Tag: ethnic media

La Ruta del Voto Latino (The Road to the Latino Vote): New Orleans, The "Invisible" Latinos

Journalist Diego Graglia has been documenting the lives of Latinos during this presidential election year. He recently traveled from New York City to Mexico City, stopping along the way to talk to Latinos in small towns and big cities about the issues that matter to them. For more on La Ruta del Voto Latino/The Road to the Latino Vote visit www.newyorktomexico.com.

A street sign in New Orleans' French Quarter

New Orleans was Hispanic before being American, as street signs remind you in the French Quarter. Bourbon Street, no less, was named over two centuries ago after the royal family -last name Borbón- that still reigns over Spain.

Three years ago, after Hurricane Katrina, Latino workers poured into the city to help with clean up and rebuilding. But Hispanic Americans were in New Orleans long before that demographic explosion. The sense I got from talking to Latinos who’ve been there for many years, though, was that there was no real Latino community to speak of: no civic or cultural organizations, no newspapers, only one store where you could buy Latin American groceries!

“Before, we used to have one supermarket, two restaurants, the Honduran consulate, and that’s it,” says American-born Diane Schnell, the daughter of Honduran parents, who grew up in the city. “Now there’s ten or twelve supermarkets and the stores have tripled and quadrupled. There’s a Mexican consulate too.”

(more…)

The Obamas and Immigration: A Top Priority?

Not only does Sen. John McCain present his stance on immigration differently when talking to Spanish-language media (as we showed yesterday.)

So do the Obamas.

A few days ago, Michelle Obama was interviewed by one of the top Spanish-language radio hosts in the country, Eddie Piolín Sotelo, on his Piolín en la mañana show. Mrs. Obama had this to tell Sotelo about immigration reform:

This will be at the top of his agenda, you know, along with ending this war in Iraq responsibly.

At another point Mrs. Obama said, “We need the Latino community and we’re gonna do everything in our power,” to attract their votes.

But going back to Sen. Barack Obama’s acceptance speech at the DNC a couple of weeks ago, one needs to look hard in the transcript to find that little nugget he dedicated to the issue of immigration.

“Passions may fly on immigration, but I don’t know anyone who benefits when a mother is separated from her infant child or an employer undercuts American wages by hiring illegal workers.”

He referred to immigration as lowering American salaries, which clearly isn’t the way most Latinos see the issue. And then he didn’t address so many aspects of the issue. What about the undocumented people already here? What about the undocumented students who want to go to college? Driver’s licenses? The Immigrations and Customs Enforcement raids that have scared people across the country?

This week, as John McCain had done, Obama sat down for an interview with a Univision anchor; this time it was María Elena Salinas. (We haven’t found an English transcript of the original conversation, so this is our re-translation of the Spanish translation.)

Salinas asked Obama whether he would call for a stop to immigration enforcement raids, to which he replied that he considers the raids a publicity trick to try to shift people’s attention from the lack of immigration reform. Obama added that what is needed is comprehensive reform which provides strong border security and which punishes employers who take advantage of undocumented workers.

Again, nothing to write Mexico or El Salvador about. Many Latino voters may still be waiting to hear the candidates reconcile their statements to Spanish-language media with their speeches and comments to English-language audiences.

How Ethnic Media Covered the Conventions

During the Democratic and Republican National Conventions Feet in Two Worlds worked with the New York Community Media Alliance to bring a group of ethnic media journalists to Denver and St. Paul to cover the conventions, the candidates and the parties.  The following article was written by a member of the group, Jehangir Khattak, a free lance Pakistani journalist who reports for newspapers and radio in the US and Pakistan. 

For more reports from the conventions by ethnic media journalists click here

America’s minority communities are the driving force behind major economic sectors such as agriculture, service, hospitality, and construction. They fill the jobs common folks are unwilling to do, as well as create job opportunities through their enterprising skills. However, major parts of these communities remain in the shadows, and their contribution to the American dream is barely mentioned in the national media.  Little wonder that mainstream media’s intentional or unintentional neglect of these fledging communities has created huge room for the ethnic press to take root and grow. According to the National Directory of Ethnic Media, there are more than 2,000 ethnic media organizations nationwide reaching out to more than 50 million Americans, or roughly one-fifth of the total population.

