Epstein Quoted: ‘Don’t Bring Me Any N*ggers’:
Racial Aspects Missing in Mainstream Reporting
Jackson’s Eldest Blasts News Media
Polk Awards Honor Hinojosa, Deportation Reporting
Abe Kwok, Editorial Writer Active in AAJA, Dies at 59
Big Media Poised to Win More Consolidation
Shocked, Shocked That Trump Could Be Called Racist
Ann Curry Plans More Trips to Sudan Disaster
Palestinian Journos Confirm Israelis’ Horrific Torture
Angola Uses Hidden Spyware to Monitor Journalists
Post-Maduro, Venezuela Eases Some on Media Repression
Short Takes: Luther Vandross documentary; Stanley Nelson and Marcia Smith; researching, reporting on far-right ideology; how Clarence Thomas won a Supreme Court seat; Diane Mack; U.S. Virgin Islands; Guyana, Trinidad and Tobago; Cuba; GM charged with embezzlement; Nicholas Wu; Alicia “Lisa” Shepard; arrest of Senegalese commentator
Homepage photo from Justice Department files
A trailer from “The Full Story on Jeffrey Epstein Revealed,” a docuseries from Netflix that debuted in 2020. (Credit: YouTube)
Racial Aspects Missing in Mainstream Reporting
“Race played an explicit and repeated role in how girls were selected within Jeffrey Epstein’s abuse network, newly released court records, FBI interview notes and private correspondence indicate,” according to Britain’s Black Current News, a digital Black-oriented news platform launched in November by Nadine White, (pictured, below) the U.K.’s first race correspondent and former journalist at The Independent.
“Other documents linked to the dead paedophile and his circle contain overtly racist language, racialised discussions about Black people, plus plans to run tests on African and Jamaican people,” White wrote Feb. 6.
“This aspect of the record has received little to no attention in mainstream reporting on Epstein’s abuse. Black Current News has examined it through analysis of the released files.
“On 30 January 2026, US authorities released a tranche of material connected to Epstein, amounting to around three million pages, including approximately 2,000 videos and 180,000 images.
“The material references several high-profile figures, prompting renewed scrutiny of individuals including Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, Peter Mandelson, Elon Musk, Donald Trump, Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton and Bill Gates.
“There is no indication that appearing in the documents is proof of wrongdoing; many of those named have denied committing any crimes in relation to Epstein.
“In sworn testimony before a federal grand jury, a teenage victim — a girl — who’s understood to have been recruited by Epstein and later pressured to find other victims for him to abuse told investigators that she had ‘made a mistake’ by bringing a Black girl to his Palm Beach home.
“According to her account, Epstein refused to allow the girl to perform a massage, though he still paid $200 ‘for her time’.
“He said he was ‘not interested in Black girls” and added that he ‘wasn’t a racist’.
“The testimony forms part of material gathered during the federal investigation into Epstein’s conduct in the mid-2000s.
“The witness, who was a minor at the time, described how Epstein instructed her to bring girls of a particular appearance and reacted negatively when she failed to do so.
“Federal Bureau of Investigation interview records compiled in later years describe similar instructions.
“In a July 2019 interview, a victim told agents that Epstein demanded ‘young fresh meat girls’ and explicitly instructed her: ‘Don’t bring me any n*ggers.’
“The statement is recorded verbatim in the interview notes, taken in the presence of the victim’s attorney. . . . .”
White also wrote, “Taken together, the records point to a consistent pattern.
“Within Epstein’s abuse network, race functioned as a racial filter, enforced through recruiters and articulated in explicitly racist terms.
“In parallel, private correspondence linked to his wider circle reveals racialised thinking about Black bodies, framed through the language of biology, measurement and reproduction and echoing traditions of colonial racial hierarchy, scientific racism and eugenic thinking that reduced Black people to biological traits rather than recognised them as individuals.”
White provided Journal-isms with links to the referenced comments within the Justice Department documents, hoping “this makes it easier for you and your readers to locate the relevant material within the DOJ release.”
