Tag Archives: Senate Media Credentialing

The Great Crisis

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First, some history.

Untangled:  Back in 2010, when the DFL last controlled the Legislature, the media credentialling system was a shambles.  The Senate Rules specifically listed the media outlets that had permanent credentials – the major metro newspapers, the state’s various TV and major radio stations, MPR, the Legal Ledger and a few others.  You could count them on your fingers and toes, if I recall correctly (and I may well not).  However, any Senator could vouch for any “reporter” they wanted, and give them essentially a “day pass” to get into the gallery, the press room, and onto the floor (at a table reserved for the media between gavels, and out on the floor proper outside the session).

It was never much of an issue until the mid-2000s, with the growth of an alternative media.  Suddenly, new media – blogs, talk radio, and video and audio streams – began demanding a place covering the Legislature.  Being part-timers and hobbyists, most of us only needed credentials on a situational basis – but others, flush with activist budgets, had the time and manpower to make it a full-time “job”.

In 2010, the DFL made a hash of things; they credentialed “The Uptake”, a stridently progressive video-blog, but denied a day pass to Saint Cloud conservative talk host Dan Ochsner.

After the legislature flipped in 2010, the 2011 session began with tat following tit, with the GOP initially getting payback and ejecting the Uptake from the Senate.

Michael Brodkorb, brand-new in his job as Senate GOP Comms czar, took matters into his own hands.  While Michael’s a polarizing figure even inside conservative circles these days (and someone I still consider a friend), he undertook a really superlative project; give the Minnesota Senate the best, most open, transparent media credentialling process in the United States.  Period.

With that in mind, he enlisted left-leaning journo David Brauer, a few capitol comms staffers (including Senate DFL comms guy Beau Berendson and, briefly, then-House-DFL communications person Carrie Lucking, in her last gig before becoming Alita Messinger’s propaganda minister) and yours truly to craft a new Senate media credentialling rule.

I chronicled the process leading to the new news credentialing policy, from conception to passage into the Senate’s permanent rules, in a series of blog posts.

One of the rules was as follows (and it reads this way in the Senate’s permanent rules today):

Organizations owned or controlled by registered lobbyists, political parties or other party organizations (defined as organizations registered with the Campaign Finance Board or the Federal Election Commission) shall not be granted credentials.

It seemed pretty clear at the time.  In fact, it still does.

But that doesn’t mean there isn’t controversy.

The Point Being:  the issuance of press credentials, and the (limited) access they give you to Senators on the floor, is non-partisan.  Utterly, utterly non-partisan.

So when the Strib’s  Baird Helgeson notes in a story about a credentialing tempest in a Senate teapot that…:

Republicans have questioned Senate press credentials for the left-leaning Uptake, while Democrats are critical of press credentials for conservative blogger Mitch Berg.

…that everyone – the Republicans questioning Uptake, the “Democrats” who bagged on me [1] , and I suspect Helgeson himself – misses the point.

Anyone can get credentials – provided they aren’t “owned or controlled by registered lobbyists, political parties or other party organizations”.

Credentials are issued by the non-partisan Sergeant At Arms – the eternal Sven Lindquist, who’s been there close to thirty years, through every possible combination of political power.

Seems simple, huh?

Muddied:  Shawn Towle is a Saint Paul would-be pundit.  For years, he ran the website/protoblog Checks and Balances.

More recently, he’s “famous” for reportedly having tweeted a link to an anonymous photo of a former Minnesota legisator – a female conservative, naturally – in her underwear, apparently while doing a little galavanting, as they used to say.  Did Towle publish the photo?  Let’s assume it fell out of the sky and hit him on the head, for all I care.  Either way, the episode was one of the more disturbing bits of “gotcha” “journalism” I’ve seen, part of a wave of (and I say this with all due respect to Towle as a journalist) prurient panty-sniffing from Twin Cites left-leaning alt-media, thinly disguised as diligent reporting (about the private and semi-private lives of female conservatives and, it seems, nothing more).

But that was last year,  We have a new controversy.

Helgeson  notes that Towle has been paid nearly $40,000 in the past few years by the DFL, including money just before the current session:

DFL Senate Majority Leader Tom Bakk’s “failure to disclose political payments he made to a member of the credentialed press is dishonest and damages the integrity of the Senate,” Senate Minority Leader David Hann, R-Eden Prairie, said Monday. “How can the public trust what’s going on at the Capitol if the reporters are being paid by the politicians?”

