Solidarity and independence aren't a zero-sum equation

Welcome to our new readers. I'm glad you're here!

This is a succinct post, as I spent a tremendous amount of time finishing the reworked essential functions of news framework. And by finished, I mean I really want your feedback and ideas. More on that after these links.

I have a few resources or provocations in two areas I've been thinking about when it comes to my own work and reporting practice.

Engagement

After weeks of looking for and asking about more immediate and relevant news about local Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent activity, I finally got a Google Doc sent to me from the union for Temple professors with information about local mutual aid and service groups. There was also a link to a listserv I've not yet been admitted to. I was thankful to feel closer to knowing what might be going on and am baffled by how little coverage there is locally of ICE activity and what residents are doing to respond.

Question Everything has an interview with data journalist and Minneapolis resident Michael Corey about just how distinct information flows are within encrypted group chats of city residents and the major news sources. My favorite quip is that Corey says, despite once working there and having many friends there, he objects to talk he's heard about giving the Minneapolis Star Tribune a Pulitzer Prize. "Give Signal a Pulitzer," he said. Corey is also transparent about how difficult it is for him to try to balance keeping some distance from activism because of his role as a journalist and acting as a good neighbor concerned about the safety of his neighborhood and city.

Resistance

A 21-year-old Temple University student, Jerome Richardson, has been arrested and federally charged (paywalled) with, according to Attorney General Pam Bondi, an attempt "to interfere with the First Amendment rights of worshipers" at a church in Minnesota where there was an anti-ICE protest. Richardson is a native of St. Paul and said he was "helping with logistics" for independent reporter Don Lemon and "connecting him with local contacts." Lemon was charged with one count of conspiracy to violate the federal civil rights of worshipers and one count of violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act, a law to protect women seeking services at reproductive health clinics that extends to places of religious worship.

I am not a Don Lemon fan. Lemon's reporting is more sensational than valuable. His former colleague Soledad O'Brien has said, on the record, "Don has long had a habit of saying idiotic and inaccurate things." Lemon is happy to cloak himself with the protections of a journalist while not being a good one. That is absolutely his right. Lemon is being targeted for violating the First Amendment in an attempt to weaken its protections across the board.

It is unclear to me if Richardson was acting as a fixer for Lemon, was himself a protester, or was both. The indictment against him has not been made public as of the time of this writing. The distinction might matter in this case, but the constitutional questions about what kind of protest is constitutionally protected are more difficult. In this specific case, the indictment appears to be in bad faith. Earlier this year, Bondi's Justice Department dismissed a FACE Act violation case brought against a Minnesota-based anti-choice activist who barricaded himself inside a Philadelphia Planned Parenthood clinic. The staff and all patients, believing the man might be a suicide bomber, evacuated the building until the man was arrested.

Richardson is raising money for his legal defense.

Essential Functions

If you weren't already questioning what the point of journalism is, these two dispatches show just how alive this question is. Those of us working in this field can and should try to answer this question so we can better serve the public right now and well into the future.

The essential functions of news framework can be one starting point for this work. These functions have been refined, with your help, over the course of the last year.

Please tell me what you think.

Do you wish record correction or narrative shift was back in here as an essential function? Do the examples of the functions work for you? Or, do you have others that might be useful? Is this framework different enough from the status quo of news to actually help reimagine it, or does it not go far enough?

Until next week, take care.