- Nur Ibrahim, Snopes: Don’t fall for alleged Epstein emails stating Trump doesn’t like Black girls (Feb. 5)
- Vannessa Viljoen, Canary, U.K.: Epstein files show how racialised trafficking erased Black girls from victimhood (Feb. 5)
- Juan Williams, the Hill: Epstein scandal: Unlocking secrets of power abuse (Feb. 9)
The family of the Rev. Jesse Jackson holds a news conference after his death Tuesday at age 84. Jesse Jackson Jr. discusses the news media at 34:39 and 35:30. (Credit: Associated Press/YouTube)
Jackson’s Eldest Blasts News Media
Jesse Jackson Jr., the eldest child of the Rev. Jesse Jackson, blasted the news media Wednesday for its coverage of his father over the civil rights icon’s career, saying, “the caricature that you’ve created as a media of who our father is, is not the reality of who we know him to be.”
The son, a former congressman, spoke at a family news conference as many of the nation’s leading news outlets were publishing multiple pieces on the historic figure for the editions immediately following Jackson’s death Tuesday at 84. C-SPAN-2 aired video of Jackson all day Tuesday.
At the Baltimore Sun, Armstrong Williams, a co-owner of the paper, messaged Journal-isms, “yes, I led the Baltimore Sun’s coverage of Jesse Jackson,” which included a tribute from Williams, considered by many to be a Black conservative, in his own column. Williams praised Jackson as a fellow South Carolina native. “Jackson had a profound impact on my thinking, my discipline, my mindset and so much more,” Williams messaged.
At the family news conference, Jackson Jr. noted that “Jesse Jackson helped challenge ABC, CBS,-NBC and the majors to expand the industry to include women and to include women of color.”
As Stephen Battaglio later reported for the Los Angeles Times, longtime “NBC Nightly News” anchor Lester Holt was one example. Holt landed a major local TV anchor job in 1986 “after CBS’ Chicago station WBBM demoted longtime anchor Harry Porterfield, removing an African American from the lineup of a station that had little diversity on its weekday newscasts.
“The Rev. Jesse Jackson and Operation PUSH led a 10-month boycott against WBBM, and Holt was moved from WCBS in New York to take over one of the nightly newscasts in Chicago.”
The death of Jackson, who had been battling a rare neurological disorder that affected his ability to move and talk, was not universally on the nation’s front pages, as a look at the Freedom Forum’s “Today’s Front Pages” showed. And on television, Jackson’s passing competed for attention with stories on the missing Nancy Guthrie, mother of “Today” show anchor Savannah Guthrie, a deadly avalanche in Northern California, and the day’s political and international news.
Jackson Jr. added at the Wednesday news conference that he found social media to be more reliable than the legacy media.
“So what’s happening now on social media is more accurate depiction of the work of Jesse Jackson. And it’s happening and occurring without you,” he said. “That’s the truth. Because institutional media has historically controlled the narrative of who Jesse Jackson is. You’ve made him to be more controversial than he is, than he was.
“You’ve made him less multinational than he is. You’ve tried to make him someone from a side of town and not universal. Today, the king of England has issued a statement about the life of Jesse Jackson and its importance. One newspaper is hung up on how many mayors he confronted. All of them were small by comparison to Jesse Jackson. He knew as they came and went that he was the constant. And our community could count on that.
“And so again, the caricature of who you think he was compared to the reality of the education campaign that is taking place independent of you is what’s taking place. And as that figure begins to emerge in contemporary thinking, I’m confident that the people, my mother said it this way, history is going to be far kinder to Jesse Jackson than the life that he lived.“
In Chicago, a public celebration of life is to be held at House of Hope, a 10,000-seat church, on March 6, followed by private homegoing services the next day at Rainbow PUSH, which will be livestreamed.
Jackson is to lie in repose next week at the Chicago headquarters of his Rainbow PUSH Coalition with a public celebration of life and homegoing services to follow, though dates for Chicago events have been changed, Sophia Tareen reported for the Associated Press. “Formal services were added, scheduled from March 1 to March 4 in Washington, D.C., and South Carolina, where Jackson was born and raised.”
“House Speaker Mike Johnson has denied a request for the late Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr. to lie in honor at the United States Capitol, citing past precedent over how the deaths of other high-profile figures were handled, according to sources familiar with the matter,” Abby Phillip and Manu Raju reported Friday for CNN, following a similar report from digital journalist Roland Martin.
A spokesperson for Johnson referred Journal-isms to the CNN story.