There are really two points here:

  • Why does the DFL feel the need to pay Towle – who, according to sources in the Capitol, apparently shows up at GOP Senators’ press conferences acting like a Reagan-era Sam Donaldson?  They don’t have enough mainstream media to do the job for free?
  • I’m not sure that this story affects the public trust in the Senate – there are bigger reasons, like a $90 million office building and three years worth of lies about property taxes to do that.  But one might certainly wonder what Shawn Towle’s angle is.

Helgeson:

Hann is demanding that Bakk have Towle’s press credentials revoked. The press passes allow journalists to get on the Senate floor during debates, but they do not grant any special access to members.

It’s a little more complicated than that – it allows access to the press gallery, to press office handouts and info and – when space is available – to a small table on the floor (limit: 6) during the debates, with precedence given to the permanent press corps members that rent space in the basement.

But it’s not much more complicated than that.

An Aside:  Helgeson’s piece has this curious interjection:

Despite Hann’s insistence, Bakk had no role in getting Towle his press credentials.

Helgeson is talking for Bakk?   I mean – according to whom did Bakk had no relationship with Towle’s credentials?

Of course, it’s irrelevant, or should be.  You don’t need connections to get press credentials anymore.  That was one of the goals of the rules we passed in 2011!

And while Bakk needn’t have had any more role in Towle getting his credentials than in me getting mine, Bakk most certainly knew and had plenty to do with the fact that…:

  • The Senate paid Towle
  • The arrangement broke the Senate rules.

Dwelling in the Irrelevant:  Helgeson:

Towle said he actually got his Senate credentials when the Republicans controlled the body and Hann was an assistant leader.

Around that time, Towle was also on the payroll of the Republican Party of Minnesota’s payroll. The state GOP paid Towle a combined $15,000 in 2010 and 2011, records show.

Towle, in many forums (including in a phone conversation with me, over the winter when this story first came out) keeps repeating that he’s been paid by both sides.  The DFL is leaning on the same point:

DFL Senate Caucus Communications Director Amos Briggs points out that Towle has “been credentialed under DFL and GOP majorities, although you will notice that the credentialing authority named in the rule is nonpartisan.”

All of it is true – and it’s irrelevant.

When Towle was first credentialed, up through the beginning of the 2011 session, there were no formal rules against paid lobbyists or affiliates of lobbying organizations or parties being credentialed.  That restriction began in 2011, well into the session.

The partisanship – or even the bipartisanship – of Towle’s contract employment isn’t the issue.  It’s the fact that under the post-2011 Senate rules, he’s getting paid by any political organization.  Period.

And some observers get this.  The City Pages’ Aaron Rupar spoke with the Senate’s sergeant at arms, Sven Lindquist – the non-partisan staffer whose office is in charge of issuing press credentials.  Lindquist notes…:

“In the case of Towle, if he is working for one or both political parties — and I would have no knowledge of that — the rule does state that he should be responsible [and let us know about] any change in his reporting status,” Lindquist said. “What I’m hearing now about this, it will have to be looked at further… we’ve never had to go down this path before.”

Lindquist said the one significant thing a Capitol credential allows reporters to do is to “have access to the Senate chamber, and with God as my witness I’ve never had [Towle] attempt to gain access to the Senate floor, and he’s been credentialed since perhaps ’99 or 2000.”

During most of which time, up to 2011, partisan affiliation wasn’t an issue – or, rather, it was as much an issue as the party controlling the Senate wanted to make it.

So To Sum Up:  Does Shawn Towle get paid by the DFL?  So it seems.  Hey, a guy’s gotta earn a living.

But the problem is in Tom Bakk’s office.  Bakk either thinks “rules” are for mere mortals, or he isn’t in control of what his staff is doing.

I’m dying to find out which.

[1] I’d like to challenge Mr. Helgeson to show me a single Republican since 2011 who’s given a rat’s ass about The Uptake.  As to Democrats and yours truly?  The only Democrat I’m aware of who’s whined about my credentials was Mark Gisleson, one of the DFL’s intellectual thought leaders and former blogger and current “where are they now”-fodder.

A Change Will Do Ya Good

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I’d like to take a moment to talk a little more about the Senate Media Credentialing rules discussion from yesterday.

First – thanks to the working group, who did the vast majority of the work.  The group included (as noted elsewhere) David Brauer of the MinnPost, Michael Brodkorb (the Executive Assistant to the Majority Caucus, Rules Committee Executive Director Cullen Sheehan, Minority caucus communications director Beau Berentson and Senate Sergeant-At-Arms Sven Lindquist.

Now, here’s the important take-away; if the full Senate passes the change (it’s supposed to come up on the floor on Thursday), the Minnesota Senate will have the most transparent, open and non-partisan media process of any state government body in the United States.   Literally – there are a few legislatures that are in the same ballpark (Montana springs to mind) but there are none better.

And for that, I have to give my kudos to Michael Brodkorb – who in addition to being a mover and shaker in the MNGOP and the Majority caucus is a former blogging powerhouse, my former Northern Alliance colleague, and my friend.  He was the driving force behind the working group, which in effect makes him the prime mover behind the reforms.  The reforms themselves do nothing to benefit the MNGOP majority for which he works; as such, they could be fairly termed “statesmanlike” of the governing majority (and yes, it is a fact that the DFL members of the Rules committee supported the changes as well).  A good idea is a good idea, no partisan label needed.

Which made it interesting to flip through the comments in David Brauer’s original post on the proposal and the working group.  Brodkorb derangement syndrome is a real, serious issue among Minnesota’s comment-section keyboard warriors.

Brodkorb isn’t the only target, naturally;  Mark Gisleson, who to my knowledge has ever had a positive affect on anything, ever, wrote:

Don’t do it. If you do, you’re acknowledging that you are the equivalent of Mitch Berg, and that’s a libelous assertion because Mitch is a partisan blogger and radio host who will never cut a liberal an even break, whereas your work is objective, and not driven by liberal politics.

Gisleson is, to be tactful, raving and utterly un-based in fact; I was there to make sure the entire alternative media, left, right and utterly unaligned, could get access and be treated as “journalists” and reporters, with the same rights (and responsibilities) as the “real” ones.  I was there every bit as much to represent the likes of left-wing media like “The Uptake” and Minnesota “Progressive” Project as I was for True North and Minnesota Democrats Exposed and, for that matter, Shot In The Dark.

Not to push a “conservative” agenda. Period.  And Brauer, although he was added as “the token lefty”, was equally party-blind in his approach to the proceedings.

(And lefties should be a lot more careful about terms like “libel”; if being associated with me defames David Brauer, it would only be among people who are so deranged with partisan paranoia that the other key part of a libel charge, “damage to the victim’s reputation”, is pretty much a moot, if not negated, point.  Just my opinion, of course).

But enough of that.  The real message is that, if the Senate passes the bill (and from what I hear, even the DFLers who’ve been asked have approved), then the mission, to provide a better, more open, non-partisan means of access to our lawmakers to the New,  Alternative media – left, right or none of the above – and eliminate the old system that subjected the new media to the partisan whims of the sitting majority – is accomplished.

And that’s all that really matters.

My Day

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It was a big day yesterday.

I kicked off by testifying at the Senate Rules Committee over proposed rules changes for credentialing reporters.  I wrote about this yesterday.  David Brauer and I each spoke briefly to the committee – led by Majority Leader Amy Koch and President Fischbach, with Tom Bakk leading the minority side.

We each answered a few questions, and then the committee went on to discuss all of the amendments proposed to the Senate rules – everything from dress codes to rules for disciplinary hearings.

One funny (in a very wonky sense) moment; there was one passage in the proposed media credentialing rules that both Brauer and I had questioned, which would have required people applying for “session passes” – credentials good for the entire session – to apply 30 days before the session started, in order to get published in the Senate’s media directory.   Brauer and I both pried into it – but the provision stayed.  I had mentioned that perhaps a web-based directory might make more sense than the traditional paper one – but that one fell under the “if it ain’t broke…” clause, so I didn’t make a big deal.

Conservative Senator Warren Limmer, however, moved to strike the deadline from the rules; after some discussion with the Sergeant at Arms, the deadline was removed by a nearly-unanimous vote.  Brauer whispered “that may be the only time in history you’ll see Limmer carrying the water for David Brauer!”

After that, it was over to the House, for an appearance on Marty Owings’ “Capitol Conversations” with Marty Owings.  I was on a panel with Sarah Janecek, as well as former DFL State reps Karla Bigham and Paul Gardner.  That was a fun time.

Then it was off to the House District 66B convention, where I was elected deputy district chair.

It was a long day, but a fun one…

Access, Part II

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It was April 28, 2003.  I sat in the public gallery of the Minnesota State Senate, with a legal pad (this back when WiFi was kinda rare, much less Air Cards), scrawling madly on a legal pad, writing down the salient points of the debate going on below – the final debate on the (intial) passing of the Minnesota Personal Protection Act.

As I sat there, I knew three things as clearly as I could see Ellen Anderson theatrically donning a flak jacket:

  1. After 16 years of reading, study and activism, I knew more about this issue than most of the legislators on the floor, and any of the Capitol Press contingent – the Pat Kesslers and Laura McCollums and even Bill Salisburys – in the building.
  2. Had I been able to do what reporters were able to – go out on the floor after the close of debate, to interview the likes of Wes Skoglund and Ellen Anderson and Linda Berglin – I could have gone a long way toward presenting the public a much better, clearer, more complete accounting of the issue than they got from the mainstream media – which, to be fair, had come a long way, at least in terms of fairness, in the previous seven years.
  3. I would not get that chance – because I was not “the media”.  I was just a mere peasant with a blog.  And that just didn’t count, back then.

The media landscape has changed since 2003 – a lot.  And Minnesota has led the way; bloggers, especially conservatives, have blazed the trail for the rest of the alternative media, knocking down walls that had stood for generations between “media” and democracy.

But not in the Minnesota state capitol.

As of the beginning of this session, there were two ways to get media credentials to the Minnesota State Senate:

  • Be a reporter who worked for a short list of old-media outlets that were spelled out, word for word, in the Senate Rules; newspapers like the Strib and the PiPress; radio stations like WCCO and KSTP-AM, which hasn’t deployed a fulltime reporter to the Capitol since Cathy Wurzer worked there, back when I worked there, in 1986, and MPR.  The big TV stations.  And that was about it.
  • Get vouched in with the Sergeant at Arms by a Senator or caucus staffer.  These were usually “day passes” – short-term access to cover debates on hot-button issues.

It was both an anachronism – there is no mention of new media anywhere in the Senate rules – and a political football.  Things came to a head in the 2009-2010 session, as the DFL caucus gave credentials to “The Uptake” – a very liberal group videoblog – but denied them to Saint  Cloud conservative talk show host Dan Ochsner for being “partisan”.

The worm looked like it was turning this session; early on, the the Senate, now controlled by the MNGOP, denied credentials to all partisan news outlets, including the Uptake.

This was the road to madness – and, likely, litigation.

About this time a month ago, Senate GOP Caucus Communications director Michael Brodkorb – who is also the deputy chair of the MNGOP, a former blog star from his days running Minnesota Democrats Exposed, and incidentally my former “Northern Alliance Radio Network” colleague  – asked MinnPost’s David Brauer and I to participate in a working group to revamp the rules.  The goals were pretty simple; to…:

  • Remove the partisanship from the process of determining who was a “journalist” and, more germanely, which “journalists” got credentials.
  • Set up a fair, transparent, non-partisan process for apportioning these press credentials that both protected the interests of the legacy media (which have invested a lot of time and money in covering the Capitol over the years) with the imperative to legitimize and normalize access from the New Media.
  • Make the process fast, simple and inexpensive for the non-partisan Senate staffers – the Sergeant at Arms’ office, the Senate Information Office and the Department of Administration – to run, and to add no extra burden or, in these cost-conscious times, expense to the process of administering press credentials.

Brauer was there in his rather unique capacity as both a vet of the  mainstream media and a reporter for a site that is a little bit old and a little bit new-media.  Me?  Although I’ve worked in the MSM, I was there mostly to represent new and, I suspect, explicitly partisan media.

On both the left and the right.

Last week, the working group – Brodkorb, Brauer, Majority Caucus staffer Cullen Sheehan, minority-caucus staffer Beau Berentson, Sergeant-at-Arms Sven Lindquist and me – had its last meeting, and handed off our final recommendations.  The recommendations went through the (non-partisan) lawyers, past us for one more round of making sure the lawyers were saying what we thought we were saying, and, today, to the Senate Rules Committee where, if all goes according to plan, Brauer and I will be testifying later this afternoon.

Brauer on the results:

Here’s what would happen if Senators approve our recommendations:

The Sergeant-at-Arms — a nonpartisan staffer — would administer the credentialing process. Senators and partisan staff are expressly prohibited from intervening unless a journalist appeals his or her rejection. (More on that in a bit.)

Believe me, nobody — not the politicians, not the Capitol press corps — wants to define who is a journalist. However, because Senate space is limited, we decided on a fairly low bar: Applicants for a session-long credential must include three pieces in any format in the past year on “matters before the legislature.” That can include blog posts, video, etc.

The proposed rules state “any opinion in such pieces is immaterial” for credentialing. Does this mean more “ideological” journalists will get credentials? Almost certainly yes.

Count on it.  I’m going to make a note to file next year.

But the Minnesota and U.S. Constitutions don’t limit freedom of the press to perceived non-ideologues.

However, publications “owned or controlled” by lobbyists, political parties and party organizations “shall not be granted credentials.” Lobbyists are currently barred from the Senate floor.

The entire proposal, post-counsel, is here.

