When Miami-based Univision reporter Vilma Tarazona arrived at the home of a migrant family in late March, she put on her gel mask and disinfected the tangled microphone cables before walking up to the front door.

Tarazona was there to interview Teresita Rosales, the mother of 42-year-old Kenia — a disabled woman who has the cognitive capacity of a 2-year-old. Kenia was admitted to an intensive care unit at Palmetto General Hospital in late January after contracting a severe case of influenza. But recent bans on hospital visits due to coronavirus has prevented Rosales from seeing her daughter.

“Now she must be thinking, ‘Where is my mommy?,” the devastated mother told Tarazona during the hour-long interview.

Tears rushed down Tarazona’s mask. She instinctively approached the woman to offer her a hug, but quickly pulled back. The reporter remembered that the strict health protocols put in place by Univision would only let her come within 6 feet of anyone she interviewed.

Tarazona is among thousands of journalists across the country who has had to adapt to stark changes in coverage amidst the COVID-19 pandemic.

“When a crisis of this magnitude occurs, the journalist always has to run to the site of the crisis,” said Tarazona, who spoke in Spanish.

As government officials continue to crack down on large crowds, news networks have had to reduce the number of employees that work in the studio.

Univision President Daniel Coronell slashed newsroom capacity from 500 staffers to 20 on March 25 after two employees tested positive for coronavirus last month.

In trying to curb the spread of COVID-19, Coronell said all reporters, with the exception of a few in the field, would work remotely.

“I was on my way back to the studio from an interview when I received an email announcing that a second case of coronavirus had been confirmed in Univision,” said Tarazona. “Until further notice, only the ‘skeleton crew’ would be needed in-studio.”

The internal email said news headquarters were closed “temporarily in order to provide intensive deep cleaning” of the infected person’s workstation. To implement additional safeguards, security screenings were placed at entry points.

Univision reporter Andrea Linares, who is also based in Miami, said she was used to traveling with her cameraman in the passenger seat. Now, she sits in the back while he drives.

“We work together in person when necessary, — always obeying the 6- feet- apart rule,” said Linares. “Most reporters are editing remotely, but the skeleton crew is meeting in the parking lot to handle production.”

Most Univision shows are now broadcast from reporters’ homes and the parking lots of the network’s two studios. Univision headquarters has stayed open to air two evening programs and its early morning show — but only a handful of cameramen and anchors are allowed in the building.

For Tarazona, these changes have been unpredictable — but she considers it her social duty to keep informing the public.

“We cannot hide in moments of crisis,” she said. “Our audience — especially those who are undocumented — needs us.”

Maria Olloqui is an undergraduate journalism student at NYU.

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On January 24, Buzzfeed, Huffington Post and several other American digital media outlets announced massive, company-wide layoffs – a total of 1000 jobs would be disintegrated. The layoffs were chilling to witness; Twitter soon flooded with messages from well established journalists and columnists, all of them announcing that they were now out of work and uncertain about future employment.

It wasn’t the first time that the industry seemed to contract, but it was the largest blow to digital media yet, and it signified that the new platform may not be able to save journalism. Alex Pareene wrote for the Columbia Journalism Review: “What became clear this week is that if the digital natives do survive, it might not have much to do with news gathering.” The most recent round of layoffs hit at a crucial time in American politics, and it left a lot of people wondering: What will happen to journalism? It’s a question that feels impossible to ignore at journalism institutions where professors, who are journalists themselves, are tasked with teaching the next generation.  

Ted Conover

“My initial reaction is horror and sadness for those journalists who lost their jobs,” said Ted Conover, who is the director of the Arthur L.Carter Institute of Journalism at NYU. “And also that it is coming in the digital area, which we’re less accustomed to, I think than the fairly steady state of disruption that has characterized all journalism for at least a dozen years.”

Conover shared that even though journalism has been an industry in decline, NYU is still seeing success with their graduates. He explained that 61 percent of NYU Journalism undergraduate majors were employed in their field following graduation – a high number considering that many who major in journalism don’t necessarily expect to pursue it as a career.

“I totally worry about the value proposition, and I feel sick every time I hear a story of journalists being laid off,” Conover continued. “But overtime, even as one kind of journalist has been losing his job, another kind of journalist has been getting one.”

“I was expecting this,” explained Nicholas Lemann, the former Dean of Columbia Journalism School. “It’s was dwarfed by the 15 year shrinkage of the headcount, particularly in the newspaper – it was much much bigger numbers.”

Nicholas Lemann

Lemann explained that during his ten years at Colombia, he and the rest of the staff made sure to not only monitor the changes to the industry, but to make sure that their institute contributed to the conversations about creating an industry of sustainable journalism. “When I was dean, I tried very hard to make the school a center of that conversation.”

Mohammed Bazzi, who teaches NYU’s introductory undergraduate journalism course, Journalistic Inquiry, says that it is important to think about undergraduate and graduate journalism programs differently – highlighting that grad programs involve students specifically entering a program to further enhance their skills and enter the job market. This makes the increasingly volatile state of the industry more worrying.

“Digital media is now hitting some of the same walls and some of the same barriers that legacy and print media has had,” Bazzi said. “The industry seems to be going through another phase of retrenchment… for graduate programs it’s a different calculation. My worry and fear would be, you know, for graduate journalism programs to not become like MFA programs, which I think is the trajectory of where they’re headed.”