- Herb Boyd, New York Amsterdam News: Hope stays alive: The life of Rev. Jesse Jackson and the legacy he leaves
- Matt Brown, Associated Press: Jesse Jackson’s 1988 presidential run inspired generations to carry his message
- Cliff Brunt, Associated Press: Sports helped shape Jesse Jackson’s career and inspired the ex-quarterback to fight for equal rights
- A’Lelia Bundles with Michel Martin, “Amanpour & Co.,“: “I Am – Somebody:” Reflecting on the Life and Legacy of Rev. Jesse Jackson | Amanpour and Company (video)
- Christina Carrega and Brandon Tensley, Capital B: Remembering the Rev. Jesse Jackson’s Impact and Civil Rights Leadership
- Anoa Changa-Peck, BlackAmericaWeb.com: Jesse Jackson’s Campaigns Offer Blueprint For Defeating US Extremism
- Benjamin J. Chavis, National Newspaper Publishers Association: IN MEMORIAM: Eternal Salute to The Reverend Dr. Jesse L. Jackson, Sr.
- Luis Cino: CubaNet: Jesse Jackson didn’t always get it right when choosing who to support. The reverend defended Fidel Castro and Nicolás Maduro
- Stephen A. Crockett Jr., BlackAmericaWeb.com: All The Black Presidents We Could’ve Had If ‘America’ Weren’t So Obsessed With Whiteness
- Isaac Cubillos, Cubillos.com: Coalition and Ganas: Remembering Jesse Jackson Through Brown Eyes)
- Renee Graham, Boston Globe: Jesse Jackson’s audacity of hope
- Juan González and Bishop William Barber, Democracy Now! Jesse Jackson Fought for Justice at Home & Abroad
- Mark Winston Griffith: New York Amsterdam News: Analysis: What Jesse Jackson’s presidential campaigns taught us
- Rashad Grove, The Root: Rev. William Barber On Why Jesse Jackson Didn’t Become President, But Still Won
- Errin Haines, The 19th: ‘He gave me my wings’: Jesse Jackson opened doors for Black women in politics
- Morgan Knight, Dru Strand and D.J. Harding, Howard University News Service: Jesse Jackson’s Legacy Resonates Across Generations
- Media Matters for America: Benny Johnson on Jesse Jackson: “What his ideology was is evil.”
- Harold Meyerson, American Prospect: Tribune for Race and Class
- Kevin Merida, The Atlantic: The Day Jesse Jackson Made Me Cry
- Aaron Morrison and Sophia Tareen, Associated Press: There was ‘a bridge called Jesse Jackson’ across decades of civil rights advocacy
- National Congress of American Indians: Mourns the Passing of Reverend Jesse L. Jackson
- Ruben Navarrette, Creators Syndicate: Jackson Was a Complicated and Controversial Figure, but Also Hugely Consequential
- Art Norman, WMAQ-TV Chicago: Remembering Rev. Jesse Jackson: A full-hour tribute from NBC Chicago (video)
- Kathleen Parker, Washington Post: My last intersection with Jesse Jackson
- Rayna Reid Rayford, Essence: From the Pulpit To The Streets: Rev. Jesse Jackson’s Enduring Legacy Of Hope, Power, And Justice
- Jessica Sager, People: Rev. Jesse Jackson’s 6 Children: All About the Late Civil Rights Leader’s Kids
- Hannah Schoenbaum, Associated Press: How the Rev. Jesse Jackson helped popularize the term ‘African American’
- Eugene Scott, Boston Globe: Jesse Jackson’s legacy included championing LGBTQ rights
Here is a smattering of the comments from media figures on social media:
At the UCLA College of Social Sciences last year, a session moderated by “Latino USA’s” Maria Hinojosa featured author and education advocate Julissa Arce, MacArthur “genius” award winner and UCLA faculty member Dr. Kelly Lytle-Hernández, Judge Natalia Cornelio of the 351st District Court, Harris County, Texas, and David Luis ‘Suave’ Gonzalez, host of “Death by Incarceration” and “The Suave Podcasts.” “Suave” earned the staffs of Futuro Media and Boston-based PRX public broadcasting the Pulitzer Prize for audio reporting in 2022. Judges called it “a brutally honest and immersive profile of a man reentering society after serving more than 30 years in prison.”
