Alec Karakatsanis Profile picture
Nov 27, 2021 27 tweets 8 min read Read on X
THREAD: Yesterday, the New York Times published a headline it knew was false. The implications of this are dangerous for everyone who cares about an informed public. Here’s what happened:
The NYT wrote another pro-police propaganda piece that had all of the usual problems I’ve discussed before (more on that below). But the editors chose to add a headline that stated that “murders ‘doubled overnight’” in the Bronx, New York. Here’s where it gets devious. Image
Notice that NYT editors chose to put the “doubled overnight” in quotes. Why? It's a signal they aren’t reporting it as a verified fact, but as a quote from a source. In the article body, we learn they are quoting a former cop turned local professor. Here it gets more devious.
In the article body, it’s not “murders” that the former-cop expert is saying “doubled overnight.” He is actually claiming that police (detective) “caseloads” doubled overnight. nytimes.com/2021/11/26/nyr…
Let me note here that this “expert” is wrong. It isn’t true that caseloads “literally doubled overnight.” NYT didn’t quote an opposing expert, show stats, tell readers that the person they quoted was wrong (it’s verifiable with some reporting), or disclose he was a former cop.
The NYT even let this former police officer “expert” add “That’s the unfortunate truth.” (It’s not the truth.)
Here it gets worse. See the sleight of hand? NYT editors took the (false) "caseloads" quote, put it in quotes, and then put it in the headline as applying to “murders”! They did this b/c a larger number of people will see the headline. They did it to create clicks and outrage.
It’s all false. Murders didn’t “double overnight.” Not even close, as others have noted. The NYT editors knew that, hence putting it in quotations so they could deny making the assertion themselves.
Note that the insertion of the quotes, the easily available homicide data that NYT has itself reported on before, and the many people pointing out the lie make it clear that editors chose to print this falsity intentionally, and it's still up online and twitter a day later.
As an aside, the "expert" point about caseloads was also silly. It's an NYPD choice to devote smaller numbers of cops to serious crimes, and most cops to arresting very poor people for drugs and minor stuff. 96% of all police time nationwide is on what cops call "non-violent."
The rest of the article is outrageous. Here are the “expert” sources it quotes, supposedly to help explain what’s happening.

1)Police lieutenant
2)“the police say” generically
3)Former cop (undisclosed)
4)Former cop (undisclosed)
5)Police lieutenant
6)That’s it.
The article is copaganda. Without contrary views, experts, civil liberties advocates, crime survivors who disagree, etc., article lets cops call for more surveillance in most surveilled communities: “the police say some of the city’s most dangerous pockets do not have enough.”
But what do the mostly poor, mostly people of color who’ve been organizing across NYC against NYPD’s expanded and profitable corporate military-contractor surveillance programs think? We aren’t told, because the NYT chooses to leave out their voice. That’s an editorial choice.
It gets worse. NYT then lets anonymous “police” spew a discredited police union talking point that these issues are caused by new laws requiring sharing of basic info with defense lawyers to bring NY state in line with rest of the country (e.g. Texas) and the Constitution.
That claim is garbage @AliWatkins. It’s astonishing that NYT lets anonymous police sources blame this on basic discovery laws that exist across the country and are a basic component of truth in trials. There is no evidence to support it, and no contrary point of view printed.
Even worse, NYT then lets a lieutenant blame poor communities of color for not cooperating with cops! Laughably, lieutenant blames a lack of desire to work with cops on due process “discovery laws” not on decades of corruption/brutality /ineffectiveness in making people safe.
NYT editors chose not to print a contrary point of view to explain why poor communities might not like cooperating with the largest and most racially discriminatory human caging bureaucracy in modern world history that many believe has not kept them safe but made them less safe.
This is part of at least three broader patterns. First, the NYT has a long and disturbing recent history of copaganda.
Second, corporate news in general often disproportionately covers and creates a sense of urgency about certain kinds of “crime,” but does not create the same urgency around objectively larger threats to public health and safety.
Third, when it does cover a narrow range of “crime,” NYT often links problems to police talking points: need for more cops/weapons/surveillance/human caging. This link is profitable to corporations, but it’s like climate denial given the available science.
There are many wonderful journalists working to shed light on the great issues of our time, like the things that threaten our survival as a species and that make society less safe/just. But this threatens that work by boosting police repression and reducing trust in the media.
UPDATE: Here is a (profanity laden) tirade by the ex-cop professor quoted in the NYT piece confirming that the headline is false. The headline is still up even though yesterday the person quoted said publicly he was misquoted. Great work by @jbenmenachem
UPDATE: The @nytimes has now changed the headline to remove the false claim. Will be interesting to see if paper issues a correction explaining who made the decision to print the knowingly false claim, how the decision was made, and why.
UPDATE: the former police officer turned professor who NYT chose to quote has now blocked me for some reason (I don’t think I’ve ever spoken to him online or otherwise). Here’s a screenshot of the relevant portion of his tirade where he agrees the headline is false. ImageImage
UPDATE: others have pointed out that I missed another blatant pro-police lie in the NYT article: that NYPD had been solving 90% of murders. Again, public data is easily accessible.
NYT reporter repeated false claims on twitter. So far the paper has issued no explanation of how this could happen and what kinds of accountability there will be. This stuff matters, esp to those who will be targeted if the cops quoted get what they want.
UPDATE: nyt reporter @AliWatkins has not corrected the tweets about this. I've commented on this reporter's bias before, but at this point, we need to understand from the editors how this is allowed to continue. Here is a piece I hope they grapple with: thenation.com/article/societ…

