How can we combat right-wing online misinformation and increase civic engagement in America? Tara spoke with Lindsay Schrupp, editor-in-chief of Courier Newsroom, and Pat Kreitlow, Managing Editor of the upcoming Up North News, to discuss how a new digital-first local news company can build trust online in a fractured media ecosystem that is constantly undermined by the President.
How can we combat right-wing online misinformation and increase civic engagement in America? Tara spoke with Lindsay Schrupp, editor-in-chief of Courier Newsroom, and Pat Kreitlow, Managing Editor of the upcoming Up North News, to discuss how a new digital-first local news company can build trust online in a fractured media ecosystem that is constantly undermined by the President. Produced by Wonder Media Network.
Tara McGowan: Welcome to For What It's Worth, I'm Tara McGowan. I am personally very excited about today's episode. As we're going to dive into a topic I'm really passionate about and that's local journalism and the role that local journalism has historically played in our politics and our elections in this country, and even more importantly, the impact that a loss of local journalism can have on a community. Today we're living through the decline of local journalism. We've seen over 2,000 local newspapers shut down just over the past 10 years alone and continue to hear about local news publishers and newspapers shuttering their doors almost every day. There's enormous amount of research that also shows a direct correlation between the decline of local news and the decline of civic participation in a community, while many voters still say that local news sources are the sources that they trust most for their information. Making matters even worse, we're seeing that void of local trusted information being filled by bad actors and in places like Wisconsin and Arizona. That's why this week I was so excited to sit down with Lindsay Schrupp and Pat Kreitlow, two journalists who are working to stem that tide and build out a new model for local reporting in journalism at Courier Newsroom. In the interest of transparency, my organization, ACRONYM, is investing in Courier Newsroom to provide digital-first fact-based local reporting to communities across multiple states around the country, and to really try to push the envelope in terms of how we think about covering local news and politics in a digital-first environment. So Pat and Lindsay, thank you so much for coming on the For What It's Worth pod!
Lindsay Schrupp: Thanks so much, Tara. So happy to be here.
Pat Kreitlow: Thanks again for inviting me on to talk a bit more about what we're going to be doing here in Wisconsin.
Tara McGowan: It's great. And Lindsay, I'm going to start with you and then Pat, I'm going to go to you next. But Lindsay, tell us what is Courier Newsroom, first of all, since it is a new company, and I'd also love to hear, you know, about your background and what drew you to the mission when you heard about Courier.
Lindsay Schrupp: The mission of Courier Newsroom is to create a more informed and engaged electorate by providing people with informative, fact-based local news. So Courier Newsroom is a network of local, state-based news outlets in about six different states across the U.S. We have reporters and editors and all sorts of folks working out of these states directly to report on the news that they find is the most important and critical to their area. And then also just looking at what are the needs of this audience that they aren't getting from national publications. With the decline of local media, there has been such a void in information, so information about everything from state legislatures to, what is the building that's being built across my street. And what we're really trying to do is, to provide through that information, help people feel more engaged with their communities and interested in participating civically more.
Tara McGowan: Lindsay, what were you doing before you joined Courier Newsroom as editor-in-chief?
Lindsay Schrupp: Sure, so I worked at VICE media for about five years with the last couple of years working as editor-in-chief of Broadly, which was their gender- and identity-focused channel and also their largest digital channel at vice media outside of vice.com. I was leading a team of folks who were really, really pushing and writing on progressive issues, mostly around women, around reproductive health, around trans rights, around LGBTQ issues. And for me, one of the turning points and realizing that maybe it was time for me to start looking for something else, was right after the last presidential election and I came in that morning into the newsroom and realized we had nothing to put up on the site because all of the editorial that we had prepped in advance, all of the illustrations, the photography, everything was about Hillary Clinton winning the presidency and what a moment this was. And just looking at this blank website and thinking about how are we going to rebuild this from scratch really made me start thinking about how do we rebuild everything from scratch? Because what we're doing clearly wasn't resonating with the right audiences no matter how big our own audience was. So when I heard about Courier Newsroom and the work that they're doing just across the board to reach people who are outside of the sort of left-wing bubbles and to help bring people together across partisan lines to understand these issues better, that felt to me like storytelling that I could really put my weight behind.
