Judy Woodruff/PBS lies about Romney, Giuliani ("anti-immigrant", Mark Shields, David Brooks)

On tonight's PBS News Hour, Judy Woodruff discussed political matters with Mark Shields and David Brooks [1]. And, she lied:

On the Republican side, you've got Romney and Giuliani trying to sort of out anti-immigrant one another.

Obviously, that's a false statement about both. Part of Romney's stock speech about this topic is to support legal immigration. And, Giuliani wants to "solve" illegal immigration by declaring a massive amnesty. Neither positions are in any way "anti-immigrant".

After that, David Brooks reiterated comments made in today's column (see the first link):

I think Rudy Giuliani is the most pro-immigration candidate probably running in the past 20 years, and now he's pretending to be something entirely different, to his discredit.

And, Mark Shield chimes in with this:

I would commend -- which I very rarely do, and I don't think I've ever done before -- commend David's column today in the New York Times on the subject of the Republicans, and particularly Giuliani on immigration.

Would it pain the NewsHour to have one person there who isn't a supporter of illegal activity in one way or another? Could they suggest that Judy Woodruff actually learns what she's trying to talk about and is able to use the correct words for things? If the two "debaters" and the host are all on the same side, is it a debate or something else?

Please contact both the NewsHour and the general PBS ombudsman with your thoughts:

pbs.org/newshour/letters.html
pbs.org/ombudsman/feedback.html

Related:
PBS NewsHour's Soviet-style immigration coverage
Anne Taylor Fleming not on immigration
PBS NewsHour: pro-illegal immigration, pro-amnesty bias
"Liberals" get "liberalism" fed back to them by the shovelful
PBS's Hypocrisy Revealed: PBS station opposes day-laborer center

[1] pbs.org/newshour/bb/politics/july-dec07/sbcampaign_11-23.html

Immigration2007b · Fri, 11/23/2007 - 17:56 · · Importance: 1