Last year, MRC Latino covered the variance in tone shown by Rep. Luis Gutiérrez (D-IL) when discussing immigration on English-language media vis-à-vis a much harsher tone when appearing on its Spanish-language counterparts.
Spittle-flecked denunciations of racism and demands of political debt repayment on Univision and Telemundo are tempered by calls for compassion and unity on the rest of the Sunday talkers. I have dubbed this phenomenon “the Full Gutiérrez”, and the man who whined the loudest about Univision’s exclusion from upcoming Republican presidential debates just went there.
There was much outrage and strong reaction upon release of the 2016 GOP presidential debate schedule and its exclusion of Univision. However, anchor Jorge Ramos’ recent concurrent articles on immigration prove the GOP’s point precisely, and render any further debate on the matter to little more than sound and fury that signifies nothing.
The article, titled “Republicans, this is personal”, was first published in Reforma (Mexico City), and then on (Univision sister network) Fusion three days later. A quick reading of both pieces reveals a subtle, but noticeable, difference in tone and tenor, and a clear softening for English-language consumption-including several choice lines that didn’t make it into Ramos’ Fusion post at all. For example:
This sentence that didn’t make it into the fourth paragraph of the Fusion piece but ran in Reforma: “But the message sent a few days ago from their vote in the House of Representatives was crystal clear: we don’t want you here.”
Ramos closes for Reforma with: “Republicans just don’t get that immigration is, for we Latinos, a matter of the soul. And so long as they don’t understand that-and do something about it-they will continue to lose our vote and (lose) the country’s most important elections. Yes, the Republicans have a Latino problem and less than two years to fix it…or they will lose again.” He simply closes for Fusion with, “Republicans now have a Latino problem and less than two years to solve it.”
In Reforma, Ramos also belittles Republican opposition to the executive actions by mock-quoting “unconstitutional” (second paragraph). The Fusion article features an actual quote from House Speaker John Boehner denouncing the unconstitutionality of the executive immigration actions.
All of which, in addition to the usual “anti-immigrant” references and the touting of the flawed Latino Decisions push-poll showing 89% Hispanic support for the President’s amnesty, lead me to this rebuttal of the talking point that emerged from Doral in the wake of the debate shutout:
“The Republican Party has been complaining lately about how some Latino journalists, including me, only ask them about immigration.”
I would respectfully posit that it is one thing to make an editorial decision to focus one’s news coverage on immigration based on the perceived needs of the audience. It is entirely another, however, to cast only one immigration outcome as acceptable, and to then cast any opposition to the network’s preferred solution as being anti-immigrant, or racist, or (when covering Hispanic conservatives who prefer incremental reforms) race-traitors.
When such rhetoric comes from the network’s anchor emeritus, it only serves to poison the debate, and does little to nothing to advance meaningful immigration reform.
Serious immigration debate, free from racial grievance and political invective, will ultimately yield policy that is best for 330 million Americans, as opposed only to 11 million or even 50 million that are catered to by Univision.
Perhaps, given this level of discourse, it is time to admit that it is Univision that has a Republican (or conservative) problem. NEVER go Full Gutiérrez.