Tara McGowan: That's so interesting. And so, and we do, we all of in our own kind of filter bubbles and echo chambers today. And I think that's made much worse in a social media environment because there's actual technology and algorithms that ensure that we are staying in these echo chambers kind of just hearing from people and brands and even candidates that just reflect our own values instead of kind of opening up a dialogue. That's really interesting because Broadly is, was not a partisan or political vertical of VICE, right?
Lindsay Schrupp: No, no. It was not overtly political. I think we had an openly feminist stance. We believed in women's rights and we really focused in on that, but we -
Tara McGowan: And it's quite sad that that is a partisan thing in this day and age.
Lindsay Schrupp: No, exactly! So yeah, people can assume that. I think more and more often though, sites are being more honest about their, the unique issues that they care about. And I think that's something that's important in the web today because that allows certain sites to go really deep on issues where others might not have the staffing or the resources to do so.
Tara McGowan: Right, absolutely. And Pat, I want to turn to you and we'd love for you to kind of introduce yourself to our listeners and give a little bit of your background and hear how you came to join us at Courier.
Pat Kreitlow: Sure. Well, it's a path that started in local newsrooms across Wisconsin, first in a couple of small radio stations and then into TV where I was first the weekend and then the evening, a weekday evening anchor for the largest TV station across western Wisconsin. And so for many years, it was great to bring people stories from around the state, but also let people know, you know, what their elected officials in Madison and Washington were doing. And then, eventually after leaving, you know, the news business, I engaged in public service for a time and then actually, moved out of the country for a bit, got back into TV news, but then moved back to Wisconsin where again I find myself at this great crossroads of both my news and political careers and I'm looking forward to bringing stories that may have a political genesis, but put it through a local lens and bring those stories home to folks.
Tara McGowan: What is your role at Courier Newsroom, Pat?
Pat Kreitlow: I'm the managing editor of Up North News, which is our Wisconsin outlet for a Courier Newsroom.
Tara McGowan: As a local news anchor in a former chapter of your life, bring us to that kind of point in time. What, there were less channels, there were less spaces in which people could find news and information, especially related to their community. How has, how has that shifted in a digital environment today?
Pat Kreitlow: Oh, it's, it's been a seismic shift. Again, I came from an era where there were only two TV stations in Eau Clair and only three networks that people would watch. And so I still, I'm in a unique position that people still can come up to me because either because I was a nightly presence and then an elected official and they feel like we're going to have a respectful conversation when they say, Hey, Pat, you know, what's the deal with X, Y or Z ? And now they know where I come from personally compared to when I was on the anchor desk, when I was an evangelical about voting. But nobody knew, you know, anything about my affiliations. And nor should they. I tried to do my job as a journalist well. But they know that even today we're going to have that respectful conversation about what's happening either in Madison, Wisconsin, or in Washington. And that's what people keep telling me they want. They stop me in supper clubs. They stop me at grocery stores and they just want a respectful amount of information that isn't either the usual talking points from one party or the other or something that's been so watered down by traditional media, you know, for fear of offending anybody. And sometimes you do have to give somebody all the unvarnished details. And I hope that I can be part of an organization now that provides more information than they might otherwise get in a landscape now where there have been so many cutbacks either in staffing or cut backs in coverage altogether.
Tara McGowan: Right, so this is really, I want to dig into this topic of objectivity because I think that there is a false perception that objectivity means sharing both sides of an argument, whether or not one side is being truthful or not. And this is a really sticky topic. And yet I think it's such an important one to talk about because obviously Courier Newsroom has a progressive bent. It has progressive investors that we are transparent about our affiliation. And yet you two are both trained journalists and we all believe and share this belief, otherwise we would not be in this work together, that facts and truth are the most important things that provide people the information they need to make their decisions, right? Whether or not our politics or our values are different, that's okay. But facts are the thing that, that need to be elevated, especially in a time and space where there's so much misinformation and so many frankly lies that are being spread. And so I'm curious, you know, and both of you can please feel free to chime in, but you know, how do you grapple with this? Obviously both of you made turns to be more overtly involved in sort of progressive minded work, whether that was running for office yourself, Pat, or focusing on, kind of progressive values driven publications. But you know, we all share this true, very, very core belief in the need to have fact-based journalism and information reaching people. And so how do you grapple with that? I kind of want to just get into that question.