Polk Awards Honor Hinojosa, Deportation Reporting
A career award to pioneering journalist Maria Hinojosa, creator of public broadcasting’s “Latino USA,” and investigations into the abuse perpetrated by President Trump’s immigration and deportation policies highlighted the annual George Polk journalism awards, announced Wednesday.
“Three additional awards honor reporting from foreign war zones, including mass starvation in Gaza, brutal front-line fighting in Ukraine, and a protracted conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo,“ Long Island University, which bestows the awards, said in its announcement.
“Other award-winning investigations examined the deadly exploitation of East African women recruited to work in Saudi Arabia, the impact of massive data centers on local communities, and fatal abuse inside New York State prisons.
” ‘Last year was the busiest year for news in memory,’ said John Darnton, curator of the awards for the past 16 years.’ So many potential winners crowded the field. An important investigation or revelation would no sooner be published than another one, even more important, would come along. Bottom line – the news media did its job,’ he noted.”
Among those honored for their reporting of abuses in the U.S. immigration crackdown were Giulia McDonnell Nieto del Rio and Mark Arsenault of The Boston Globe; Nick Miroff of The Atlantic; Stephanie Keith, a freelancer on assignment for New York magazine, three Gaza-based Associated Press photographers, Abdel Kareem Hana, Jehad Alshrafi and the late Mariam Dagga, and correspondent Cecilia Vega, immigration reporter Camilo Montoya-Galvez and producers Andy Court and Annabelle Hanflig of CBS “60 Minutes.”
Hinojosa’s bio says, “A trailblazer in journalism, she has spent nearly 40 years carving out space in traditionally exclusive newsrooms, amplifying marginalized voices, and shedding light on overlooked stories to offer a more complex and accurate portrait of American society.”
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Abe Kwok, Editorial Writer Active in AAJA, Dies at 59
Abraham “Abe” Kwok, a longtime reporter who became an editor and then a columnist on the Arizona Republic’s editorial board, has died at 59, Richard Ruelas and Catherine Reagor reported Monday for the Republic.
Whitney & Murphy Funeral Home, handling he arrangements, said Kwok died Sunday and that services would be held this coming Thursday, Feb. 26, in Scottsdale, Ariz.
As president of the Arizona Republic Guild, Ruelas reported in a leaked communication last August that the Republic’s owner, Gannett, had fired Kwok, who was also active in the Asian American Journalists Association, in July while on medical leave. He had suffered a stroke.
However, Ruelas told Journal-isms Saturday, that message “was intended as an internal communication. But, as it happened, it leaked out to at least one media outlet.
“Our local management worked to rectify the situation.
“Abe was reinstated as an employee through the end of 2025.
“It brought him dignity and surety to his final months.
“And he left with no ill will towards The Republic.”
AAJA said of Kwok in a statement Tuesday, “Throughout his career, he held multiple roles in AAJA at both the local and national levels, including chair of the Media Watch Committee and vice president of print. He helped build and sustain AAJA’s Arizona chapter and served as a mentor to members nationwide. He was also a longtime Voices student convention project leader who inspired many to go into journalism.”
Bobby Caina Calvan, who worked with Kwok on the Media Watch Committee, messaged Journal-isms Saturday, “He was a quiet force in AAJA — someone who helped get things done in a way that was so collaborative. He really cared about AAJA’s mission, including helping MediaWatch monitor fair and accurate coverage of our communities. You could always count on Abe.
Ruelas and Catherine Reagor wrote in the Republic’s obituary:
“As an editorial columnist, Kwok dove into the nuances of policy and prized introspection over hot takes.
“In 2016, he weighed in on the death penalty. He wrote about witnessing an execution as a reporter, which he called ‘efficient.’
“He also wrote about covering the murder trial of a person who was convicted and sentenced to death row but was later freed because of DNA evidence.
“He said that case made it ‘difficult to support capital punishment.’
“ ‘I’m still disquieted,’ he wrote. . . .
“Former Arizona Republic Editorial Page Editor Elvia Díaz said Kwok was so diligent in his fact-checking of guest opinion columns that sometimes the writers would complain.
” ‘I would tell the guest columnists they should feel lucky to have Abe’s editing help,’ she said.”
As Media Watch chair, Kwok called out The New York Times in 2005 for “the use of a racial stereotype to illustrate the story, ‘Calling Out the Cable Guy.’
