White House calls out Minnesota Star Tribune over immigration coverage

CHRIS FARRELL: The Trump administration. It singled out Minnesota's largest newspaper for its coverage of immigration enforcement. A press release yesterday accused the Minnesota Star Tribune of covering for people in the White House that they called, quote, "criminal illegal immigrants." It linked to social media posts from federal agencies that criticized Star Tribune immigration stories, as well as an opinion column.

For its part, the newspaper told MPR News in a statement, and I quote, "we stand by our reporting and don't have any additional comment." So, joining me to talk about this is Jane Kirtley, Media Ethics and Law Professor at the University of Minnesota. And thanks for taking your time.

JANE KIRTLEY: Thank you, Chris.

CHRIS FARRELL: OK, so I can remember back in the years, the Nixon administration, they had their beef with the press. Reagan administration, Obama administration. So this isn't the first time Trump or any president has publicly disparaged news coverage they don't like, right?

JANE KIRTLEY: Certainly not. And you can go even farther than that. Thomas Jefferson, famously--

CHRIS FARRELL: I was going to say, probably from the beginning of the presidency, right?

JANE KIRTLEY: Right. And so, again, nothing new or novel in a president criticizing a news organization. But I think what we've seen is a steady escalation on the part of the Trump administration, especially in this second administration, where he's been not just talking about fake news or the lying press in a general sense. He's taking on specific outlets, suing some of them, banning some of them from coverage. This is just the latest salvo. And I don't know what to say other than, so what else is new?

CHRIS FARRELL: Well, one of the things that is new about this, and I may be wrong, but most of the time, he went after AP-- it's been going after national news outlets. This is a local news outlet.

JANE KIRTLEY: That's true. I guess I would say that the suit that he brought against the Des Moines Register--

CHRIS FARRELL: That's true, yeah.

JANE KIRTLEY: -- and a pollster that they used. I respect the Des Moines Register, but I think most people don't think of it as a national news organization on the scale of, say, the Washington Post or the New York Times. But I don't how he chooses or his administration chooses who they're going to beat up on today, or yesterday, or whenever it is.

But I think it's probably not surprising that the Star Tribune would be a target, simply because the Trump administration has made it clear that they don't like the governor of our state, that they don't like a lot of things about the way our government in this state operates. And the Star Tribune has been relentless in its coverage of what's going on with the detention and deportation of undocumented or so-called illegal immigrants. And I think it was really only a matter of time. But why this particular set of stories and opinion columns attracted their attention, I don't quite know.

CHRIS FARRELL: So, as journalists, we take seriously the difference between reported pieces and opinion columns. There's a real divide there. But we take that seriously as journalists. Do you find it significant at all that one of the pieces that was criticized from the Star Tribune was an opinion column?

JANE KIRTLEY: Well, I did find it very interesting that he did that, or I should say the administration did that-- I don't know who wrote this press release-- because it did not make that distinction that you're discussing. And, of course, there are many readers of news organizations product that don't make that distinction clearly and talk about bias when they're pointing to an opinion column that is supposed to represent a point of view.

In this attempt to just suggest that it's all the same and there's no distinction. I think, frankly, the Trump administration is playing to a general misconception among the public. And, as you said, we in the news media understand that distinction, but, perhaps, we aren't as careful as we should be in making certain that our readers do.

CHRIS FARRELL: Well, I love this, because I get to ask you all kinds of questions that are puzzling me. And one of them is, most of the criticisms of the media have been through social media. Trump's very good at using social media. But this was a press release. This is a White House press release. And so is the audience other journalists now?

JANE KIRTLEY: Could well be. One of the things that I noticed when I read this, and it's not unique to this press release-- I've noticed it in many of the social media and, for example, speeches that have been made by Trump administration employees-- they have a very different tone than those of us that have read press releases for the last 20 years are accustomed to.

It is scrappier. It's more informal. It's more accusatory in tone. And we're used to this from social media-- Truth Social, X, and so forth-- it's unusual to see it in a press release. Yes, he is, to some extent, playing to the media, because the media are the primary people that look at press releases. But I also think it's really clear that the tone of this is playing to his audience.

He is hoping, I think, that the press will pick up these press releases, and repeat them verbatim, and, therefore, getting the message out to a much wider audience. Is this a shot across the bow to warn other news organizations that they're likely to be equal targets? Possibly.

But, from my perspective, the criticisms that are being made are ones that news media should be prepared for and, to some extent, should be wearing proudly. Because what he's criticizing them for is accurately reporting what is going on, which he's already getting pushback from the public on, as polling is showing that more and more people are not comfortable with the way the deportation and detention process is going forward.

So we're reporting what's going on. He and his administration doesn't really like that. It's understandable that he would be pushing back against it.

CHRIS FARRELL: So, last quick question-- there have been a lot of lawsuits that the administration has done against the press. Are these articles the kind of articles that could end up being sued? Or this is more of just we don't like this coverage?

JANE KIRTLEY: Well, I think it's primarily the latter. The reality is that the Supreme Court of the United States has made clear that opinion enjoys the highest level of First Amendment protection, which is something that Trump and his supporters benefit, too, from when they're engaging in discourse of varying kinds.

So I'd say as far as the opinion column is concerned, I think the likelihood of a successful lawsuit based on that would be relatively low. The basis for a libel suit is false statements of fact. And unless you're able to show that the statements were false, that they were knowingly false, or published recklessly, under the New York Times v. Sullivan actual malice standard, an elected official like Donald Trump cannot prevail.

So I don't see these as serious suggestions of a lawsuit based on this reporting. But, again, who knows what they might go after in the future?

CHRIS FARRELL: Well, thank you very much for your time. I really appreciate it.

JANE KIRTLEY: Most privilege for me too. Thanks.

CHRIS FARRELL: Jane Kirtley is the Silla Professor of Media Ethics and Law at the University of Minnesota.