The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel did not stumble onto a scandal in Senate District 21. It manufactured one.
On August 20th, Republican businessman Jim Croft posted a 40-second Facebook video while at a Pick n’ Save. He pushed a cart and spoke about grocery prices. The campaign logo appeared on screen, and music played in the background. He outlined the actions he would take to address the cost of living if voters elected him to the state Senate. The clip received over 50 likes, six comments, and seven shares. That isn’t a viral moment; it is a candidate in Franklin speaking to people about feeling their pain over the cost of living.
Two weeks later, Ricardo Torres, a reporter with the Journal Sentinel, phoned Kroger, the parent company of Pick n’ Save, to enquire about the company’s policy concerning political videos. Only after this call did Kroger contact Croft’s campaign and request that the video be removed. The campaign deleted the video on September 3. Torres then published it the following day. The printed edition appeared on September 8 with the headline stating that Croft had ‘learned the hard way’ that he could not film inside a grocery store.
Learned the hard way from whom? From the newspaper that dialed corporate.
Jim Steineke, the former Republican Assembly majority leader who now lobbies for the Wisconsin Grocers Association, stated that the store was not aware that the filming had taken place, that Pick n’ Save needs prior approval, and that the campaign “graciously agreed” to remove the video when it was informed. Leah Peterson of the Committee to Elect a Republican Senate said exactly the same thing in a single sentence: Croft had spoken on the high cost of living in the 21st District; the owner then asked; and they took it down.
No crime. No fine. No customer complaint in the Journal Sentinel’s own account. A private company enforced a filming rule after a political reporter pointed it out, and then the same newspaper treated the takedown it set in motion as news.
Torres wasn’t doing any watchdog reporting; he was manufacturing opposition research with a byline.
Croft, an IT analyst and small-business owner from Franklin, is the Republican nominee for the open 21st Senate District against Democrat Trevor Jung, a former Racine alder. Sen. Van Wanggaard, a Republican, is retiring. Both parties have flooded the race with cash because the seat will determine whether Republicans retain control of the Senate or Democrats achieve the trifecta they have been hoping for. Insiders classify the district as Lean D. Democrats need it. The Journal Sentinel created the scandal to help them.
This type of journalism shows that Torres and the Journal Sentinel are little more than stenographers for the state’s Democratic narrative: Crowley over Tiffany, “MAGA” as a default adjective, Republican candidates as the ones who require a lecture. It is the same paper that has whitewashed Democratic scandals when the names run the other way. Calling Kroger about a 50-like Facebook clip in a targeted Senate district is not a coincidence. It is what a party newspaper does when it wants the other guy on his heels two months before Election Day.
Croft removed the video. Jung did not have to lift a finger. The paper that created the controversy then reported it as though it had simply come across it. The people of the 21st Senate District can judge whether that constitutes journalism or is just a means of distributing the message of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin.
