Former Marion County Record reporter Deb Gruver: ‘No, you don’t get away with this’

This story is part of a series by Kansas Reflector and The Handbasket to examine the one-year anniversary of the raid on the Marion County Record. Support independent journalism by subscribing to The Handbasket or donating to Kansas Reflector.

MARION — Marion County Record editor and publisher Eric Meyer began speaking out about the police raid of his home and office before the officers could even retreat to their celebratory pizza party.

He said it never entered his mind to keep quiet.

“Crap like this happens more often than we hear about,” Meyer said. “I don’t know of anybody else that’s been raided quite the way we were. But there are other similar things that have gone on, other acts of intimidation of one sort or another, that have gone on around the country. And you don’t hear about them because nobody said anything.”

Meyer can afford to take risks. Unlike virtually all other news media, he doesn’t have to worry about his finances — this is a retirement project for him. Other outlets face a different reality. But he sees it as more than work. And there’s a reason he continues to go through the grueling exercise of producing a newspaper.

“It’s still a calling,” he said.

The attack on constitutional freedoms in Marion placed a spotlight on the inherent tension between journalists and the powerful people they hold accountable. And while the sight of American police seizing computers from a newsroom sent shockwaves around the world, and threats to reporting efforts by local officials continue, the Marion County Record and others like it remain resolute in their mission.

Every Friday afternoon at the offices of Harvey County Now, a half-hour southwest of Marion, locals gather around an actual bar in the back — a remnant of a previous business — to shoot the breeze. Though they’re in the news business, Joey and Lindsey Young provide beers and sips to those who come by, and who often bring libations of their own.

“It’s a great way to talk about community issues without people feeling intimidated, because it’s like, none of us are writing it down — which is a shame,” Young joked recently from behind his desk in the storefront office. “But we get good stories, and we talk to people, and people are always more willing to just hang out and talk if they feel relaxed.”

This collegiality is important in contrast to continued skepticism of the media, both locally and nationally. It also creates a personal relationship between the town and the paper, and helps the community see it as an essential part of a functioning society.

In Marion, according to a local pastor, despite the widespread outcry, the raid didn’t change anybody’s opinion of the newspaper.

“I think there’s some people who will tell you what is printed at the Marion County Record is 100% truth, and it’s gospel, and it’s accurate every time,” said Jeremiah Lange, pastor of the Marion Presbyterian Church. “I think there’s other people that would disagree with that.”

In the aftermath of the raid, journalists from across the state began calling Emily Bradbury, executive director of the Kansas Press Association. She said they would ask things like: “I’m looking at my city manager. Are they going to come in and do this?”

Bradbury said nothing surprises her after what happened in Marion. But her main reaction to the raids has been to inform the public about the role journalists play in a healthy democracy, and educating judges on federal and state laws that are supposed to shield journalists from police raids, and making sure outlets are able to put out a paper, even if law enforcement has seized their reporting tools and technology.

The KPA provided news outlets with posters that outline protections for journalists, as well as a legal warning letter that journalists can hand to police if they try to search a newsroom. The idea, according to Bradbury, is to be “optimistic it won’t happen again, but prepared if it does.”

“We’re going to be a lot more prepared moving forward on how we react to those kinds of situations,” Bradbury said. “It’s one of the few bright sides that came out of it.”

But local officials still have other avenues for punishing news outlets.

Kansas law requires cities to publish public notices in a “paper of record,” but some cities have declared the city website to be the paper of record, stripping the local newspaper of advertising revenue from charging for print space. If every city in the state took that action, Bradbury said, half the newspapers in Kansas would disappear overnight. That gives local officials extraordinary leverage over reporters.

Earlier this year, the Wichita City Council pulled its public notices from the Wichita Eagle. Officially, the move was about saving taxpayer money. But Bradbury pointed out the city, while facing a $12 million deficit, saved a mere $150,000. She said the decision was really about “sticking it to the paper.”

Max Kautsch, a First Amendment attorney who operates a hotline for journalists through the KPA, said local officials also punish reporters by refusing to hand over public records or by charging outrageous fees for a records request. The officials know that newspapers in Kansas rarely have the resources to pay for a court battle over the records.

“Taking advantage of the Kansas Open Records Act is a time-honored practice,” Kautsch said.

And few Kansas leaders have been willing to stand up for journalists, even after the state became known as a hub of hostility toward a free press. In the state Legislature, the House speaker this year blocked a resolution that would have declared support for a free press in Kansas — even as the chamber readily passed resolutions supporting Israel, Taiwan and St. Patrick’s Day.

Rep. Mari-Lynn Poskin, a Leawood Democrat, recalled watching the “crazy” story unfold in the days after the raid on the Marion County Record. But she wondered at the time: “Where are the defenders of the free press?”

She drafted a resolution declaring support for the freedom of the press, as guaranteed by the U.S. and Kansas constitutions, and gathered 45 co-sponsors — including 10 Republicans with wide-ranging ideology. She thought it would be “a unifying thing” to start the legislative session this past January. But she was “awestruck” by the response from House Speaker Dan Hawkins, a Wichita Republican.

“He was livid. He said, ‘This is anti-law enforcement.’ And I said, ‘Wow. I am really sorry you feel that way,’ ” Poskin said.

Hawkins’ spokeswoman didn’t respond to a request to comment for this story.

Former Marion County Record reporter Deb Gruver maintains that local and state governments ultimately were unsuccessful in their attempts to silence their critics in the media.

“They didn’t get what they wanted. They thought they were going to get away with it, and they learned very quickly, no, you don’t get away with this,” Gruver said. “And it’s reopened the conversation about the fourth estate and our role.”

The Marion County Record and Harvey County Now continue to churn out a weekly paper, and Young and the KPA have rolled out an online course called “Earn Your Press Pass.” The idea is to give people living in rural areas access to basic knowledge for getting started as a local news reporter, and to create desirable job candidates for outlets in the area.

Over the course of nine months, Lindsey Young, the co-owner of Harvey County Now and a former high school journalism teacher, built the course.

As Joey Young explained, it was made so that the owner of a local outlet could approach someone in town and “be like, ‘Hey, you’ve got kids in school. You live here. Those are all assets to the newspaper that we never thought about previously.’ It’s like, ‘Oh, you’ve got a ton of institutional knowledge. We’ll teach you the journalism stuff.’ ”

At the Marion County Record,  readership has grown from 2,000 to 6,000 subscribers in the year since the police raid of the newspaper office.

Special prosecutors determined no law enforcement officer broke the law by carrying out the chilling raid, but Meyer filed a federal lawsuit seeking damages in excess of $5 million. He said he would prefer to get a verdict rather than settle the case, even if it costs him money, because he wants to set a precedent.

“The whole point of doing this is not to get money,” Meyer said. “The whole point of doing this is to say ‘you can’t do this crap.’ ”

And he still sees a place for his paper: “If we’ve got truth on our side, there are enough people who still believe in truth.”

Gruver put a finer point on it.

“I think that journalists are public servants, except that we don’t get regular raises and sweet, sweet benefits,” she said. “So I feel like there are a lot of winners in this, actually. And I feel like the next generation of journalists will be winners because of this.”

Kansas Reflector is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Kansas Reflector maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Sherman Smith for questions: info@kansasreflector.com. Follow Kansas Reflector on Facebook and Twitter.

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