On March 20th, McClatchy (whose slogan is “Speak truth to power”) published an article called “Tea party protesters scream ‘nigger’ at black congressman.” There are a number of factual errors and unverifiable claims in the piece that ought to be corrected and clarified. The problematic sentences are identified in block quotes with explanations of the errors beneath each quote:
Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, D-Mo., said he was a few yards behind Lewis and distinctly heard “nigger.”
“It was a chorus,” Cleaver said. “In a way, I feel sorry for those people who are doing this nasty stuff – they’re being whipped up. I decided I wouldn’t be angry with any of them.”
Cleaver’s office said later in a statement that he’d also been spat upon and that Capitol Police had arrested his assailant. The statement praised the police, who Cleaver said escorted the members of Congress into the Capitol past the demonstrators.
As Larry O’Connor has demonstrated, there isn’t evidence to confirm that Cleaver was with Carson and Lewis when walking to the Capitol; they only walked together on the way back from it to the Cannon Office Building.
This video shows the police escorting them into the Cannon Office Building from the Capitol:
[youtube b287OpdjJ3k nolink]
This video shows Carson and Lewis walking to the capitol from Cannon:
[youtube 7dto5e2ji3A nolink]
Notice: no Cleaver. McClatchy cited a provably false “fact.”
Furthermore, Douglas’s claim that a member of the the Congressional Black Caucus was spat upon is eminently debatable.
“The man who spat on the congressman was arrested, but the congressman has chosen not to press charges,” the statement said.
According to Capitol Police, no one was arrested, detained, or handcuffed. One person was questioned but Rep. Cleaver was unable to make a positive identification.
Aside from these obviously correction-able statements, there are other elements of the article the fall squarely on the side of irresponsible journalism, if they don’t actually merit corrections in their own right.
For example, the article leads with this paragraph:
Demonstrators outside the U.S. Capitol, angry over the proposed health care bill, shouted “nigger” Saturday at U.S. Rep. John Lewis, a Georgia congressman and civil rights icon who was nearly beaten to death during an Alabama march in the 1960s.
There is no evidence provided in the piece to suggest the word “nigger” was “shouted,” and the only evidence suggesting it was even said at all is flimsy at best. Paragraphs later, Douglas offers his most persuasive piece of evidence, “A colleague who was accompanying Lewis said people in the crowd responded by saying ‘Kill the bill, then the n-word.'” In the day of cell phone cams and flip cams, McClatchy relies upon hearsay that comes from an unidentified “colleague” of Rep. Lewis.
We kindly request McClatchy issue corrections and clarifications to this article where appropriate.
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