Credentialing, by the way, means…:

  • You can get in line for one of the six seats on the Senate floor (stage-left from the podium), or ten seats reserved for media in the Gallery. Four of the floor seats are reserved for the “mainstream” media that rents space in the Capitol basement; the other two are “first-come, first served” seats for any other credentialed media.  Four of the ten gallery seats are reserved for TV cameras from the lessees downstairs, if they show up.
  • You can get material – agendas, roll-call votes and so on – from the Senate Information Office.
  • After the final gavel, you can go on the floor to interview Senators – provided that you follow the decorum rules and the Senate’s unwritten dress code (.  This is one thing that media people can do that the general public can not.

The most important part of these changes?   There is no partisan input into who is a “journalist”, or who is granted credentials.  The entire process is run by non-partisan staff, working to standards that leave the process open to pretty much anyone who wants to cover the Senate and who can make a fairly minimal commitment – writing three articles, not being a lobbyist or a party employee, following the decorum rules – to just about the lowest-possible barrier of entry to the term “journalist”.  You’ll need to apply for your session pass thirty days before the session kicks off.

And unlike the current system, there is recourse if you’re denied.  Brauer notes:

The Sergeant’s office has 14 days to review an application. That means if you want to cover opening day, get your application in by mid-December. It also means you can’t just drop in on the Capitol and declare yourself a journalist. (There’s a separate provision for day passes.)

If the Sergeant’s office rejects an application, the reasons must be spelled out in writing. One legal advisor strongly suggested having an appeals process. Therefore, the matter would go to the Senate Rules committee, which must issue a decision within 14 days.

This does bring politicians into the mix. The concept is that the Senate is the final arbiter of its rules (short of the courts, where applicants can always turn). Could Senators bum-rush an applicant they didn’t like? It’s possible. But unlike the current process, the debate would occur in public and be governed by their rules, which again, forbid consideration of opinion.

The upshot:  bloggers, talk-radio hosts, videobloggers, and traditional news media will be considered journalists, for purposes of getting credentials, if the Rules Committee and then the Senate passes the proposal.  Partisanship will not be either a disqualifier or a factor in apportioning access.

Having a good alarm clock, however, will.

I think it’s a fair trade.

Access

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The ongoing squabble over access to the floor for media – partsian alternative media as well as the traditional kind – has been an ongoing battle at the State Capitol for a few years now.

The rhubarb flared up again as the session started earlier month, as left-leaning group-blog “The Uptake” was denied “floor credentials”.

Now, “floor credentials” aren’t the beginning and end of capitol journalism.  David Brauer notes:

While credentials aren’t needed for Capitol press conferences, floor passes are about access. Conversations are only permitted before or after a day’s session, but the immediacy of interviews before lawmakers scatter is as valuable, as is the candor that occasionally results before marching orders are received.

It’s not the be-all of reportage: Senate Sgt-at-Arms Sven Lindquist says press seats on the cramped floor are frequently unoccupied, except during big votes. Still, it’s a tool for the journalistic toolbox.

And it’s a tool that pretty much everyone wants – just in case.  Including The Uptake.

Now, the power to grant credentials, as Brauer notes, used to be a non-partisan activity:

Sgt-at-arms Lindquist says the power to review and grant credentials used to be handled by himself and Senate Secretary Patrick Flahaven. But in recent years, Lindquist says the power moved “elsewhere” — to the majority leader’s office, which is, by definition, partisan.

It’s obviously an issue needing some resolution.  Which is where this piece starts.

Earlier this month, a source close to the GOP’s caucus leadership told me that, while (as Brauer notes) the rules don’t bar “partisan” media, the decision was made to deny credentials to all partisan media, pending the development of a policy.

A few weeks ago, Michael Brodkorb – who handles communications for the majority GOP caucus in the Minnesota Senate, in addition to being the deputy chair of the Minnesota GOP – called me to ask if I’d be interested in working with a group of DFL and GOP staffers, as well as MinnPost writer David Brauer, on coming up with a more or less comprehensive policy on granting floor credentials.

Every state has a different solution to the issue – ranging from free access to the floor to credentialed media in Rhode Island and Montana (and credentials are pretty much given for the asking) to Illinois, which requires a vote of the applicable chamber to allow the  media to take pictures, much less get on the floor.

The goal – near as I can tell so far – is to come up with a transparent policy that’ll give fair access to the Senate floor to media organizations, while coming up with some sort of balance between the establishment media’s vocational need for access and the alt-media’s right to a place at the proverbial table.

I’m honored to have been asked.  My goal is to try to help this group come up with a policy that fairly and transparently gives all media a fair, clear means to cover our Senate, for the good of the entire electorate.

I’ll keep you all posted.  Because even if I didn’t, Brauer certainly would.