”The image of a snake charmer, turban and all, not only perpetuates a hackneyed caricature of Indians but also appears irrelevant for an article about two Baby Bells’ forays into the TV business. We would gladly hear your reasoning on how the image and the story are congruent,” Kwok wrote.
”We at the Asian American Journalists Association strongly urge you to exercise caution when using images with a racial or ethnic bent, and we ask that the [aforementioned] image — unless it accompanies a story about actual snake charmers — be retired from your pages.”
It no longer accompanies the story online.
The Whitney & Murphy Funeral Home says, “In lieu of flowers, donations can be made to the Asian American [Journalists] Association (AAJA) – Donate – Asian American Journalists Association.
Big Media Poised to Win More Consolidation
“If there were any mystery remaining, it disappeared Wednesday,” Ted Hearn reported Thursday for broadbandbreakfast.com.
“FCC Chairman Brendan Carr told reporters that he wanted to approve Nexstar Media Group’s acquisition of TEGNA, forming a broadcast TV powerhouse with 265 stations that will reach 54.5% of U.S. TV households as calculated under FCC rules. The limit, whether by law or rule, is 39%.
“ ‘With respect to Nexstar-TEGNA, I support that transaction,’ Carr told reporters in Washington. Carr’s endorsement came after President Trump backed the deal at the same time he tried to assuage deal critics like Newsmax CEO Chris Ruddy.”
Only the previous week, a coalition of media groups representing people of color lobbied on Capitol Hill against the measure.
Approval would “allow a single corporation (Nexstar acquisition of Tegna) in a acquisition of over 265 TV stations, reaching over 80 percent of U.S. households. The current ownership cap is now at 39 percent,” reported LaVozColorado.
“This merger is under review and if approved would diminish local/community journalism, reduce viewpoint diversity, will be contrary to public interest and will affect community information/reach to Latinos and all ethnic communities. As it stands, this merger would result in an overall generic reach to all audiences, excluding diversity in journalism.“
Shocked, Shocked That Trump Could Be Called Racist
“ ‘You’re kidding, right?’ replied Leavitt during a White House press briefing on Wednesday.
“She was responding to O’Keefe’s question, which quoted Trump’s tribute to Jesse Jackson a day earlier.” Trump singled out “Barack Hussein Obama,” as “a man who Jesse could not stand.”
Just a week earlier, the news media responded with near unanimity in declaring racist the animated clip shared on Truth Social depicting Trump as a lion and Barack and Michelle Obama as apes in a jungle. It quickly drew bipartisan condemnation, with Tim Scott of South Carolina, the Senate’s only Black Republican, calling it “the most racist thing I’ve seen out of this White House.”
- Jenice Armstrong, Philadelphia Inquirer: Trump’s sharing of a racist video of the Obamas on Truth Social is beyond the pale, even for him (Feb. 6)
- Charles Coleman, MS NOW: Trump’s obsession with the Obamas prompts another sickening racist eruption (Feb. 7)
- Eric Deggans, Substack: Trump, the Obamas and racism: Why won’t some people admit when it’s racism? (Feb. 7)
- Gerren Keith Gaynor, TheGrio: Trump fights off criticisms of being racist with Black MAGA-friendly crowd at BHM event
- Louis Jacobson, Poynter Institute: Trump is reshaping how the federal government presents Black history
- Roy S. Johnson, al.com: Yes, Trump’s post was racist. No surprise at all (Feb. 7)
- Theodore R. Johnson, Washington Post: It took a year for Black MAGA to crater
- Nedra Rhone, Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Response to Trump’s racist post implies there’s more to come (Feb. 11)
- Christopher Rhodes, Blavity: Stephen A. Smith Dismisses Racism As Not ‘As Prevelant’ Anymore, Stirring Backlash And Controversy
- Harrison Ray, Media Matters for America: Fox News has completely ignored Trump’s since-deleted racist Truth Social post. (Feb. 6)
Ann Curry Plans More Trips to Sudan Disaster
The trip to Sudan by Ann Curry (pictured), the former “Today” show co-host whose journey to report on the humanitarian disaster for “PBS News Hour,” was her first international reporting trip since she left NBC News in 2015. The story aired Feb. 13.
“I went because I really believe this is a war we need to know more about,” Curry told Susie Banikarim of Columbia Journalism Review on Friday.