The demand for ethnic media is growing at such a pace that in New York alone there are nine different Urdu-language weekly newspapers. Nationwide, the number of Pakistani community weekly newspapers, radio and television channels has crossed the 20 mark. However, the strength and importance of this uncelebrated segment of the American media has rarely been recognized in the mainstream media. In fact the more the mainstream media ignores ethnic minorities, the more it strengthens media from these communities.

There has always been a need for organizations that could recognize, highlight and connect the ethnic media with the mainstream and build its capacity to market publications meeting the highest possible journalistic standards. It’s in this context that the New York Community Media Alliance and Feet in 2 Worlds sponsored journalists from the New York-based ethnic press to cover the DNC in Denver. The initiative proved to be more productive than many had thought as it exposed the ethnic media journalists, many of whom were covering a DNC for the first time, to the vast trove of information for their respective communities. For the first time ten different communities saw the convention coverage from their angle.

Not only that, the NYCMA and FI2W’s project had some impact on the mainstream media too. The New York Times “embedded” one of its reporters with our group of ethnic journalists to write about a story about ethnic media’s coverage of the convention. Thus the initiative not only generated several blogs, dozens of stories and radio interviews, but also mainstream media recognition of our efforts. The New York Times story could be the beginning of a nationwide mainstream media effort to pull the ethnic media out of the shadows and into the limelight, recognize its strength and utility, and enter into partnership to dig deep inside America’s immigrant population. NYCMA and the FI2W deserve full credit and accolades for the thoughtful intiative to empower a forgotten side of the larger American information sector.

Jehangir Khattak is a US-based Pakistani journalist, and can be reached at mjehangir@aol.com

Do immigrant voters connect to McCain?

There are many points where Senator John McCain’s career and life story intersect with immigrant communities across the US. He was one of the principal sponsors in the US Senate of comprehensive immigration reform, legislation that he subsequently repudiated during the presidential primary campaign. He and his wife Cindy have an adopted daughter from Bangladesh. He comes from a state with a large Latino population. During the Vietnam War he was held prisoner by the North Vietnamese government, and later became a strong advocate for normalizing relations between the US and Vietnam.

Despite these points of contact, ethnic media journalists say McCain has a long way to go in cementing support among immigrant voters.

“The McCain campaign is using double-speak,” said Pilar Marrero, a reporter with the Spanish-language newspaper La Opinion in Los Angeles. “To the mainstream they are going to the base with a lot of red meat. To Latinos and to the Latino media they are talking a different talk. What they are saying to them is ‘don’t pay attention to the party and the platform.’ The platform that has English-only and, let’s build a wall on the southern border, and lets just kick out all the undocumented workers. ‘Pay attention to the man, the man who pushed immigration reform. Pay attention to him because in his heart he still believes in immigration reform and he’ll still support it. He loves Latinos, he is from Arizona.’”

Marrero spoke at a panel discussion in Minneapolis sponsored by Feet in Two Worlds and the New York Community Media Alliance. The panel was held at the Weisman Art Museum as part of the American Politics Sideshow on the final day of the Republican National Convention in St. Paul.

Marrero said the McCain campaign’s tactics with Latinos did not appear to be working. “There always (are) some Latinos that vote Republican,” she said. “As far as getting to that 35 or 40 per cent that (the Republicans) know they need to win certain states, that’s yet to be seen.”

Wameng Moua, the editor of Hmong Today , a newspaper that serves Minnesota’s large Hmong community, said McCain had made a connection with older Hmong voters. “John McCain has an historical tie to the Hmong community in the sense that the Americans in the Vietnam War recruited the Hmong to save fighter pilots who were shot down in Laos. Unfortunately John McCain was shot down in Vietnam, so he wasn’t able to be saved by Hmong people. But nonetheless there still is that historical connection.”

Moua noted that even younger Hmong voters were taking a look at McCain after the Democratic National Convention in Denver. “There was a lot of excitement about the Obama campaign at first. But now, talking to a lot of my friends, they seem to have a second thought on the premise that they really weren’t riveted by Obama’s speech (at the convention).” But Moua also said there are two Hmong members of the Minnesota state legislature from St. Paul. Both are Democrats, and both are expected to support Barack Obama.

