AG Report 8.13.2024

Associated Press Pushes Activist Narrative

The Associated Press published an article last week suggesting that a “credentialed” journalist had been wrongly arrested and charged with a hate crime by the NYPD because he merely documented the criminal actions of anti-Israeli protestors. It’s rather clear that the narrative in the article was provided by the attorney for the journalist and the authors did not bother to push back.

What the article completely omits is that the “journalist” had allegedly acted as a lookout for criminals who targeted multiple locations for vandalism and other destruction. If the authors had bothered to do any actual investigation, they would have found that the alleged individual has a long history of criminal and far-left activism and uses his “journalism” as cover for the criminal behavior he supports.

This story emphasizes two major recurring problems within the press. First, the belief that journalists are a special class exempt from the rules. Second, activists feeding reporters scoops and using them to promote certain narratives.

The latter wouldn’t be as big a problem if reporters would investigate those narratives and provide contextual balance. But that rarely happens, which is how you end up with an article suggesting it’s outrageous to charge someone who was allegedly an accomplice to multiple criminal acts just because they identify as a journalist. 

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