The Chopping Block

[June 20th, 2007] Much has been made of the idea that there are no unbiased journalists or news organizations.

An equal truth: There are no unbiased readers. And nothing illustrates this more clearly than the fresh reaction last week to WW's May 2 cover story ("Chop Shop") about the Del Monte Fresh Produce food processing plant in North Portland.

Like a Rorschach inkblot test, the story morphed in the hearts and minds of many readers after federal immigration agents raided Del Monte and arrested 167 workers, including two juveniles, on June 12.

Before the raid, readers who already sympathized with illegal immigrant workers largely praised the May 2 story for describing working conditions at the plant. Unsympathetic readers saw it as a weak-kneed defense of law breakers.

The raid flipped those responses, prompting some readers to fault the story for naming the plant and others to praise it for apparently aiding agents in their bust.

The facts of the May 2 story itself are no different today than when they were published. What is different is this: U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials extensively used the article in their affidavit to explain—and, perhaps to some extent, justify—their sweep, which had been in the making for about five months before I spent three days undercover as an employee at the plant.

After all, the story was a pre-packaged narrative as convenient to federal authorities as the fruit platters coming out of the plant. Yes, it acknowledged the presence of illegal immigrant workers at Del Monte. But it also described conditions and possible safety violations that authorities could cite when they defended their selection of this plant as the site of their otherwise infrequent and targeted workplace enforcement efforts.

The original story's use as a prop last week made me a participant rather than a bystander to the raid.

The Associated Press, KATU, KGW, KXL's Lars Larson, Clear Channel, KBOO and KOPT in Eugene all sought my comment, and most of the interviewers were interested in hearing about safety conditions inside the plant.

Throughout, anger about the raids continued to fester in Portland. And critics of the immigration officials' actions focused on the families who were split up because of the deportation proceedings under way.

And that gets back to my original point. Readers often view stories through a lens that has little or nothing to do with the words on the page—but everything to do with what they think they already know.

Here's something they're forgetting: The flow of labor to this country destroys families, too.

On Sunday, Father's Day, I recalled the story of one Del Monte worker, Pablo Sabastian, a slight 25-year-old man with physical scars from his time cutting onions at the plant.

When I interviewed Sabastian for "Chop Shop," he lived with his toddler and the young child's mother in a Portland home he shared with several others. A threadbare sheet had divided the living room into a sitting area and an extra bedroom, where Sabastian, who agreed to let me use his full name, slept with his toddler and the young child's mother.

Sabastian had stopped working at Del Monte months earlier because he had injured his back and was instead working as a day laborer. He was therefore not among those arrested in the June 12 raid.

Sabastian had arrived in the United States from Guatemala three years ago. Crossing Mexico by bus, he had pretended to be a Mexican citizen.

He carried no luggage, just a Bible, and—in case he was questioned by federales—had learned the first name of Mexico's then-first lady, the colors of the nation's flag and a few phrases that wouldn't employ Guatemalan-sounding expressions. His story was not included in the original article, but the new point is this:

In addition to his child in Portland, Sabastian has a 4-year-old son in Guatemala. That boy is growing up without his father. And that's not because his dad was deported.

His dad was imported, and that's an uncomfortable fact for which U.S. immigration enforcement officials bear no responsibility.

We're responsible for that.