VIDEO: Harvard student SLAMS leftist activists upset by newspaper seeking ICE comment
Leftist activists at Harvard University protested the school's student newspaper reaching out to ICE for comment.
The group said that the paper doing so is virtually the same as "tipping them off."
Harvard student and Campus Reform Correspondent DJ Lacy reacted.
Harvard student and Campus Reform Correspondent DJ Lacy reacted to leftist activists at his school boycotting the Harvard Crimson student newspaper over its decision to contact ICE for a recent story during an interview Thursday with Fox News’ Martha MacCallum.
As Campus Reform previously reported, the Crimson newspaper contacted ICE for comment regarding a protest on the Ivy League campus seeking to abolish the federal agency. Leftist protesters, however, took issue with the paper following standard journalistic procedures in this way, saying that doing so “is virtually the same as tipping them [ICE] off.”
“We strongly condemn their decision to uphold a policy that blatantly endangers undocumented students on our campus,” Act on a Dream, the group that protested the Crimson reaching out to ICE, said.
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“Responsible journalism includes being conscious about the impact caused by their actions as a news organization,” the statement added.
Lacy, however, defended the Crimson, saying that he supports everything the paper did.
”They were simply adhering to standards of journalistic integrity when they were going out and contacting a government agency, like ICE, to make sure that all perspectives are put into this story,” Lacy told MacCallum. “So I find it frankly problematic that these activists on campus think that they are able to police who the Crimson is able to contact for stories.”
Kristine E. Guillaume and Angela N. Fu, the paper’s president and managing editor, also defended their decision to contact ICE for the story, saying in a statement, “At stake here, we believe, is one of the core tenets that defines America’s free and independent press: the right — and prerogative — of reporters to contact any person or organization relevant to a story to seek that entity’s comment and view of what transpired. This ensures the article is as thorough, balanced, and unbiased toward any particular viewpoint as possible.”
Lacy further pointed out Thursday that the Harvard Crimson “is a publication that is training the next generation of journalists so of course they’re going to have their journalists adhering to principles of journalistic integrity and that includes anyone who is mentioned in the story has the right to issue a comment and simply by reaching out to ICE, that’s what they were doing.”
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