“And in the world of journalism today, where people are thinking more about what news consumers want to know and maybe thinking not as much about what we need to know, I just think it’s a mistake to not pay attention to what’s happening. I have not given up my faith in the soul of humanity.”
Banikarim wrote, “Curry plans to continue covering the crisis in the months ahead. She has been heartened by the interest in her PBS piece and her reports on Instagram, where one of her videos has been viewed almost two hundred and twenty thousand times. ‘We want to know what matters, and we want to care about what matters. I think we want to be smarter and better informed,’ she said. ‘Without being informed, we are powerless in our world.’ ”
- Isma’il Kushkush, Nieman Reports: Dangerously Underreported (on Sudan journalists)
Shadi Abu Sido, a Palestinian photojournalist and cameraman from Gaza, was detained by Israeli forces for approximately 20 months after a raid on Al-Shifa Hospital on March 18, 2024. He was released last October as part of a ceasefire deal. (Credit: YouTube)
Palestinian Journos Confirm Israelis’ Horrific Torture
“Palestinian journalist Ahmed Abdel Aal remembers the moment the ear-splitting music started. For five days, he said, he was held blindfolded in a room in an Israeli detention site, stripped and beaten, while loud Hebrew and English songs played at an unrelenting volume. Every time he drifted into unconsciousness, an electric shock or a blow jolted him awake,” the Committee to Protect Journalists reported Thursday.
“Another journalist, who asked not to be named for fear of reprisals, described similar treatment inside what detainees refer to as the ‘disco room.’ He said soldiers bound his genitals with zip ties and beat him until the injuries made it impossible to urinate without blood. ‘They told me that I would no longer be a man,’ he said.
“Their accounts are among 59 in-depth testimonies collected by the Committee to Protect Journalists from Palestinian journalists released from Israeli custody since October 7, 2023. These interviews revealed that 58 — all but one of those released — reported being subjected to what they described as torture, abuse, or other forms of violence since the onset of what human rights groups agree is a genocide.
“CPJ has documented the detention of at least 94 Palestinian journalists and one media worker in that period – 32 journalists and one media worker from Gaza, 60 from the West Bank, and two in Israel. Thirty remain in custody, as of February 19, 2026. CPJ’s 2025 Prison Census found that Israel has been listed as a top jailer of journalists since 2023.
“The organization attempted to contact all 65 journalists released from Israeli custody since October 7, 2023. One, Ismail al-Ghoul, was killed in an Israeli air strike, and the five others declined to speak.
“CPJ could not independently verify each allegation, but the reports align with findings by human rights organizations documenting similar treatment of Palestinians in Israeli detention faciities, which Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem has described as a ‘network of torture camps.’“ . . .”
Through forensic analysis of the links and associated domain names, Amnesty International’s Security Lab determined with “high confidence” that all the links sent to Teixeira Cândido to this WhatsApp number were attempts to infect his phone with the Predator spyware. (Credit© Colin Foo/Amnesty International)
Angola Uses Hidden Spyware to Monitor Journalists
“A new investigation by Amnesty International’s Security Lab has discovered evidence that the Predator spyware was used in 2024 to target Teixeira Cândido – an Angolan journalist, jurist, press freedom activist, and former Secretary-General of the Syndicate of Angolan Journalists (Sindicato dos Journalists Angolanos),” the human rights organization reported Wednesday.
“This is the first forensically confirmed case of the Predator spyware being used to target civil society in Angola,” it continued.
“Teixeira Cândido is known for his vocal defense of press freedom and his criticism of government restrictions on journalism. He has repeatedly condemned attacks on journalists and the increasing intimidation against the media, describing these incidents as direct threats to freedom of expression. In December 2022, the Syndicate of Angolan Journalists, at the time led by Teixeira Cândido, organised a national protest condemning attacks on journalists and defending press freedom in Angola.
“ ‘I feel naked knowing that I was the target of this invasion of my privacy. I don’t know what they have in their possession about my life. […] Now I only do and say what is essential. I don’t trust my devices. I exchange correspondence, but I don’t deal with intimate matters on my devices. I feel very limited,’ said Teixeira Cândido.
