Covering the War en Espanol

When veteran KMEX-TV reporter Oswaldo Borraez and his crew arrived at the Costa Mesa home of the Garibays last week, non-Latino neighbors called police. Here, they thought, were the callous and disrespectful media violating the privacy of a family in mourning.

But the mother of fallen Cpl. Jose Angel Garibay -- the first Mexican-born U.S. Marine to die in the Iraq conflict -- did not wish to eject the Spanish-language crew from her home. She had invited Borraez herself.

Accustomed to his reports on issues of concern to the region’s immigrant Latinos, the Garibays had turned to Borraez to describe their deep loss to that community.

A sister prepared tea. An uncle dashed out to buy bottled water. Then, Simona Garibay poured out her son’s story.

“She said, ‘You come into our house every day,’ ” said Borraez, whose stern yet sympathetic face has beamed into Southland living rooms for nine years on KMEX-TV Channel 34, the Los Angeles affiliate of the Univision network. “ ‘Now you are here in person.’ ”

Spanish-language media have advised the Latino community on everything from immigration to health. Reporters have helped crack crime rings when frightened residents turned to them with tips. They have broadcast personal messages between families here and abroad when earthquakes and hurricanes struck.

Now, as a record number of Latinos help wage war in Iraq and as casualties mount, the distinctively close ties between Spanish-language media and Southern California’s Latino population have come into high relief. That connection has won Spanish-language reporters intimate access to families of service members as they seek comfort and connection. And it has colored the coverage of war, casting the conflict in personal terms that play a secondary role on English-language broadcasts.

“I like the Spanish stations, whether it’s television or radio,” said Armando Navaja, who straps a radio to his bicycle with elastic cords so he can listen as he pedals home from his Santa Ana landscaping job.

“They know people like me, they come from where I come from, they think the way I think,” said the native of Jalisco in southwestern Mexico.

The coverage goes beyond language.

“It’s a way of thinking,” said Lucinda Robles, who purchased flare-cut jeans and peasant tops in a friend’s crowded Santa Ana apartment one recent day -- with one eye on the television. “When the boy died,” she said, referring to Garibay, “you saw how they treated that. How they respected him.”

The stations gain loyalty by showing respect to immigrants “in a country where they often don’t get a lot of it,” said Sachari Millian, a producer for Guillermo Descalzi’s morning show, “Descalzi en Directo,” on Radio Unica, KBLA-AM (1380) in Los Angeles, which interviewed Garibay’s mother.

Interviewers don’t look down on subjects who lack formal schooling. Young news reporters speak deferentially to elders at interviews. During religious holidays, anchors turn the microphones over to priests for words of prayer.

Trust is a key to the relationship. For the undocumented in particular, Spanish-speaking reporters are seen as safer confidants than law enforcement personnel. Witnesses have slipped Borraez information on suspects at crime scenes. His newsroom uncovered a pyramid scheme -- known as La Luz de Oro -- that victimized 16,000 Latinos by routing information and call-in tips to authorities. At KVEA-TV Channel 52, the Telemundo affiliate, assignment editor Robert Inigo once got a call from a South-Central Los Angeles family being held by armed intruders in a home-invasion robbery.

On other occasions, stations have raised money for organ transplants. And when a Mexican mother recently sought to be reunited with her leukemia-stricken daughter in Hawaiian Gardens, the phone call came to Telemundo. The station helped to arrange a humanitarian visa; mother and daughter were reunited, with cameras rolling.

Mistakes also have been made. The Gonzalez family of Rialto was watching Telemundo early March 23 when they saw images of dead U.S. troops -- including a close-up of a young man they believed to be their son. The devastated family was officially notified by Marine officials the next morning of the death of their son, