with the man-to-man opposition: Some guy named Lopez, backed by lots of immigration activists, backs down Stith and Hodge.

[...]

Stith said his effort is to help stop crime, not immigration.  

"We are a sanctuary for civil rights, for law abiding citizens," Stith said. "We are a sanctuary for people who are moving forward and prospering. That's not what this debate for me is about."

The Durham City Council did not support Stith, but the councilman is correct about a contradiction.

The city has a written rule that police are not to ask anyone, under any circumstances, about their immigration status. But the new chief did say officer might ask immigration status of someone who is a criminal suspect.

First of all, the "written rule" has been broadly discussed, here and in other forums, and while opinions disagree -- it is in no way clear that the existing rule does prohibit such questions of individuals who are under arrest, a point we've addressed here since coverage began last Saturday. Claiming the councilman is "correct" about something is, frankly, either shoddy reporting or bias. I'm guessing the former, given the preponderance of evidence to that effect elsewhere in the piece.

Second, and much more importantly, the article implies this Lopez guy "might" do something about immigration issues for someone "who is a criminal suspect." No mention of the fact that such activities have been the status quo for several years.

If you have concerns over the coverage of the story by WTVD, I'd suggest you email the news director or director of web operations. Based on past correspondence with WTVD personnel, I believe this is the reporter's email address. If I get any feedback from any of them on this story, I'll post it in the comments.

Predictable: John Locke Goes Hobbesian on Immigration

Finally, to no surprise to anyone, the John Locke Foundation blog is spinning the issue as a 'slippery slope' for immigration, and changing the game. No longer is this about City policy vs. police practice. Suddenly, it's about, "Hey, why shouldn't we be asking people on the street their immigration practice, huh?"

The Durham City Council today basked in PC glory as they decided that asking illegals if they are illegal is just, well, not a feel-good thing to do. New Police Chief Jose Lopez Sr. concurred. ... The advocates at City Hall today said they were satisfied with the police asking about immigration status when someone is arrested or is involved in a criminal investigation. But that’s just for now. Once you’re headed down the slippery slope, it’s hard to stop.

Of course, none of this reflects the actual debate, since stopping individuals and asking them their immigration status was never in question. Stith never proposed that, though his robo-calls sure were misleading.

But hey, why let facts get in the way of pretty good rhetoric?

Why This Matters

This whole issue of media coverage matters because it all manages to give mayoral candidate Stith what I suspect he was after from day one: a public perception of being "tough on immigration."  An issue that, as people like Victoria Peterson and John Best have shown, does resonate with segments of the community.

There's been lots of nuanced coverage of the facts behind the issue -- and what this issue is, and is not, about -- in print and on the blogs (if I do say so myself to the latter point.) But the former reaches an attractive but shrinking audience. And while BCR's readership is literally growing weekly, it still amounts to only about a couple thousand hits a day, from about 5,000 unique individuals per month (most of whom are in the Triangle).

I'd wager more people saw or will see/read WTVD's coverage of the subject in 48 hours' time than will read any blog -- Durham-focused or otherwise -- in two weeks' time.

Durham voters should know what the issues are, now what they're voting on. TV news watchers just walked away with a very different opinion of what Thomas Stith is trying to do than what he's actually trying to do. And this is before WPTF and other conservative outlets try to jump on the story.

Perhaps the Hizonner-in-campaigning could make robo-calls to voters to correct their misconceptions and clarify his policy, or send out mailers. After all, WTVD at least got his stand dead wrong.

Somehow, I'm not holding my breath.