“Predator is a highly invasive mobile spyware developed and sold by Intellexa – a mercenary spyware company – for use by governments in surveillance operations. Previous investigations by Amnesty International, Citizen Lab, Recorded Future, among others, have documented human rights abuses [tied] to the spyware in multiple countries over the past five years. Intellexa has rebranded their spyware products and shifted their corporate structure multiple times during that same period, apparently in response to public exposure of spyware misuses. . . .”
- Joseph Cox, Samantha Cole, Emanuel Maiberg, Jason Koebler, 404 Media: We’re Suing ICE for Its $2 Million Spyware Contract (Sept. 3)
- Committee to Protect Journalists: Spyware installed on Kenyan filmmakers’ phones in police custody (Sept. 10)
- Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai, TechCrunch: Journalist targeted on WhatsApp by Paragon spyware: ‘I feel violated’ (Feb. 3, 2025)
- Lauren Girgis, Seattle Times: How ICE is using technology, databases to track people (Feb. 13)
- Martin Shelton, Freedom of the Press Foundation: ICE revives contract for spyware (Sept. 22)
Post-Maduro, Venezuela Eases on Media Repression
“Traditional media outlets in Venezuela that have been censored for years are daring to take a new direction following Nicolás Maduro’s capture by U.S. forces in early January,” Julio Blanca reported Wednesday for the Miami Herald.
“After years of harsh repression, television channels and social media accounts have begun to include the voices of opposition figures and relatives of political prisoners in their reporting.
“But while regular citizens notice a shift in coverage, journalists warn that repression and fear remains an obstacle to their work.
“Free-to-air television channel Venevision has become a salient example of increasing media freedom, incorporating content that some Venezuelans believe represents an important step towards restoring freedom of expression.
“One of the most notable changes came at the end of January when the channel broadcast statements by exiled opposition leader María Corina Machado, who discussed her desire to return to Venezuela soon. . . .
“Venevision is also covering the complaints of relatives of political prisoners for the first time in years, and broadcasting opposition protests, such as the caravan last week led by Juan Pablo Guanipa and other political leaders shortly after they were released from prison.
“In a sign of shifting tides, the channel even interviewed student leaders from the Central University of Venezuela, who used the opportunity to call for a march on Feb. 12. . . . ”
Blanca also wrote, “While citizens say they have noticed a loosening of media constraints, Venezuela’s journalists say this change is just a small step on a long road to restoring freedom of expression in the country.
“Luis Carlos Díaz (pictured), a Venezuelan journalist and activist, describes the shift in media freedom as ‘millimetric,’ saying that the press continues to face repression.
“The traditional media remain under the control of the National Telecommunications Commission, which is still in the hands of the same military official,” Jorge Elieser Márquez, Díaz said. ‘The only thing that has changed in recent weeks is that, as Venezuela is in the international spotlight and there has been this change with the United States, some media outlets have moved forward a millimeter. But it is only a millimeter.’
“In 2017, the National Telecommunications Commission suspended transmission of CNN en Español from the country and has imposed strict controls on Venezuelan media outlets. Díaz described a ‘hunger for information’ in the country, saying the population has been misinformed for years due to censorship and the closure of at least 400 radio and television stations, in addition to the blocking of social networks such as X. . . .”
Short Takes
- TV One is airing the Dawn Porter-produced documentary “Luther: Never Too Much” this Sunday, Feb. 22, at 6 p.m. Eastern, 5 p.m. Central. Critic Eric Deggans called the Luther Vandross biopic, which previously aired on CNN and OWN, “a great introduction to an artist who always worked hard to transcend boundaries others might place on him.” Journal-isms covered Vandross’ funeral in 2005.
“Filmmakers Stanley Nelson (pictured) and Marcia Smith have been selected as Black Public Media‘s 2026 Trailblazers,” Black Public Media announces. “The married duo, documentary filmmakers and co-founders of Firelight Media, will receive BPM’s most prestigious honor at the PitchBLACK Awards on Thursday, April 30, at 6:30 p.m. The PitchBLACK Awards ceremony also celebrates the winners of the PitchBLACK Forum, the nation’s largest pitch competition for independent filmmakers and creative technologists creating Black content. The Forum takes place Wednesday, April 29, from 9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., and creatives will take the stage to vie for up to $150,000 in production funding.”