Lindsay Schrupp: If I can just, yeah, start on this one. I mean, it is such a massive topic, but I think one that we can't really stop talking about enough. I think that spin and bothsidesism have done such damage to our news ecosystem in pushing out stories that aren't balanced because of that sort of forced attempt to be balanced or to appear that way. And I do think that there are always many sides to a story, but it's less about the sides to a story and more about the perspectives and more about the angles you bring in. And I certainly don't think that the two sides that you should always be focusing on are left- and right-based. I think that we need to more and more be thinking about how does this impact people and issue impact people on the local level? How does this issue impact people who are at the center of it? How does this impact people who have been traditionally left out of media or misrepresented intentionally? And so I think that the bothsidesism kind of misses the point that we do need to be doing much more robust journalism. And we do need to be better at contextualizing all stories. But it does not mean putting every story through the lens of partisanship.
Tara McGowan: Right? And so, and it's almost as though, you know, right now, a quote unquote objective journalist has the talking point from the Republican and the talking point from the Democrat. And there's not even fact checking on if either or both of those are fact-based. And what we really need to focus in on is how issues and policies and legislation and campaigns and elections affect everyone's lives. And healthcare is a universal issue. The way that our healthcare industry works and treats us and charges us for our health care affects all of us. We can have different opinions or different ideas about solutions to solve for the complexities of it, but it affects all of us. Gender inequality, pay equity, these things affect everyone regardless of their party or if they have a party affiliation. And yet, just to play back what I think you're saying, Lindsay, is that the polarization sort of this bothsidesism as you called it in journalism, actually further dilutes the coverage of these issues and how they impact people's lives.
Lindsay Schrupp: Absolutely. And I do think because we've grown into such a culture of needing to counter back and forth with so many stories on the same issue, really just through salacious or whatever, headlines back and forth, that to me, the like one of the biggest losses is all of the stories that went uncovered because these journalists were assigned to blog about how, no, you're wrong. No, you're wrong. No, you're wrong on the exact same issue. And really not taking it further than that. And that to me is just a massive, massive loss.
Tara McGowan: That's a great pivot, Pat, to what it means to provide honest, fact-based, local coverage of the issues. And I think that's something that I am, I'm deeply worried about seeing local newspapers and journalism publishers going out of business. And so I'd love to hear you talk a little bit about the importance of local coverage and reporting and also how you think, you know, your role at Courier can help sort of drive some innovation in that space where it's so, so desperately needed.
Pat Kreitlow: Sure. And let's just remember that when we're talking about coverage and you're only covering person on the left and then person on the right, that may be coverage, but it's not journalism. I would even argue that it's stenography and I am adamantly opposed to stenography. I'm for journalism. And that means none of this false equivalency, none of this symmetric polarization, none of this pox on both your houses, look down your nose type of coverage. Instead, it would be, I don't know who to give credit to, but whoever said to the line, if one person tells you it's cloudy and one person tells you it's sunny, don't report both. As a journalist, go open the window and tell the people what the situation is out there. Go beyond the talking points that anybody's going to give you. To give you an example, there are all kinds of rosy headlines about, you know, records on Wall Street, but real reporting that people want at the local level involves going behind those headlines. And that might include mentioning that while Wall Street has, you know, record highs, we've lost a record number of farms in Wisconsin. We've had a rash of farmer suicides. We have young families that are being crippled by student loan debt. There are stagnant wages. Everybody talks about 5G. There's no 5G across most of Wisconsin. We'd be happy with a lowercase G when it comes to some of our cell and cable coverage. And that doesn't mean that all the news is bad. I'm just simply saying go beyond the talking points from either side and give the stories of what people actually are saying to one another. And that's what I ultimately believe an audience in Wisconsin and across the country want. They want information, they want to feel engaged, they want to go into the voting booth, feeling empowered, not overwhelmed. And that's what good journalism does, not stenography, not, not game show, you know, cable talk shows. And so part of what I'd like to do with courier newsroom for our forthcoming to Wisconsin product is to take those big policy ideas and put them through a local lens. I mean, sure, we'll tell you what Governor Evers says or what the Senate and Assembly Republican leaders say. But more importantly, I want to know what that farmer in Clark County is talking about or that small business owner over in Sheboygan and so forth. And if we can do that, then we're going to have people that feel like we have not created a new model so much has gone back to the old craft of journalism in bringing real stories home that that isn't just the horse race.
