MacKay pulled from role as temporary columnist
Providence Journal political reporter Scott MacKay's temporary assignment as a political columnist has come to an abrupt end after his Tuesday column cited a disconnect between some politicians' emphasis on illegal immigration and its actual impact in Rhode Island.
The move, in which MacKay was filling in for vacationing political columnist M. Charles Bakst, has raised eyebrows across the ProJo newsroom, particularly since Bakst has another week-and-a-half of vacation.
Conspiracy theorists may wonder why MacKay was relieved of his temporary role within a few hours of when most ProJo readers read the immigration column.
In this summer of $4-a-gallon discontent, a Rhode Island economy hemorrhaging jobs at an alarming rate, and the housing slide eating away at homeowners’ accumulated wealth, you might think our political leaders would have something more important to do than wrangle over the illegal-immigration issue.
During the legislative session that closed last month, the State House was the scene of contentious debates over proposals to crack down on illegal immigrants. In the end, the measure requiring private employers to use the federal E-Verify system to check the immigration status of new hires crashed in the waning hours of the session.
MacKay went on to note that a small percentage of respondents in a Rhode Island College poll cited illegal immigration as top priority, and also, "Rhode Island’s economy is heavily reliant on tourism, which requires seasonal workers, many of whom are foreign."
As it happens, Governor Donald L. Carcieri, who has made a high-profile stand against illegal immigration, appearing Monday on Fox's The O'Reilly Factor, returned to Rhode Island's talk-radio airwaves Tuesday to talk more about the issue. Amy Kempe, a spokeswoman for the governor, said the administration "absolutely" did not express any concerns to ProJo management about MacKay's immigration column or about his role as a fill-in columnist.
MacKay declined to comment. In his role as a temporary columnist, he has also written about Democratic unity, the likelihood of status quo in the General Assembly, and the repercussions of slavery in Rhode Island, topics less contentious than the current hot button of immigration. Tom Heslin, the ProJo's interim top editor, could not be immediately reached for comment. I'll post an update if he calls me back.
On Tuesday, WPRO-AM talk-show host Dan Yorke ripped MacKay and myself for what he characterized as a misleading use of the immigration-related data in the recent Rhode Island College poll. I responded, in part, by telling Yorke that illegal immigration receives a disproportionate amount of media attention in relation to how much voters care about it.
Anchor Rising's Andrew Morse has a post on the same topic:
[Of two recent articles that made mention of the RIC poll one] was from Scott MacKay of the Projo…
Last night, Governor Carcieri was again on national television –– conservative Fox News pundit Bill O’Reilly’s show –– to talk about his executive order cracking down on immigration.
While Carcieri, some legislators and the talk-radio hosts may think the issue is gaining traction locally, a recent public opinion survey by veteran pollster and political science Prof. Victor Profughi, of Rhode Island College, shows a substantial disconnect between average Rhode Islanders and political figures pushing illegal immigration as a top issue.
When asked “what do you think is the biggest problem facing Rhode Island right now,” hardly any respondents mentioned illegal immigration. Thirty-three percent said the economy, 17 percent said the state budget, 6 percent mentioned gas prices, 8 percent listed government corruption, 6 percent said taxes, 5 percent said education and 4 percent said illegal immigration.
In reponse to both xcerpts, let me suggest that using polling results from open-ended questions to determine what people believe government's day-to-day priorities should be is a premise flawed from the start. In the present-day Rhode Island that we know and love, we have a perfect example of the limitations.
Ultimately, MacKay, who has an encyclopedic knowledge of Rhode Island politics, was a worthy choice as a temporary replacement for Bakst (whose retirement looms on the horizon). Yet considering the different roles of a reporter and a columnist, perhaps it's not surprising that the ProJo has reconsidered the assignment.