Gannett: Fanning the Flames With Falsehoods

Has anyone in Alabama read HB 56?

The answer is surely “yes,” but none of them appear to have been involved in the story “Hundreds from across state protest immigration law,” published May 28 in the Montgomery Advertiser, which describes people protesting Alabama’s immigration law as wanting “others to understand their frustrations, concerns, and in some cases, pleas” – chief among them, according to the story, is a provision that allows police “to stop those based on whether they appear to be in the country illegally.”

And which provision is that? It’s….uh…that’s funny. There is no such provision!

The mainstream media has an embarrassingly bad record when it comes to reprinting this false claim. NumbersUSA member Paul Nachman recently wrote to me concerning a different story that made the same error: “…it’s the same tired old “Papers, please” claim that was steadily used to slur Arizona’s SB1070 law after it passed in 2010,” Paul wrote. “And it’s been debunked over and over. A mere glance at section 12a of the Alabama law will debunk it anew.”

Paul’s right. Here is what Section 12a of Alabama’s HB 56 law says:

Upon any lawful stop, detention, or arrest made by a state, county, or municipal law enforcement officer of this state in the enforcement of any state law or ordinance of any political subdivision thereof, where reasonable suspicion exists that the person is an alien who is unlawfully present in the United States, a reasonable attempt shall be made, when practicable, to determine the citizenship and immigration status of the person, except if the determination may hinder or obstruct an investigation. Such determination shall be made by contacting the federal government pursuant to 8 U.S.C. § 1373(c) and relying upon any verification provided by the federal government.

The immigration provision kicks in after someone has been stopped, detained, or arrested for a different violation. There is nothing in the law that directs police to stop people based on their appearance. But try telling that to the protesters.

“It’s about judging people on the color of their skin instead of the content of their heart,” according to one protester quoted in the story. “It’s affecting the non-documented, and the documented, too,” another protester said. “They don’t want to be profiled.”

Now, the aforementioned Section 12 of the law prohibits police from considering “race, color, or national origin” in the implementation of the law. So does Section 7, Section 9, Section 10, Section 11, Section 15, Section 28, and Section 29. None of that is mentioned in the story. It is hard to know if the protesters were misleading the press or the press was misleading the protesters. What’s clear from the story is that no one has read the bill. Yet, they all keep repeating the same old baseless claims to each other and publishing them as if they were gospel, fanning the flames of the immigration debate with falsehoods.

The Montgomery Advertiser is a Gannett publication. On its website, Gannett states that its vision is “To be the trusted, leading media and marketing solutions company at the forefront of a new era in human engagement.” If it’s coverage of Alabama’s immigration law is any indication, Gannett has a long way to go to earn that trust.
JEREMY BECK is the Director of the Media Standards Project for NumbersUSA