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More from @equalityAlec

Jun 20
THREAD. As I visit London next week for the UK launch of my book Copaganda, I have to say publicly how outrageous the mainstream British media’s crime coverage is. It’s like they’ve studied the worst aspects of U.S. news culture while taking performance-enhancing drugs.
This may seem comical to U.S. news consumers who lived through the fake “retail theft” panic, but British press has worked itself into a frenzy in 2025 using the same playbook. Some of it is funny, but the effects will be devastating for British society. Look at BBC: Image
Here are some other recent examples from a smorgasbord of UK copaganda about low-level theft: “Broken Britain.” “Industrial-scale crime.” “Shoplifting crime wave." Image
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Read 16 tweets
Jun 18
THREAD. The New York Times editorial on the New York City Mayor race is shameful. A lot of people have criticized its cowardice for refusing to endorse, but I want to highlight something deeper and more disturbing.
One main theme of faux-intellectual neoliberal propaganda in recent years is that we tried progressive policies, and those policies failed. As I discuss in my Copaganda book with lots of funny/disturbing examples, this NYT lie is one of the most pernicious lies in modern media: Image
The story goes: lefty policies to make society more equal, free, and ecologically sustainable are naive. Now that we've tried them with terrible results, we have no choice but to boost repression to manage inequality we cannot solve and to help oligarchs make society less equal.
Read 11 tweets
Jun 15
THREAD: The assassinations in Minnesota highlight a dirty secret hardly ever mentioned in the news: U.S. has 1.1 million private police officers. There is an unprecedented footprint of privately organized violence that is doing all sorts of things most people have no idea about. Image
Many journalists and "experts" quoted in the news go out of their way in new stories to conceal the reach of the private security/policing industries, what interests are behind it, and what it means for the possibility of a democratic life.
In my Copaganda book, I tell the story of how pro-police scholars and journalists have worked to conceal from the public estimates of private police--from forces at universities like Harvard, to much of downtown Detroit, to DC metro, to smaller stuff like this shooter.
Read 5 tweets
Jun 1
Few stories better capture modern policing than this one about a conspiracy of private corporate interests paying off-duty state troopers as part of a "shadow force" to cleanse downtown Nashville of homeless people using metal chains, cages, and violence. Image
It's great to see local news covering issues like this by reporter @JFinleyreports because it helps to expose the vast bulk of what police do: only 4% of their time is spent on "violent" crime, and much of it is done to make people money: wsmv.com/2025/05/29/sha…
But it's vital to understand this is not some egregious "bad apple" conspiracy particular to Tennessee or Nashville. It's important to understand that local policing looks like this in every large U.S. city, regardless of whether Democrats or Republicans are in control.
Read 5 tweets
May 24
THREAD. A lot of attention is rightly going to Medicaid cuts and other very bad things in Trump's bill passed in the House, but there's something that isn't getting attention, that is difficult to find in any news coverage, but that will fundamentally alter life for all of us.
The bill provides $160 billion in border/immigration funding in next 4.5 years. It's hard to describe the unprecedented scope of this, but I'll try: tens of thousands of armed agents in every corner of society are going to be nearly immune from state prosecution or civil suits.
This article describes it more, but I want to focus on a few things. First, when you build infrastructure like this and create new jobs/pensions for right-wing unions, it's hard to ever remove them. A new gestapo could become a permanent feature of life. wola.org/analysis/160-b…
Read 15 tweets
May 12
See if you can spot the difference between the New York Times headline and the article's own description of what actually happened, which will be read by far fewer people. Image
Headline: Police and Brooklyn College Protesters Clash After Pro-Palestinian Rally  Actual facts: The police moved in to make arrests after demonstrators left the college grounds and gathered outside. Officers punched some students and slammed others to the ground.
One of the standard media tropes is the "clash," which leaves casual news consumers with the vague sense that opposing sides were each violent, even though what's often happening is that an unaccountable violent repressive force is brutalizing people complaining about injustice.
It's also worth noting the shameful conduct of university administrators. If you think about what they mean by the word "safety" here the implications are dark and Orwellian for our society. Image
Read 4 tweets

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