Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP
Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito Jr. (L) and his wife, Martha Ann Alito, pay their respects at the casket of the Rev. Billy Graham in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda on February 28, 2018, in Washington.
Editor's note: David Zurawik is a professor of media studies at Goucher College. He was media critic for The Baltimore Sun for 30 years. The opinions expressed in this editorial are his own. See more opinion at CNN.
CNN —
As a journalist and professor of media ethics, I have long opposed secret recording operations like the one conducted by Lauren Windsor against Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito and his wife, and Chief Justice John Roberts.
But as a citizen living in this perilous time for our democracy, I appreciated the information she received and shared on Monday, especially the range of Mr. Alito's right-wing and religious views.
Justice Alito, who often rules in favor of conservative religious groups, responded to Justice Windsor's statement that there is a war between those who believe in God and those who don't, and that believers must fight to lead the country to a “holy” place by saying, “I agree with you. I agree.”
This raises the question of his impartiality on the issue of separation of church and state, and whether his ruling will move us from a secular democracy towards a theocracy.
I know there is a great contradiction in opposing an act and appreciating what it produces, but living with and being honest about such contradictions is necessary in this age of media revolution if we are to uphold high journalistic standards and find ways to contribute to and even save our democracy.
The central problem I faced in trying to make moral sense of Windsor's actions and my reaction to them is that if I want to accept or support her actions, then do I also have to accept some of the work of the right-wing activist group Project Veritas and its founder, James O'Keefe? This is a deeply uncomfortable thought.
Remember, for example, when in 2009 he and fellow activist Hannah Giles went undercover in Baltimore as a prostitute and her pimp to expose alleged corruption at the grassroots community organizing group ACORN?
I was completely clear then. I condemned their actions in print and on cable television. Journalists do not cheat or lie to get information. Period.
Fifteen years later, I no longer have that clarity. As a journalist and as an ethicist, I still disagree with misrepresenting things to get information. I wouldn't do that. I think it's wrong.
But as we approach a potentially monumental Supreme Court decision on whether former President Donald Trump enjoys presidential immunity from federal prosecution related to his alleged actions in the Jan. 6, 2021, storming of the Capitol, we need all the information we can get about the people who rule — and the members of the Supreme Court are not revealing anything.
As citizens and voters, we welcome all the information we can get as we approach the 2024 election and a Supreme Court decision that could have a significant impact on its outcome. Even before Windsor released the recording, Alito had said he would not recuse himself from ruling on Trump's absolute immunity claim, so we need all the information we can get about what Alito thinks and how he will act.
Some have questioned Justice Alito's impartiality regarding the 2020 election, as well as Trump's false claims that the election was stolen, after The New York Times reported that an upside-down American flag — a symbol of those questioning the results of the 2020 election — was displayed in Alito's family home shortly after the January 6 riot. Some of the people who stormed the Capitol were carrying the same type of flag.
The question here is another aspect of a larger media question of the past eight years: If we believe that American journalism must serve democracy, how do we report on someone who we believe is trying to destroy it?
Windsor’s actions are excusable. Certainly, she was disingenuous in presenting herself as a conservative Catholic and secretly recording their responses. But she does not claim to be a journalist. So should we judge her by journalistic standards? And what about all the news organizations that reported her findings? Didn’t all the major mainstream media, including the New York Times, publish the information she recorded, whether or not they had listened to the entire recording themselves and knew what she did or did not include? So even if we describe her as a liberal activist and filmmaker, it might seem a bit hypocritical for journalists to criticize her when their organizations are making money off her work.
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Windsor's findings don't tell us as much about the Supreme Court's secrecy and lack of ethics as ProPublica and The New York Times have, and they did so without any pretense. But Windsor has made me believe that Justice Alito is more on the religious right than I thought he was, and that matters to me as a citizen, especially as it relates to reproductive rights and other issues the Court hears.
Activist filmmakers have a role to play in gathering information to help voters make informed choices, and that role is more important than ever, but we shouldn't call it journalism, and we should be upfront about what has and hasn't been verified when replicating the findings of our own media.
As for comparing Windsor's work to that of Project Veritas, Windsor was certainly disingenuous in presenting herself as a conservative Catholic, in asking the Alitos questions that implied their affiliation with them as opposed to secular liberals, and in secretly recording their answers. But while the approach was similar, Maryland has laws against secret recordings, and the consent of the couple was required. There is no such law in Washington, DC, where Windsor's recordings were made. Windsor did not ignore any laws in obtaining information; she certainly adhered to traditional journalistic standards. But she did not break any laws by taking us behind closed doors and giving us a sneak peek into Alito's mind.
