House Speaker Paul Ryan and House Republicans have released a comprehensive plan to tackle poverty in America, but so far Univision and Telemundo have studiously ignored covering the proposal.
The country’s top two Spanish-language television networks have failed to devote any coverage to the House Republican majority’s initiative, which aims to encourage work, improve education and tailor welfare to the needs of individuals. The proposal, entitled A Better Way, was unveiled by Speaker Ryan at an event held in the impoverished neighborhood of Anacostia in Washington, D.C.
While the evening news broadcasts of Univision and Telemundo showed images of Ryan and his colleagues at the event, they ignored the initiative entirely and chose to focus instead on the Speaker’s comments about Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s clash with the federal judge who is presiding over a lawsuit against Trump University.
Less than a year ago, Univision announced with much fanfare a permanent section of their news website devoted to covering the struggle against poverty. In addition to poverty in Latin America, through this effort the network has also focused on the challenges of poverty in American cities like New York. Nonetheless, even the dedicated “Desigualdad” (“Inequality”) section of the network’s website has also still failed to present any news of the Republican majority’s anti-poverty initiative.
Telemundo was also in lock-step with Univision on this one. Their coverage of Speaker Ryan’s poverty policy announcement in Anacostia also solely focused on the questions the media made about Trump, and completely failed to report on the launching of the proposals that Republicans are touting as a major part of their campaign to retain their historically large majority in the House.
In the Trump era, it seems like nothing is more important to Univision and Telemundo than to constantly push anti-Trump news angles, at the expense of attention to the great economic issues of the day, such as the persistent failure of current welfare state policies to lift tens of millions of Americans out of poverty.