Tara McGowan: Right, that's exactly right. And so I want to talk a little bit just for a quick minute on distribution, right? So part of the reason that media companies in local journalism in particular are failing as business models today is because of their failure to be able to evolve their distribution strategies and models in a digital-first ecosystem. And that in large part has been a result of the very rapid pace at which Google and Facebook have really shifted our information ecosystem and diet, how and where we get our information. And so, you know, something that I get very excited about the work you guys are doing at Courier Newsroom is that I really believe that we can innovate models and, and strategies that, that the entire journalism community could benefit from, by making it really digital first in terms of the content. So I would love to hear a little bit about that. What does that, what does that gonna look like and how, how do you guys intend to actually meet people where they are and build trust with that information?
Lindsay Schrupp: One of the things we're just really, really trying to focus on is understanding who our audience is, understanding that we have, if we want massive audiences, they're all going to be different and there's going to be real complexity in that. And so right now we're kind of thinking about how do we segment audiences. How do we really address their concerns, the things that they're interested in, the values that they have in their lives and then where are they actually getting their news? Because that's where we want to be. We don't necessarily need to be on cable television if that's not where so many people are reading headlines every day while they're scrolling through their phone at the shopping market. We want to make this as easy as possible for people to access news. And we also want to create storytelling that resonates with these audiences because they're captivated and they're engaged in the way that they are when somebody across from them is telling them a story about what happened to them in a local town meeting. Like we want people to understand how these sometimes massive issues impact very real lives. And a lot of times that means just going to the platforms where they are and speaking that language, whether that's on Snapchat or whether that's on Instagram or whether that's in newsletters. Again, we want to just make this as easy as possible because everybody deserves access to information. And right now too few people are getting it. So it is a big part of our mission to really understand how can we reach those who have been left out.
Tara McGowan: That's absolutely right. And in the, in the vacuum of people not being reached with a lot of information, they are unfortunately increasingly being reached with a lot of misinformation that spreads online and it's not so visible to see on the surface the way maybe you know, what you see in your television news or newspaper is. So Pat, I'm curious, you know, in Wisconsin, talk a little bit about how, you know, how you've seen information and misinformation play a role in the communities across the state of Wisconsin.
Pat Kreitlow: Well, what's happening is that misinformation is filling the vacuum that's left when newspapers cut back. And when broadcasters cut back, I mean, I think there are probably fewer people than ever in the newsroom that's in the State Capitol because there used to be people there from a whole host of newspapers. But that's, that's just not the case anymore. And it's not because everybody suddenly stopped liking political news. There are plenty of people out there that want to be engaged. They want to know what's happening. And if they're not going to get that information, if they can't get that information from a reputable source they'll find it from a friend that shared something on Facebook, the sourcing of which might be rather dubious. You know, at best. And I've said that to people that, you know, stories that look not just very right-wing, but frankly very from the left as well. I've sent them a quick little note saying, Hey, you know, that that source is actually, you know, not what you think it is. You know, I don't call it a bot necessarily, but it's not, it's not verified. It doesn't have any credibility. And they said, Oh, I didn't know that. And so we want to give folks something that they know is based right here at home, with, you know, the team that we're putting together here has, you know, five veteran journalists who have experience doing these things and rebuilding some of that trust that people are looking for in credible news. We don't need to build, you know, to counter misinformation, and a lot of it from say, the right side of the spectrum, the answer is not to create misinformation from the left side of the spectrum. The answer is to fill more credible information in there to people and to people who want it. And coming back to your earlier point about, you know, how we're building a digital audience, I think there's tremendous opportunity there because as a broadcaster, formally, you know, the model was go get all of the news and try to push it out to all of the people and try to get all of them to watch you, which of course was always impossible. And now the opportunity that we have in this new digital landscape is to get, you know, the stories that we think are best going to be received by segments of the audience. And those segments are people who want to be better informed voters. And Wisconsin is a classic example of those swing state or purple state voters, who are willing to go either way. A lot of times in swing elections they vote against the party in power simply because they're dissatisfied. And I've often said, going way back to my and TV days, I feel like our job isn't to motivate you to vote against something but to vote for something. But people aren't going to vote for the people that represent them unless they have better stories about what the people in power are doing or what they haven't done, the promises people are making or the promises that people have broken. That kind of local journalism pushed out to a digital audience that's seeking it is going to be better for democracy and better for media in general.
