As we told you, the anti-DeSantis contingent — consisting of the White House, the mainstream media, and Team Trump — is currently engaged in a full-fledged smear campaign against Ron DeSantis and the Florida Department of Education over the new history curriculum. These dogged DeSantis opponents have seized — yes, that's right, we said "seized" — on a particular passage suggesting that some slaves benefited post-slavery from trades they had learned and honed while enslaved. That's certainly not a justification for slavery, as the African-American scholars involved in constructing the curriculum recognized. But it hasn't stopped people like Kamala Harris and Byron Donalds from misrepresenting it for purely political purposes.
Anyway, DeSantis press secretary Jeremy Redfern did what none of those people could or were willing to do and compared the purportedly problematic passage to what was in the AP African-American Studies curriculum that DeSantis had rejected due to its Critical Race Theory elements. And Redfern found a rather striking similarity:
Remember when Florida wouldn’t allow that AP African American Studies course because it focused too much on CRT and not enough on history, and the @WhiteHouse lost its mind?
— Jeremy Redfern (@JeremyRedfernFL) July 27, 2023
Well, here is one of the standards considered “essential knowledge.”
See it here https://t.co/MFjfBjEFc9 pic.twitter.com/s8boDdYzks
That definitely seems like something worth reporting, and Politico, to their credit, covered it in today's Playbook newsletter. Unfortunately, their coverage of Redfern's role left some stuff to be desired. Namely an accurate characterization.
Independent conservative journalist Jeryl Bier couldn't help but notice this subtle but hacky framing:
Gotta love how @Politico frames this: "dug up"
— Jeryl Bier (@JerylBier) July 27, 2023
"Jeremy Redfern, press secretary for the governor, dug up a copy of the framework for the AP African American history course..."
He "dug up" the **2023-24** AP History standards... what a find!https://t.co/XwigzkLM9k https://t.co/3l5wRLrsRE pic.twitter.com/PPSPQawMUp
Jeremy Redfern on his quest to find the elusive, current year AP curriculum pic.twitter.com/88sfGYUStt
— Ginger Lady (@GingerLady6) July 27, 2023
"Dug up" makes it sound like Redfern was doing something sneaky. He wasn't. He was merely doing the job that outlets like Politico should have done but couldn't be bothered to do. Why didn't our mainstream media dig up the AP African-American History standards as soon as the big to-do over Florida's curriculum started up?
The fact that the journalist equates easy, basic research and fact-checking with an archaeological expedition says a lot about the Politico work ethic.
— Don Burton (@deburton63) July 27, 2023
Well, that's not an entirely fair criticism. As it happens, Politico did do some digging. It just so happened that all the digging was only in one direction:
Look, back in January and February, @Politico "dug up" the same standards dozen of times... but guess which part they somehow missed? pic.twitter.com/eRofDQS9HE
— Jeryl Bier (@JerylBier) July 27, 2023
Funny, that.
Not only that, they put that bit in an entirely different section that you have to scroll down to read. This blurb would have fit into the lead section. Can't have counter-arguments blowing up their narrative, I guess
— Shaner (@shaner5000) July 27, 2023
Oh yeah. That, too. The whole first section of the Playbook newsletter is an attempt to summarize the controversy over the Florida history curriculum and list the major players. Redfern's "digging" apparently wasn't worth discussing until a later section that readers might not have bothered to scroll to.
Journalism. How does it work!
— Boo (@IzaBooboo) July 27, 2023
Actual journalism doesn't work like this ... but Real Journalism™ sure does.
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