Disclosing the truth exposes journalists to all kinds of risks
Jason Calderon is the News Director and chief U.S. correspondent of the international news channel NTN24. He is also the anchor for El Informativo´s prime-time newscast. Based in Washington D.C., Jason has been a political journalist, reporting the daily news of the White House, U.S. Congress, and State Department. He is a Member of the Foreign Press Correspondents Association. With 15 years of experience working for media outlets in Latin America, Jason Calderon is the author of the book “War Journalism in Colombia: The Crossfire of Information," that collects the experiences of journalists who covered the armed conflict during the last decades in Colombia.
What have you learned from your 15 years of experience in media and as an international correspondent in Washington, D.C.?
Life in journalism has given me the opportunity to look at the world through different lenses. It has allowed me to develop empathy with those I am interviewing and to put myself in their shoes, their achievements, their dramas, their struggles, and their dreams. I have been able to understand the victims, the persecuted, the most vulnerable. And I have learned to convey it to audiences to get them to connect with those realities.
Working as a journalist has taught me not to assume anything, to confirm everything, to investigate every piece of information. It has taught me that I should always strive to see things impartially and to include all versions in my reports, showing different views of the same story. It has taught me to value credibility more than ever today, which is the value that should guide and identify us in times where there is so much misinformation.
During these 15 years, my profession has brought me closer to places that are outside my own borders, places that in everyday life I would never have entered. It has allowed me to cover situations of extreme poverty, armed conflicts, migratory crises. But particularly being a correspondent in Washington DC, has been like a training ground to cover the political agendas of those who make decisions from power and diplomacy. It is a city that opens many doors for you and teaches you the importance of building and cultivating new sources. I have learned to be more persistent and incisive, in a place where all of us cover the same sources but try to get different information and different points of view about the issues that affect our countries.
What led you to become a foreign correspondent in the USA?
I really like to cover geopolitical issues, inform, and explain the role of each country on the world stage. With globalization, today the entire world is interconnected, and what happens in other parts of the world affects us all equally. A well-said phrase is "when China sneezes, the world takes to its sickbed". And we are living it with the Covid-19 pandemic.
Working in an international channel such as NTN24 has allowed me, from my profession, to be able to contribute to helping to build democracy as well as to promote respect for human rights and freedom of expression in the countries of our region. And I always wanted to have an inside look at the decisions made in the United States, a country considered by many, a model of independence of powers, of justice, of the fight against corruption, of respect for civil liberties and human rights. And how those decisions have an international impact.
Something else is that I have always wanted to deliver international news for Hispanic audiences in a unique way because I feel that many Latinos have gotten used to seeing on television for years only shocking and sensationalist current affairs news outside of our countries.
I am proud when I see a Latin American speak properly about the electoral process in the United States, for example, or the need for immigration reform. It has been a challenge and a responsibility to be able to explain to the public, in an interesting way, with different and well-contextualized points of view, how what happens in Washington can impact their daily lives. It requires thinking about the audience, who is not always an expert on all subjects, and reporting with clear and precise language.
Jason Calderon
In your career as a foreign correspondent, what was the most difficult experience that taught you a lesson that made you a better journalist?
Disclosing the truth of the facts exposes us, journalists, to all kinds of risks when exercising our job. Throughout my career, I have had many experiences, but two marked me a lot and helped me reflect and exercise my profession with greater awareness. First, when I was covering the armed conflict in the department of Cauca, Colombia, before the signing of the peace process with the FARC rebels. There was a guerrilla takeover in a town and when we got to cover it, an armed confrontation occurred between guerrillas and army soldiers. We had to take shelter in a school, under the desks with dozens of indigenous children. Many of the bullets hit the walls and we were miraculously saved.
At the end of the fight, I had the best story, the best images, but I did not calculate the risk I had exposed myself to and I did not have the training or the necessary protective equipment to be in the middle of the crossfire. And it is imperative that a journalist who is going to cover the war is prepared to act on a dangerous mission. That is why I decided, together with another colleague, to write a book called ‘War Journalism in Colombia: The Crossfire of Information,’ which collects the experiences of journalists who covered the armed conflict during the last decades in Colombia. And it became a practical guide that allows today's journalists, drawing on others' experiences, to have more tools when deciding how to cover an armed conflict.