Tara McGowan: I hope so. And the question that I kind of want to want to end on here is, you know, we are, we have a president in the White House right now that has undermined the media and the mainstream media at every turn, right? He talks about fake news, the fake news media, et cetera, and that that has a real impact on his supporters and his base. Right? He has basically said trust no one but me, which gives him then the permission to lie about anything and really, really, indoctrinate his base with with falsehoods and mobilize them around issues and priorities of his based on lies. Everything from talking about an increase in violence and crime from immigrants when actually crime rates across the country have gone down. And it's just, he's made it so truth no longer matters to the people that really listen to him and trust him. And I'm curious, you know, how you guys both would respond to, especially since, you know, this is a progressive values driven enterprise. Why should audiences trust Courier Newsroom properties and how do you guys really think about building that trust in this incredibly fractured media environment with really truth hanging by a thread because of really powerful forces trying to undermine it?
Lindsay Schrupp: People should be holding us up to a high standard. They should be critical of what we're doing. They absolutely should be skeptical because there are actual fake local news sites out there.
Tara McGowan: Right, it's a healthy thing that people are asking these questions!
Lindsay Schrupp: It's great! So I'm, and so what we're really trying to do is be as transparent as possible. We're taking interviews, we're talking with folks, we're meeting with people on the local level and we're really just trying to put out there that we are transparent and our work is going to speak for itself. I think one of the things that's so scary about, Trump and this proliferation of fake fake news and nobody knowing what to trust or who to trust is that does erode so much of the trust in media. And when we don't have those shared sets of facts. When we don't read shared headlines, then we also kind of lose sight of having trust in each other. We understand each other less and I think we have just that sort of rise in partisanship and in violence in certain ways in this country. And I think that that can also play a big part in that. But all that to say, I think with local news, one of the things that you'll see us doing that's different is we are really trying to get people to engage. And I think one of the benefits of local news is that national news can feel so overwhelming. You can read all this stuff that's happening in Washington, you can read tweets from Trump and just feel like giving up.
Tara McGowan: Powerless. You can feel really powerless.
Lindsay Schrupp: Absolutely. And I think that is something that's so many of us share right now, but with local news there actually are steps that you can take to take action and I think that that is really powerful. I think local news in that context is a way to get people to start taking steps that are real meaningful steps. And that's the way that we're going to fight this. It's through all of us understanding what the information is out there, having a shared sense of truth and then taking actions to actually make sure that we're all participating in this democracy.
Pat Kreitlow: People make a good living in the political business by discouraging people from going to vote, by muddying the waters or by discouraging them from voting, like trying to purge the voter rolls, as we're seeing here in Wisconsin, or you know, the lame duck power grabs that we've seen here as well are all meant to discourage and to suppress activity. The way that you counter that is to be unabashedly pro civic participation, voting, hearing, learning more about what people have to say and encouraging them to ask questions and really listen to those questions. That's what media outlets everywhere should be doing is not just, listening to the candidates and pumping out what they say and taking money from the candidates and playing their commercials, but coming to their listeners, their viewers and readers and saying, what questions do you have? How can we make you feel better about participating going forward? And I think that through Courier Newsroom, we have a great opportunity to be innovative about bringing these fact-based, community-based stories to people and help them, again, feel good about participating in their communities and heading into that voting booth.
Tara McGowan: Absolutely. And so, thank you both so much. Politics, all politics is local, so we need journalism that is local and we need participation that is local. So everyone again, feels a sense of community and a sense of agency. And I think that this is an incredible moment and opportunity for that. And I'm so excite you two have up the mantle of this work. So thank you both and thank you everyone for listening in.
Lindsay Schrupp: Thanks so much for having us.
Pat Kreitlow: Thank you.
Tara McGowan: That's all we have for this week. If you want to take a deeper dive into the state of digital politics, and if you're not already a subscriber to our weekly newsletter, also called For What It's Worth, you can sign up at anotheracronym.org/fwiw.