Puerto Rico Governor Ricardo Rosselló (D) achieved a lot of free press on the U.S. mainland, with help and direction from CNN’s Jim Acosta. But Telemundo needlessly took the Governor’s remarks a step further.
In the clip below, Telemundo senior anchor José Díaz-Balart hypes Rosselló’s inflammatory remarks by misrepresenting them:
RICARDO ROSSELLÓ, GOVERNOR OF PUERTO RICO: That Puerto Rico is treated differently by this or any other President is a symptom of what we are trying to address here. It is a 120-year-old symptom that we want to solve
JOSE DÍAZ-BALART, SENIOR ANCHOR, TELEMUNDO: The tension between the Governor of Puerto Rico and Trump is growing. Rosselló said today that he won't stand idly by and threatened, and I tell you verbatim what he said, 'If the killer gets close, I'll punch him the mouth.'
Inexplicably , “bully” becomes “killer”. Such a gross characterization of the liberal governor’s recent remarks is inexcusable, given the network’s access to such resources as interpreters and translators, in addition to parent company NBC’s vast resources.
The governor’s reckless remarks were newsworthy on their own, and didn’t need any extra spice from Díaz-Balart, or whatever layers of editors let such an egregious exaggeration slide.
Such a gross misinterpretation of Rosselló’s statement only serves to fuel Democrat grievance politics as regards Puerto Rico, and adds credence (as does Rosselló’s tantrums generally) to the conspiracy theory put forth by socialist Mayor of San Juan Carmen Yulín Cruz- that the federal government bureaucracy is willfully killing Puerto Ricans (or otherwise forcing them to relocate to the mainland U.S.) in order to sell the island off to hedge fund billionaires and Bitcoin Bros.
To make matters worse, this inflammatory mistranslation mars an otherwise factually accurate report, just as the governor's tantrum marred the filing of the statehood bill by sucking up all of the news oxygen.
We’ve come to expect more from Telemundo, as have their viewers, and hope this isn’t a reversion to old bad habits.
Below is a full transcript of the above-referenced report as aired on Noticias Telemundo on Thursday, March 28, 2019:
A bipartisan group of legislators filed a bill to make Puerto Rico into another state. The bill doesn’t provide for a plebiscite but accepts past referendums where the majority supported the proposal (statehood). The debate comes after President Trump said that the island received too much money due to Hurricane Maria. These statements have created tension and rejection in Puerto Rico.
RICARDO ROSSELLÓ, GOVERNOR OF PUERTO RICO: That Puerto Rico is treated differently by this or any other President is a symptom of what we are trying to address here. It is a 120-year-old symptom that we want to solve
JOSE DÍAZ-BALART, SENIOR ANCHOR, TELEMUNDO: The tension between the Governor of Puerto Rico and Trump is growing. Rosselló said today that he won't stand idly by and threatened, and I tell you verbatim what he said, 'If the killer gets close, I'll punch him the mouth.'