Second, as an international correspondent in Caracas, Venezuela, I went to record in an official home where the government of Hugo Chavez was protecting several Colombian guerrilla leaders. I went alone with my camera operator in search of an exclusive. Upon arrival, we were detained for several hours by men from the Bolivarian Intelligence Service, who took our equipment from us and made us erase all the material we had recorded because they did not want us to be there. I managed to make a call to a colleague from another channel and report that I had been arrested for exercising my work. The media pressure for my case was so big that it forced the Minister of Communications to speak out and they set us free. But those were moments of uncertainty, and anything could have happened to us. Today, many journalists have been killed for going to cover stories alone about organized crime, drug trafficking, or exposing corruption in politics.
I understood back then that the purpose is not to have a scoop or an exclusive, but that when it comes to a dangerous investigation, acting as a group will shield and protect us against retaliation. Today we have seen how journalists and the world's media have come together to reveal information that has made governments, presidents, and celebrities tremble, such as the so-called Pandora Papers, something that would not have had the same impact under a single name.
What is the best way for a foreign journalist to become successful as a correspondent in the US?
Keeping a fresh look, always new, on the things that happen around us. Seeing things with open eyes will allow us to discover news in each place, in the coffee we drink, in the transportation system we use, in the dollars we spend. When you enter a place to cover a story, open all your senses. What do you see? What do you hear? What do you smell? All that serves to write a powerful story. You must be willing to learn and unlearn things. It does not mean that we do not adapt to a place like Washington DC, but that we should not get used to the fact that everything that happens in Washington is normal.
The fact that the president of the United States has Covid-19, even if he is as controversial a character as Donald Trump, is news that we must report, whether or not we agree with his policies. For not having taken things for granted, I have been able to cover first facts such as the march to the Capitol, which ended in the storming of the Congress. This has marked my journalistic agenda in an outstanding way.
What are the factors you use to evaluate the importance of a news story and what makes a story newsworthy to you?
The opportunity to give a voice to those who do not have it is something profound that has made me find a purpose in what I do throughout the years. Journalism has a social function that is its reason for being.
News is important according to the impact it has on a certain community or country. But we must not only see the stories from a local point of view, but also those that allow the audience to be informed of what is happening globally.
On the other hand, behind each report, each newscast, each transmission, there must be a well-told story that is different, true, and of general interest. Also, if it reveals something new, if it helps to get the truth, it is news. The media have a duty to be vigilant of the powerful, to denounce what needs to be investigated, and to expose what others want to leave behind.
In what ways has your experience working as a foreign correspondent in the US influenced your personality?
It has been a job that I have loved, and I have been able to do with passion. That passion has made me stand out and has opened doors for me when I least expected it. It has taught me to be persistent, to be patient, and not to give up on my goals. This profession has also taught me that, if I am wrong, I must have the courage to admit it and learn the lessons of the experience. People are going to charge us, journalists, much more for our mistakes because we are exposed to the judgment of public opinion.
What frustrates you in your daily work and what makes you happy?
Journalism is a very exhausting job; the news happens at any time so it can be difficult to draw a line between family time and work time. It also frustrates me that people think that it is not necessary to train to be a journalist. Training, in any discipline or profession, is more than necessary. A good journalist is a mixture of several things. Being able to do a good report or story requires rigor, looking for sources, contrasting information.
Today, it is believed that anyone can be a journalist by simply posting something on social networks, falling sadly into mediocrity. It also frustrates me that there are people who call themselves journalists but seem more militant about a political party. The trickiest thing to learn and to internalize is journalistic ethics.
However, it makes me happy when my work helps build bridges at the service of the community and the most vulnerable. Thereby I am not working but making an impact with what I do. I feel that behind everything there is a purpose, which is to help others. The Colombian Nobel Prize for Literature Gabriel Garcia Marquez said well that "it is the most beautiful profession in the world" and that many times "the best news is not the one that is given first, but the one that is given best."
What message would you like to convey to the community of foreign correspondents in the US?
We have all come a long way. To those who are starting, make it clear that many times starting is not going to be easy, you should know that everything that is worth it, costs. And don't forget that passion that brought you here. At first, you may experience the loneliness of working in an unfamiliar environment, and making big connections is difficult. But later, that work will pay off.
And to those who have been around for a longer time, who always see journalism as a vocation of service, as a human profession: journalism makes us feel powerful, boastful, and vain at times. And this profession is not a magic formula to feed the ego and become famous, as many try to make it seem. The news are not the journalists, we journalists are the transmitters of the message. Journalism is a lifestyle that must contribute to building society. And this will always put our professionalism to the test.
Finally, let's always be good people. Let's do the right thing.
