Matthew Moore: It is Tuesday, Feb. 17, which is the first day of early voting here in Arkansas. Here to talk about more about early voting and plenty of other stuff that he works on with his team at the Arkansas Advocate is Editor-in-Chief Andrew DeMillo. Andrew, thanks for coming back on Ozarks at Large with us.
DeMillo: Great. Thank you for having me again.
Moore: Let's talk early voting. Today is the first day that voters in Arkansas can head to the polls and go fill out their ballot. You guys are doing some coverage on it now, and you're planning on more coverage of it leading up to the actual election day of March 3?
DeMillo: Yeah, that's correct. We're covering the start of early voting. Early voting is something that's become increasingly popular in Arkansas as well as other states that have early voting. We're going to be out talking with voters to see what their mood is, what races they're interested in, what's really driving them to the polls. We've got a very interesting election year here with the governor's race up, as well as the Senate, as well as kind of a handful of races in the legislature, even down to the local level, depending on where you are in the state, some just really fascinating matchups. Arkansas is one of those states that we've seen the percentage of people who vote well before Election Day has been increasing over time. So basically, the election is happening now.
Moore: We often think of this springtime election — or I guess it's still winter, but you know what I mean — this early in the year election as more of a primary election. But there are plenty of nonpartisan judge races across the state, including one for a Supreme Court seat.
DeMillo: Yeah, that's correct. We have a Supreme Court race. Nicholas Bronni, who is serving on the court right now, he's running against John Adams, who is an attorney here in Little Rock. It's an interesting race where Bronni, since he was appointed to the court, cannot run for reelection to that seat. So he is running for another seat on the court, which he's allowed to do. So he's running for reelection, but not reelection to the exact same position.
Arkansas Supreme Court races in past years have drawn even more attention and drawn even more dollars than some of our other statewide partisan races. We've seen outside groups spending pretty heavily in Arkansas. And this is part of a national trend that we see of national groups, especially conservative groups, spending pretty heavily on these races, because the Supreme Court plays such an important role in a number of cases. Arkansas is no exception. There are several cases that are eventually going to make their way up to the Supreme Court dealing with abortion, dealing with the method of execution. And this is going to be really key. The thing to remember, though, is whoever wins this race is not really going to change the ideological tilt of this court. The court right now, it's nonpartisan, but the majority of the court — 5 of 7 — have Republican ties. So it's not really going to flip control of it, but has a chance for progressives to at least try to whittle that down somewhat.
Moore: I want to touch next on the Arkansas State Library Board. We had a lot of conversation about this in the recent past, especially when it regarded former state Rep. Jason Rapert and his involvement in the library board. We're seeing some news out of there now that they are delaying aid and funding to libraries across the state.
DeMillo: Yeah, that's correct. And this really puts in limbo more than a million dollars in aid to libraries around the state. And this is going to affect things from the ability to transport books between libraries — and especially in rural libraries, where they've got kind of far-flung locations, that's going to have a big impact — as well as summer reading programs. And this really comes down to past debates that we've seen have focused on the ongoing fights over content at libraries, especially content dealing with LGBTQ issues. And this seems to be more of a very specific issue dealing with the audit of one particular library system. But they end up kind of tabling the funding for all these libraries, and it's really kind of unclear what happens next. It sounds like there's still room for another meeting for this to get freed up, but I'm not really sure kind of where this heads at this point.
Moore: Last one I want to touch on here is you wrote a column on Sunday and the headline is "Journalism needs more leaders like Daisy Bates. Fewer like Jeff Bezos." It sounds off the top like it's certainly revolving around the massive removal of journalists at The Washington Post. More than 300 working journalists are no longer working at The Washington Post. Tell me a little bit about the genesis of this column and what you hope to get across.
DeMillo: Yeah, thank you for asking. This was a column that really was kind of inspired by the first time that I saw the Daisy Bates statue up at the United States Capitol. It's an amazingly detailed, just beautiful statue. Anyone who's in Washington, I hope they get a chance to see it. But two of the details that really struck me are — in one hand, Daisy Bates is holding a copy of a newspaper, and in the other, she's holding a pen and a reporter's notebook. And that was really representative of the fact that she and her husband, L.C. Bates, owned the Arkansas State Press, which was an African American newspaper really focused on covering the civil rights movement. And it was looking at just the threats that she had faced, both literal threats as well as business threats, in running an operation like this. There were advertiser boycotts, and working 12- to 16-hour days, which I think a lot of journalists can relate to. But this was even more of just what she had to endure during this.
And in her book, "Long Shadow of Little Rock," she writes about how she knew it was a gamble. They knew it was a gamble, but they thought it was a gamble worth taking. And that just really stood out to me as a contrast to what we see with Jeff Bezos — someone who can really afford to take a gamble — and the cutbacks that were made at The Washington Post, really decimating the newspaper in the nation's capital. They're removing some of their last connections to the Watergate era, and just seeing the contrast between the courage that she showed at the time — both financial courage, political courage — and it's really a contrast to what we're seeing right now from Bezos, and really a wish that we would see more news outlet owners, journalism leaders really look to her as more of the model.
Moore: One of the things that sticks out to me about the cuts at The Washington Post are the two areas that got hit the biggest: Metro, which is their equivalent of local reporting, and sports. And when I hear from folks about what they want to hear in the news, they want to hear about their community and they want to hear about their high school sports teams.
DeMillo: Yeah, exactly. And if you know the history of The Washington Post, you know the history of Katharine Graham — that's another journalism leader who really took a lot of risks, who also knew the value of a newspaper to the community. And she was really willing to take a stand. The Pentagon Papers, I think, are a great example of it. Coverage during Watergate. But also, she really saw the value of what it means for the community, not just covering the national news, international news — which are also taking a hit from these cutbacks — but also covering the news in your own backyard. And just seeing the reductions that this is going to end up having — as someone who grew up idolizing the Post, who can quote every line of "All the President's Men," every single line, I won't do it now — it's really disheartening. And so I was really trying to — with Daisy Bates, there's so much to be inspired by, with her history and with her role as a civil rights leader. And this is another part of her legacy that I think really should be recognized as well.
Moore: Well, speaking of "All the President's Men," do you have a book recommendation for us that you want to pass along, something you've picked up that's sitting on your nightstand?
DeMillo: The book that I just finished reading recently is a book called "On Democracy." It's by E.B. White. And people who grew up reading "Stuart Little" or "Charlotte's Web" know who E.B. White is. But he was also an amazing author, amazing essayist. And this is a collection of his writings about politics and about just so many issues that seem so relevant and resonant to what's happening right now. I think it's a great book for a lot of people who maybe are really just disillusioned with politics over the past several years — the types of folks who probably turn on "The West Wing" when they need a pick-me-up. This is kind of the literary version of that. And there are so many examples where he writes about the impact of professors who were fired from a university for being suspected of being communists, and just what that means for democracy when that happens. He talks about the value of having multiple owners of newspapers. So it's something that I definitely would really recommend. It's a book that, there were so many lines that I would pick up a highlighter or pick up a pen to underline parts that really stood out to me. And I think it's a great read for this election season.
Moore: I love it, Andrew. We can find your reporting and your team's reporting at ArkansasAdvocate.com. Andrew Demillo, thanks for your time, appreciate it.
DeMillo: Thank you.
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