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| By Stephanie Gadlin OP-ED--Special to NNPA (CHICAGO, IL) - The unintended consequences of a recent attempt to discredit the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition (RPC) and its founder the Rev. Jesse Jackson, continue to stump supporters and critics alike. After three 'exposes' on the civil rights group, the National Enquirer continues to try to gather negative information on the leader. Weeks after Jackson issued a preemptive strike against the tabloid's plan to expose the birth of a 20-month old child he fathered in May 1999, 12 current and former RPC employees continue to find themselves subject of harassment and bribery attempts by the weekly publication. The former employees held varying positions in the organization, including national press secretary, chief financial officer, director of finance, executive secretary, scheduling director, and bureau directorships, among others. In fact, the National Enquirer attempted to contact this writer more than ten times over the course of two weeks. A team of writers, consisting of white males and a black female, has called my place of employment, my home and parents' home seeking interviews. When none of the calls were returned, on at least two occasions the same individuals came to my parent's home seeking my whereabouts. The most egregious incident occurred when one estranged family member was approached to obtain internal documents for a bounty in upwards of $15,000 in bribes. (The relative) was also asked about the social habits of current Rainbow/PUSH employees, as well as if other female staffers or I had been intimate with Jackson. Other former employees were reportedly asked to sign contracts as a guarantee they would provide negative information on Jackson. Not only does this violate one's privacy, but never has a so-called news organization so blantantly sought and attempted to create the "Judas factor," within an organization. (The biblical Judas Iscariot was paid 30 pieces of silver for betraying Jesus to his oppressors.) Although some provocateurs have stolen erroneous RPC documents and provided them to the tabloid, most employees agree that their "integrity is not for sale," and "there is no amount that can be offered" to help destroy a Black organization. In a news interview with a black daily newspaper here, Patricia Shipp, the reporter who wrote the initial Enquirer story, denied harassing Jackson confidants, and then ducked a question about bribes. "...It's a good story, and that's all I'm in town doing. That statement I just gave is all I'm going to give." Shipp, who is black and based out of the paper's Los Angeles bureau, attempted to reach me at work by telling my assistant, she was a "close personal friend." At my parents' home she left a business card with the words "I can compensate you for your time," scrawled across the back. A middle-age white male visited my parent's home one Sunday evening asking to "talk to his friend." We found he later combed my childhood neighborhood seeking answers to questions unknown. Other employees have reported being accosted on the street or at their homes. Some speculate they may be followed, and all are prepared to pursue legal recourse of the harassment continues. The Enquirer is reportedly one of several papers in holdings by ultra-conservative publishing mogul Rupert Murdock's NewsCorp, Inc. In addition to the tabloid, NewsCorp is the parent company of Fox Network, 20th Century Fox, Harper Collins book publishers, the New York Post, TV Guide, the LA Dodgers, and 21 Fox affiliates across the nation including, Chicago, New York, Washington, D.C., Atlanta and Houston. The Rainbow/PUSH Coalition is a merger of Jackson's Operation PUSH and National Rainbow/PUSH Coalition. It counts economic development, shared fnancial security, education, health care and the prison industrial complex among its press secretary to Jackson and the organization for over five years. Atty. Willie Gary, an attorney for the civil rights group, issued a terse letter to National Enquirer chairman David Pecker saying "we will not tolerate any more spurious attempts at destroying the credibility of Rev. Jackson and the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition," and that his firm will "not allow what appears to be illegal and unethical behavior that is actionable to continue." The Enquirer's stratagem is reminiscent of government's counter intelligence operations (COINTELPRO). For over thirty years, COINTELPRO sought to identity and then covertly disrupt and destroy organizations formed by American citizens thought adversarial to public policy or the political process. Targets included high-profile leaders, such as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., the Honorable Elijah Muhammad, W.E.B. Dubois, Marcus Gravy, Stokely Carmichael, and Panthers Huey Newton and Bobby Seale. Other lesser-known targets were group members and/or their relatives, donors and media or political sympathizers. Tactics used by operatives included illegal wiretaps; paying informants and agitators to infiltrate community groups; attempts to incite violence during peaceful demonstrations; creation of internal chaos and dissention; and to engage in methodical misinformation campaigns about the groups, its representatives or membership. News organization across the nation agree that "offering payment" to sources corrupts the information provided, and may also cause sources to fabricate information in order to please the publication. Furthermore, paid information cannot always be taken at face value. In the case of stolen memos indicating a $35,000 payment to Karin Stanford, the child's mother, because the tabloid reportedly paid for the document, they could not verify the authenticity of the documents or provide the context in which they were written. However, such facts did not deter them from publishing what they thought was a scoop. Later, when realizing the documents were published out of context, the paper offered neither a retraction or explanation to its readers. This leaves everyone to question not only the Enquirer's methods but its motives as well. |