Taricani Lecture Series on First Amendment Rights<\/a>. During a 90-minute lecture and question-and-answer period, Dickerson discussed the importance of objective investigative journalism in the modern world, as well as her Pulitzer Prize-winning work revealing the truth about the U.S. government\u2019s policy of separating migrant children from their families at the southern border.<\/p>\n\n\n\nLike many of her stories, Dickerson said the family separation story started with a tip. She heard from a government source that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security was considering family separation as a way to deter people from attempting to cross the border. Those sources presented the idea as something they thought was outrageous, but Dickerson was able to confirm that the plan had reached the desk of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen for consideration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After Dickerson\u2019s front-page story in The New York Times about the proposed policy, reports began trickling in that separations were already happening. Yet government officials denied those reports were true and that such a policy was in place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Those flat denials were a surprise to Dickerson. Normally, she says, government officials will do one of three things when faced with a question they\u2019d rather not answer: They refuse to comment, offer additional information that helps to place the issue in context, or attempt to misdirect the reporter by offering an alternative issue to discuss.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThat\u2019s what you get as an investigative reporter,\u201d Dickerson said of those stock responses. \u201cWhat you don\u2019t [normally] get is a lie. That\u2019s not how this country works. It doesn\u2019t matter who\u2019s in office. Partisanship aside, there\u2019s an expectation in this country since it was established that we need a free and fair press with access \u2026 to information.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dickerson persisted and was finally able to confirm that separations were indeed happening. After another front-page story in The Times, the Trump administration finally announced the policy publicly. Amid a fierce blowback, Nielsen eventually resigned as secretary of homeland security. Dickerson stayed with the story, eventually publishing in 2022 a 30,000-word expos\u00e9 in The Atlantic detailing the policy, its haphazard implementation, and the pain it inflicted on families.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The piece won Dickerson the Pulitzer Prize for Explanatory Reporting. It and other stories about family separation also played a role in a legal settlement the U.S. reached with migrants affected by the policy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe lawyers who were involved in that settlement talked a lot about the importance of journalism exposing the truth about what happened,\u201d Dickerson said, \u201cespecially when you\u2019re talking about a story that was misrepresented to the public.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
During the question-and-answer session, Dickerson encouraged aspiring journalists to dig for truth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWhatever the story you\u2019re working on, it starts with a simple goal: to inform,\u201d she said. A reporter\u2019s job is \u201cto tell readers not what people with a lot of power want them to think is true, but what\u2019s actually true\u2014what\u2019s actually happening.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As difficult as it might be at times, Dickerson also encouraged would-be investigative journalists to put their opinions aside and follow the facts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
An investigative piece simply doesn\u2019t work if \u201cwhat you write is laden with your own perspective with not enough fact,\u201d Dickerson said. \u201cEven when the fact defies conventional wisdom, even when it defies what \u2026 your reader might prefer, you really have to give it to people straight in order to arm them to participate in our democracy.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The role of journalism in a functioning democracy remains critical, Dickerson said, even at a time when trust and respect for journalists appears to be waning. \u201cThe country needs us,\u201d she said. \u201cEven though they hate us sometimes, they need us.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
KINGSTON, R.I.\u2014Nov. 7, 2023\u2014Pulitzer Prize-winner Caitlin Dickerson says it was around the time she cast her first vote in an election that her future as an investigative reporter started to come into focus. During that time, Dickerson told an audience in the äçÐÄvlogÃâ·ÑBÕ¾\u2019s Swan Hall, she started thinking about the importance of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":90176,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-90173","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archives"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90173","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/27"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=90173"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90173\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":90179,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90173\/revisions\/90179"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/90176"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=90173"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=90173"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=90173"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}