Obama and McCain were faulted for their lack of outreach to immigrant communities by Ka Chan, communications director of the New York Community Media Alliance. Chan said that the candidate who had done the most to connect with immigrants was Hillary Clinton. “It’s not surprising,” Chan said, “because Hillary has so many ties with so many ethnic community groups.”

As to McCain, Chan added, “(he) could have been a front runner or the maverick, as he calls himself, in immigration reform, but he did not. There is speculation that he needed to win the primary, that’s why he distanced himself from what he stands for in immigration reform. Just like his war hero image, he could have been an immigration reform hero for all these immigrant voters. But these days we don’t really hear that rhetoric anymore, ever since he entered the direct race with Obama. The effort still needs to be seen.”

AudioStories

Podcast: Asian Elites Weigh Issues, History and Race in the Presidential Contest

Asian voters have been called the, “new sleeping giant,” of American politics. Asians make up about 5 per cent of the US population, and their numbers are growing rapidly. But according to a recent study by researchers at UCLA, political participation by Asian Americans is significantly lower than the national average. Even so, both the Obama and McCain campaigns are reaching out to Asian voters. Lotus Chau, Chief Reporter at Sing Tao Daily in New York recently wrote brief profiles of two Asian American Democrats who have come to very different conclusions about Barack Obama’s candidacy.

For Brian Wang, a first-time delegate to the Democratic National Convention there is, “important symbolic meaning for the Asian community,” if Barack Obama becomes the first black president of United States. Wang, a lawyer from San Francisco, recalled the 1988 primary when his mother voted for Jessie Jackson for the Democratic presidential nomination. Holding a Martin Luther King-style poster which said “Change and Progress” in Chinese, Wang recalled that his mother’s Chinese friends were upset by her support of Jackson. But, he said his mother responded to her friends, “If Jessie can be the president of this country, my son also can be the president one day. Voting minority gave me hope.” Brian said he followed the same path as his mother, supporting Obama and at the same time fulfilling his own dream.

Po-Ling Ng, the director of the Open Door Senior Center, was a Democratic delegate in 2004. She is a long-time supporter of Bill and Hillary Clinton, and in 2000 supported Al Gore for president. This year she was invited to be a Democratic delegate form New York, but she refused the invitation. “Deep in my heart, I am not prepared for a black candidate as president of the country. I don’t want to spend my money and time to support someone not from the bottom of my heart. I prefer to step back and stay in New York,” she said.

A record 270 Asian American delegates attended this year’s Democratic National Convention. There appeared to be only a handful of Asian delegates at the Republican National Convention, although an exact count is not available. However, Asians are organizing on behalf of John McCain. James S. Cheng is a businessman from Virginia who is involved in efforts to build support for McCain among Asian Americans. I spoke with him about campaign strategy and the challenges facing the campaign.

Listen to an interview with James S. Cheng a strategy adviser to the Asian Americans for McCain Coalition.

[audio:http://www.jocelyngonzales.net/FI2W/fi2w_cheng.mp3]
AudioStories

Feet in Two Worlds Reporters Discuss Republican National Convention Speeches on The Brian Lehrer Show

Feet in 2 Worlds continues to provide the immigrant press’ views and analysis on the conventions with regular appearances on WNYC.

This morning, reporters Pilar Marrero (columnist and political editor of Spanish-language La Opinión) and freelance journalist Aswini Anburajan were guests on The Brian Lehrer Show to discuss last night’s speeches at the Republican National Convention in St. Paul. Pilar explored how Vice Presidential nominee Governor Sarah Palin’s acceptance speech and nomination might resonate with Latino and Latina voters. Listen here:

[audio:http://audio.wnyc.org/bl/bl090408apod.mp3]

During the second hour of the show, Aswini discussed the role of entrepreneurship, high-tech industries, and H-1B high-skilled immigrant workers in shaping an economic platform for the future, as well as what 21st century jobs might look like.  She also shed some light on immigrant community views on free trade agreements and how they influence their party choices. Listen here:

[audio:http://audio.wnyc.org/bl/bl090408bpod.mp3]

Reporter's Notebook: A Russian American Journalist at the Republican Convention

This article was written by Ari Kagan who is in Minnesota to cover the Republican National Convention under a project sponsored by Feet in Two Worlds and the New York Community Media Alliance.

