Chicago is one of the targets of U.S. President Donald Trump’s deportation “blitz,” which seems to be aimed at neighborhoods with high immigrant populations. And yet despite the fervent national attention on this issue, verifiable information is hard to find.
It’s not for a lack of trying. A leader at Chicago Public Media says his newsroom cannot get the federal government to answer basic questions.
Gilbert Bailon, executive editor of news platforms, says his team cannot verify the number of people who’ve been arrested. They’re questioning the federal government’s official narrative around a traffic stop leading to a man’s death because of its reporting. They cannot confirm how long people are being detained at an immigration facility — and whether the center’s operation is even legal.
This may be an extreme example of government secrecy, as far as the United States is concerned, but I see it as a worrying sign of the future of government transparency.
The reality is governments don’t need the media like they used to.
Government leaders have robust social media operations to advance their narratives. It’s sometimes the only perspective seen by our audiences, who have increasingly spurned legacy news outlets. It doesn’t help that social media platforms feed users content that reinforces their biases and perceptions, which ultimately adds fuel to the polarization we see in society.
While this is happening, legacy media’s declining relevancy is unmistakable. I see it in Canada in how government leaders choose to announce news on social media first. In the recent federal election campaign, the Conservatives banned media on their campaign plane, limited reporters to only a handful of questions a day and then choose which outlets could ask questions, often prioritizing niche outlets that tend to ask easier, less contentious questions.
As for Trump’s immigration enforcement operation in Chicago, the U.S. administration seems to feel it doesn’t need to be forthcoming. The government is pursuing its mass deportation policy with gusto, regardless of the pushback it’s receiving.
Bailon told us it’s been challenging for his Chicago Sun-Times newspaper and WBEZ radio station to report on the deportations because the U.S. administration isn’t cooperating.
The newspaper had an explainer article last month that illustrated what his newsroom knew about the latest deportations, and what it didn’t.
“I’ve been doing this a long time, but I’ve never had a government be this difficult on this subject,” Bailon said.
“In ordinary times,” he said the government responded to open records requests from journalists seeking data within a reasonable time frame. “They’re not doing that.”
His reporters have also struggled to get information about the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency’s office in the Chicago suburb of Broadview, where people are supposed to be processed into detention after they’re arrested.
Bailon said the law restricts people from being detained at that facility for more than 24 hours, but “we know there’s people who have been there for weeks” because reporters have interviewed detainees upon release.
In an age of government secrecy, I believe it’s vital for news outlets, such as Chicago Public Media, to invite audiences into its reporting process and share what it knows and what it doesn’t.
It reminds me of what The Associated Press Reporter Ryan Foley told a public forum he moderated last month in Muscatine, Iowa, with the World Press Institute. He said journalists need to be transparent, and public forums that shed light on our work is one way of doing it.
