July 29, 2007

Anthony Ramirez/NYT spins Morristown rally for illegal immigration supporters

You know the rule: if a politician commits a crime and his party affiliation isn't mentioned, that means he's a Democrat. Anthony Ramirez of the New York Times offers the corollary to that rule in "Unrest and Arrests at Immigration Rally", about an event that took place on Saturday in Morristown, New Jersey.

All five of those arrested were counter-protesters who support illegal immigration. Despite having eight paragraphs to work with, Ramirez fails to explicitly note that. In fact, the only clue to the affiliations of some of those arrested comes from this:

In the most serious clash, a man threw two small metal cylinders at a pickup truck. When the driver of the truck and his female companion confronted the man, they were set upon by about 10 other men, said Lt. David Ackerman of the Morristown police.

Three men were arrested and charged with assault, disorderly conduct and other charges. The rest fled, Lieutenant Ackerman said.

The woman was treated at Morristown Memorial Hospital, he said. The injured man had been one of the speakers at the rally, organized by the ProAmerica Society, which urges stricter enforcement of immigration laws...

Most people will probably have tuned out by that point, and others who aren't paying attention won't realize that those who support illegal immigration were the ones arrested. And, there are still two more arrests that Ramirez doesn't cover, both from the illegal immigration-supporting side. And, even those paragraphs don't note that the ones who threw the cylinders were from the other side; some people might end up thinking it was a disagreement among those on the same side.

Maybe the NYT could learn something about real reporting from their country cousins over at the Daily Record, who disclose the affiliations of those arrested in the third paragraph.

Please write Clark Hoyt with your thoughts: public *at* nytimes.com

Related:
Attacks on illegal immigration protesters
AP: Minuteman march turns violent
Los Angeles Times: Covering for Commies

Posted to Immigration2007a at July 29, 2007 12:23 PM