Dr. Solomon Bayevsky, an 85-years-old resident of Menorah Plaza Apartments in St. Louis Park, Minnesota, book writer and Persian culture scholar, knows a few things about war. He was just 19 years old, when he was badly injured during the fierce fighting against the Nazis at Stalingrad in 1943. “We don’t need more wars,” said the immigrant from Mogilev, Belarus. “With John McCain America will start a new war with Iran, and maybe even with China (over Taiwan) or Russia.” Bayevsky, who lost the use of his right arm in the war, added, “we will stay in Iraq much longer than we need. I will vote for Barack Obama because he will finish the Iraq war, will use more tough diplomacy in other conflicts, and because he is young, smart and energetic. I also like the Democratic approach toward immigrants and low-income people.”

Listen to an interview with Dr. Solomon Beyevsky by Feet in Two Worlds executive producer John Rudolph.

[audio:http://www.xrew.com/joceimgs/FI2W/fi2w_rnc_solomon.mp3]

Bayevsky’s opinion is not entirely shared by his neighbors, many of them Russian Jewish immigrants who live in this quiet retirement home in a suburb of Minneapolis. Some praised McCain and expressed reservations about Obama’s message of change. But everybody here is ready to vote on September 4 to choose the next president. Most Russian seniors in St. Louis Park receive their information about presidential politics either from Russian-language TV and newspapers or from their children who tend to vote for Republicans.

Listen to an interview with Leonid Kerbel. Mr. Kerbel, 75, immigrated to the US in 1994, following the collapse of the Soviet Union. He was a tennis coach in the USSR, and still stays in shape by playing tennis. Here he explains to John Rudolph why he plans to vote for John McCain.

[audio:http://www.xrew.com/joceimgs/FI2W/fi2w_rnc_leonid.mp3]

DSCN4271
Ari Kagan (left) interviews a resident of the Menorah Plaza Apartments in St. Louis Park, Minnesota about the 2008 presidential election.

My visit to the local Russian community was at the end of the first weird day of the Republican National Convention in Saint Paul. The most visible and noisy event of the day was not the convention or appearances by Laura Bush and Cindy McCain who urged delegates to donate money to the Gustav Hurricane relief fund. Instead the biggest media attraction in Minnesota was an anti-war march near the State Capitol. While the main part of this rally (about 8,000 people) was peaceful and predictable, one group of violent self-proclaimed anarchists (about 200 people) behaved and looked like underground terrorists. These young marchers, in dark clothing, and with bandannas over their faces, smashed the windows of a Macy’s department store, slashed the tires of a police car, tried to block the Republican delegates’ buses, and threw various objects at police. Some of them held signs like “Thank God for Gustav,” “Fag McCain,” and “God hates Palin”.

I was pleasantly surprised to see how local police exercised the necessary restraint. Hundreds of cops, sweltering in heavy riot gear on a very hot day, protected delegates and streets from some of the craziest protesters. As a Russian-speaking Jew, who immigrated to America in search for freedom and capitalism, I shook my head when I saw some of the more peaceful marchers with anti-Israel, anti-capitalism and anti-American placards. I am no fan of George W. Bush or his war policies, but I don’t think that signs like “Free Palestine: support the right of return” or “Stop American aggression and idiocy!” were effective in terms of spreading the anti-war message. But we have freedom of speech, so even some radical views could be heard here. That is the beauty of America.

Ari Kagan is Senior Editor for Vecherniy New York, a Russian-language newspaper, and host of the weekly TV show “Here in America” on RTN – the Russian Television Network of America.

News Analysis: What do Arab Americans Want?

This article was written by Antoine Faisal, publisher of the Arab American newspaper Aramica. He was part of a group of ethnic media journalists who covered the Democratic National Convention in Denver under the sponsorship of Feet in Two Worlds and the New York Community Media Alliance.