- “Last October, Tristan Lee and Jennefer Harper teamed up to launch Decoherence Media, an independent, nonprofit news outlet,” Gretchen Peck reported Thursday for Editor & Publisher. “Their research and reporting focus at Decoherence is on far-right ideology, terror groups and anti-democratic movements. “We saw, especially at the beginning of the second Trump administration, that a lot of the outlets and organizations that had done a very good job covering the far-right beat had either closed down, were significantly downsized or changed their mission. . . . A lot of outlets are no longer doing the kind of reporting on the extreme right that used to be kind of a solid watchdog beat,” Lee told E&P in January.
- “Thirty-six years ago, the NAACP had an opportunity to block Clarence Thomas’ path to the Supreme Court. But after a secret meeting between the Black Republican rising star and Althea Simmons, the civil rights organization’s Washington Bureau director, the NAACP blinked,” DeWayne Wickham wrote Feb. 11 for the Washington Spectator. Wickham is a former Gannett columnist and founding dean of the Morgan State University School of Global Journalism and Communication.
I
In New Orleans, “After 35 years, Diane Mack, Morning Edition host and the gentle voice that has guided generations of public radio listeners through the start of their days, has announced her retirement from WWNO – New Orleans Public Radio, 89.9 FM. Her last day on the air will be Friday, March 20,“ the station announced Feb. 9.
- Seth Stern of the Freedom of the Press Foundation spoke with Shirley L. Smith (pictured), an independent investigative journalist from the U.S. Virgin Islands, who was “sick of getting the runaround, and realized that the archaic and toothless laws on the books made evasion of records requests possible.” Why should those on the mainland care? ,“People born in the U.S. Virgin Islands and other U.S. territories, like our neighbors in Puerto Rico, are U.S. citizens. Yet, we are often treated as second-class citizens by the federal government. Under the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, journalists have the right to monitor the activities of the government on behalf of the public, and that includes the right to examine and get copies of public records. . . . What happens in the Caribbean can have a ripple effect throughout the country. Also, many national stories emerge from local incidents. . . .”
- “The Caribbean media landscape has suffered another blow with the announcement of the closure of a second newspaper in a matter of weeks,” Barbados Today reported Feb. 14. “Stabroek News, one of Guyana’s daily newspapers founded in the 1960s, has announced it has taken the ‘extraordinarily difficult and painful’ decision to cease printing . . . March 15, 2026. The development follows last month’s shutdown of Trinidad and Tobago Newsday after 32 years in operation.”
Cuba, while under threat of a blockade by the United States, has blocked the Cuban digital news outlet El Toque, prevented the departure of the country by the independent journalist Boris González Arenas, who planned to travel to the United States to participate in the Edward R. Murrow project for journalists, and detained two content producers with El 4tico, a social media outlet in eastern Cuba. Agents took computers, phones, cameras and equipment that Ernesto Ricardo Medina and Kamil Zayas Pérez used to “record and document their work,” which included documentation of local life as well as activism, the Committee to Protect Journalists said.
In Sacramento, Calif., “former CapRadio General Manager Jun Reina (pictured) has been criminally charged for allegedly embezzling money from the public media station for years,” CapRadio reported Jan. 29. Sacramento County District Attorney Thien Ho’s office announced Thursday Reina — identified as Fidias ‘Jun’ Reina Jr. — faces multiple felony counts of embezzlement, grand theft and forgery stemming from his time overseeing CapRadio’s finances. The station is licensed to Sacramento State.'”
Nicholas Wu (pictured) “is joining Semafor is joining “our DC team . . . to cover the House of Representatives. He’s a veteran congressional reporter, coming to us from Politico, and he previously worked at USA Today,” Semafor announced.
Almost two years after her passing, Alicia “Lisa” Shepard, described in this space as a conscience of the news industry, advocate for diversity and friend of Journal-isms, has delivered a memoir, completed by her husband, David Marsden (pictured, at left, with Shepard’s son Cutter Hodierne,) and launched Friday in Washington at Busboys and Poets. “The Luckiest Unlucky Couple” covers Marsden’s and Shepard’s sequential battles with cancer. “Lisa said she was writing it to tell our story and help cancer patients and families,” Marsden said.
- The Committee to Protect Journalists called on Senegalese authorities to release news commentator Abdou Nguer, who was arrested on Wednesday for challenging a public prosecutor’s statement on the cause of a student’s death.