NYU’s Arthur Carter Journalism Institute

For Lemann and Conover, this worry didn’t seem to occur to them. Both believed that their institutions offered valuable instruction and access to the field that people pursuing journalism might not otherwise be able to benefit from outside of their institution. And neither believe that the need for journalism will lessen.

“I personally think that there is zero chance that journalism as a function of society will completely disappear, it’s too important. We need to have a conversation to figure out how to pay for,” Lemann said.

Conover echoed that sentiment.

“Anybody who enters journalism these days needs to do so with their eyes wide open,” Conover said. “But I do believe journalism isn’t going to go away, regardless of how much our current president wishes it would. There’s an important fight to be fought and we’re a great way to prepare for that.”

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At 9:30 a.m., a suspicious package was found in the mailroom of CNN’s headquarters at Columbus Circle in New York City. The package contained white powder and an explosive device that law enforcement said was virtually identical to similar devices which had been addressed to Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and George Soros.

The Time Warner Building, which holds CNN’s offices and the Shops at Columbus Circle, was evacuated, and a warning was issued to “shelter in place” or stay where you are, on mobile devices via the emergency alerts system. Despite the warnings, journalists and observers alike gathered in the area, speculating on what was going on and what spurred the wave of threats.

NYPD officers and other law enforcement officials cordoned off the affected area. Photo by Li Cohen.

Some worried that the situation had been encouraged by President Donald Trump’s violent rhetoric.

“I think that it’s the divisive rhetoric that the President uses at his rallies daily, on Twitter daily, where he just encourages the nation to be divided,” said Laura Bray, who had been shopping at Whole Foods in the shopping center. “He incites violence, he encourages violence, he likes people that commit violence against journalists. I think that some people take what he says as the leader of the free world very seriously. They take it as gospel. And I think what we’re seeing is them acting on his rhetoric.”

Journalists on site expressed concern about the increasing normality of such threats.

“As a journalist, it’s scary when things like this happen,” said Bob Brown, who was reporting for WNBC. “It’s disturbing and it’s a waste of time. It’s a waste of energy. It’s a waste of policemen and power. Unfortunately, as a journalist, it’s the times we live in.”

“It’s scary times,” said Don Tagala, an international journalist who works with ABS-CBN News in the Philippines.

He got an alert on his phone about what was happening, and wanted to be with fellow journalists as it unfolded.

“First of all, the President has been demonizing journalists and the press in general, and then this happened,” he said. “The only thing I could think about is that with him demonizing the press, there are going to be crazy people out there who try to do something.”

While Tagala expressed fear about the recent attacks on journalists, he said that he was not scared about continuing in his career, even as the role of the press in society changes.

“You have to be aware,” he said. “You have to be careful. You have to know what’s going on. As long as we are reporting the truth, we should not have to be afraid of anything.”

An act to divide midterm election voters

Others said that the situation was the result of increased divisiveness within the country, especially as the 2018 midterms approach.

“They were targeting Democrats,” said Thomas Roeker, who works at a restaurant in the Shops at Columbus Circle and was evacuated. “I mean, CNN, Obama and Hillary, that’s got to be a correlation. It was timed too perfectly. It’s scary to think someone’s political views could drive them to do something so crazy and outlandish.”

Conservative blogger Stephen Parelli, who wore a “Make America Great Again” cap,  said that the rhetoric contributing to the defamation of the media is a result of people not agreeing with media outlet platforms and journalists focusing on perspectives that fit their own agendas.

“I appreciate when CNN or Fox News has someone else on the panel that is going to take the opposite view,” he said. “Sometimes it gets heated, but when they really try to go for presenting the opposite view it’s good. We need to have more of that. There was a day when journalism really was trying to uncover the facts but now it’s about reporting on one’s platform.”

Stephen Perelli, a conservative blogger, called for more diverse discussions in the media about political issues to reduce divisiveness about journalism. Photo by Li Cohen.

When Parelli got the news of the situation at CNN, he immediately thought of his experience witnessing the second plane hit the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001 from the 30th floor of Rockefeller Center.

“It didn’t evoke a lot of scary feelings because I felt like the situation is under control,” he said, adding that the NYPD is one of he best police departments in the world. “It reminded me a lot of what’s been happening in Europe. There were a lot of bombs going off.”

“When you see Obama, Clinton and Soros, you think it must be the Alt-Right. I would hate if that’s the case because that doesn’t represent me. I come from the right and I’d hate to think anybody would do that, alt right or alt left, because that’s not the way we behave in a civilized society.”

The device was removed from the area just before 11:40 a.m. by the New York Police Department’s bomb squad, who said that it was a live explosive with white powder. The department’s counterterrorism unit and K-9 unit monitored the area throughout the morning.

The packages sent to these locations, as well as Rep. Maxine Waters, D – Calif., and Obama’s attorney general Eric Holder Jr., are considered linked. An investigation into the situation is underway and officials believe that the same person or group is responsible for all the devices. A criminal investigation is also being launched by the Secret Service.

According to The Guardian, the area has been secured and swept with dogs and equipment. Police will also be deployed to media locations throughout New York City. No specific, credible threats are directed at the city.

This is a breaking-news situation. Please check back for updates.

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