For weeks prior to the convention, the question on my mind was, ‘What do Arab Americans want – from the convention, from Obama, from the Democratic Party?’ I thought I could answer those questions with confidence but a shift has occurred both from within and outside our community that has significantly altered my perspective on our community’s place in the American political landscape.

At this year’s DNC, there were over 40 Arab Americans participating either as members of DNC standing committees or as delegates.

Former Congresswoman and current president of the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee Mary Rose Oakar served as the chairperson for the DNC Rules Committee (the committee responsible for proposing the Permanent Rules for the convention, adopting the proposed convention agenda and making recommendations for permanent convention officers) while Dr. James Zogby, founder of the Arab American Institute served as the Convener of the Democratic National Ethnic Coordinating Council (DNECC).

Also, the Obama campaign’s official website has launched an Arab American page.

Antoine Faisal

Antoine Faisal

Day One

It’s already a madhouse at the Sheraton – the main venue for caucuses, meetings, and major schmoozing. I am focused on finding people to answer my questions – the only people who can answer my questions – fellow Arab Americans: delegates, activists, politicians, attendees.

I have an itinerary I am supposed to follow but decide to fly solo and see where my curiosity takes me. I am handsomely rewarded for my journalistic knack of sniffing out a story when I run into an old friend of mine at the American Muslim caucus.

She invites me to tag along to a press briefing: ‘A Key Demographic in the Battleground States: Dr. James Zogby and Arab Americans at the Convention’ where, Eureka! The mother lode! Arab American delegates, activists, community leaders, and politicians – many whose faces and names have appeared in the pages of Aramica on numerous occasions – all in one room, psyched to be at the convention, and happy to answer my questions.

I spoke first with Ismael Ahmed, Director of the Michigan Department of Human Services and co-founder of the Arab Community Center for Economic and Social Services (ACCESS). Mr. Ahmed has been involved in politics as a community activist for the better part of 3 decades.

Far from being a convention newbie, this is his 7th time attending the DNC. He has sat on the Platform Committee and the Rules Committee, as well as having been a regular delegate 5 times. He is now the co-chair of the Michigan State Democratic Party.

Also at the briefing was Andre Sayegh, 6th Ward Councilman of Paterson, NJ. This was his first convention. Not a delegate, Mr. Sayegh traveled to Denver to support his party and his community.

Unity within Diversity

Given the rich diversity of the Arab American convention-goers, including Dr. Zogby, Mr. Ahmed, and Mr. Sayegh, the responses given by those who participated in my ‘survey’ were astonishingly similar both in content and tone, which was decidedly upbeat and confident.

Staunch Obama supporters; the general consensus is that Obama is an “extraordinary candidate” and that Arab Americans are going to play an important role in the outcome of this election and beyond. His views on the two-state solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, and American withdrawal from Iraq are the only reasonable, realistic ones presented and what is right not just for Arab Americans but for the entire nation.

Senator Joe Biden is viewed as a good choice for vice president, even if there are issues on which he and Obama differ because, ultimately, it is Obama defining the ticket, not Biden. But Biden’s experience in the Senate and with foreign policy will be an advantage.

Nobody believes Arab American ‘issues’ are that different from any other American’s issues: healthcare, education, immigration, poverty, the economy – they are all matters of great importance to everyone and more importantly, of grave importance for our nation.

This, above all else, is what distinguished the Arab American delegates and community leaders at the DNC – their vision is inclusive, for the entire nation, not just for Arab Americans. They see a bigger picture – one in which Arab Americans do not stand alone but are an integral part of the Democratic Party and the nation.

Even on an issue of potential discord, such as the resignation of Mazen Al Asbahi as the Obama campaign’s Michigan outreach coordinator, there was unity of opinion that Mr. Al Asbahi took the high road, chose to stay involved, and that is what is important – not to focus on, as Mr. Ahmed described it, the inevitable, “bumps in the road,” we travel to reach our destination.

The 2008 Democratic National Convention – the finale after two years of fierce campaigning – was an historic occasion marking a truly monumental event: the first ever nomination of an African American by a major American political party.

A victory not just for African Americans, it marks a moment of arrival for all American minority groups – including Arab Americans – whose presence and participation at the 2008 Democratic National Convention will reverberate post-election, resulting in an even larger showing at the 2012 DNC. Quite an extraordinary accomplishment for one of the US’s smaller minority groups and one about which each and every one of us can be proud.

What If They Held A Convention And Nobody Came?

Lotus Chau, the chief reporter at Sing Tao Daily, woke up in St. Paul, Minnesota on the first day of the Republican National Convention, glanced at the TV screen, and saw CNN’s Anderson Cooper in a rain slicker, his body pressed against the wind, reporting live from the hurricane-ravaged Gulf Coast. “What’s he doing there?” she asked, “he’s supposed to be here.” Chau is part of a group of ethnic media journalists from New York who are in the Twin Cities to cover the Republican National Convention. So far there isn’t much to cover. While Cooper and a number of other network news stars have quickly shifted their focus and their considerable resources to the impact of Hurricane Gustav, reporters for ethnic media, on limited budgets, are in St. Paul waiting for the start of a convention that has yet to get off the ground.

There is no question that John McCain’s announcement on Sunday suspending all but the legally-required convention activities has had a major impact. So have the decisions by President Bush and Vice President Cheney to skip the convention. But there’s more to it. On this first day, it looks like Minneapolis and St. Paul are hosting a non-convention (not the UnConvention, since that’s the name of a series of alternative events being held in the Twin Cities to coincide with the RNC). In contrast to downtown Denver, which on the first day of the Democratic National Convention last week was buzzing with delegates, demonstrators and security officials, downtown Minneapolis this morning looked like a ghost town. To be fair, it is Labor Day, but even so it looked like they had rolled up the sidewalks.

On University Avenue in St. Paul, just a few miles from the the Xcel Energy Center where the RNC is scheduled to be held, the only evidence of political activity was a hand-lettered sign held up by an anti-war demonstrator on his way to the state capitol for a rally. The sign said “McCain is a War Whore.” There were no “McCain for President” signs to be seen on any of the local streets. A Walgreens drug store had no GOP souvenirs for sale. “No they didn’t send us any,” replied a clerk when asked why the shelves were bare of McCain swag. The only specialty items in the store were Halloween costumes. In Denver Barack Obama t-shirts, hats and pins were sold on many street corners and in convenience stores. Two days after the DNC sales continued at a brisk pace.

Shortly after John McCain announced the pared-down convention schedule, Anne Mazone a delegate from Navasota, Texas expressed optimism about the impact of the convention on the fall campaign. “Oh honey, when we come out of here we’ll have so much momentum it’ll be scary,” she said. But now the attention of the national press has been diverted from the Republicans and their convention, at a time when the GOP was hoping for all the free media that a convention normally affords.

In the meantime ethnic media reporters who are here to cover what’s happening in St. Paul are scrambling for material. With a lack of events to cover, they are interviewing each other. It remains to be seen how Bangladeshi newspaper readers will react to the political analysis of Russian and US journalists who have been quoted by a Bangladeshi reporter who needs to fill columns in the paper he works for, but is located many miles from the eye of the storm.

AudioStories

Deconstructing the Ethnic Vote on Community Radio in Colorado

In the shadow of the Pepsi Center (site of the Democratic National Convention) – inside what’s called “The Big Tent” – New York Community Media Alliance and Feet in Two Worlds hosted a panel discussion on the role of ethnic voters in this year’s election.

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Photo by Hugh Graham via Flickr

The scene outside the Big Tent in downtown Denver.

The discussion was moderated by John Rudolph, Executive Producer of Feet in Two Worlds. The panel guests included Jehangir Khattack, a U.S.-Pakistani reporter with Defense Journal, and Dawn; Raymond Dean Jones, Political Columnist, Denver Urban Spectrum; Lotus Chau, Chief Reporter, Sing Tao Daily; and Pilar Marrero, Senior Political Writer and Columnist, La Opinion.

The panel explored the concerns of ethnic voters, their shifting political allegiances, their hopes and fears about the election, and most importantly: Do ethnic voters connect to the Democratic candidate?

KGNU Community Radio is hosting audio from the event on their station blog, which you can listen to here:

DECONSTRUCTING THE ETHNIC VOTE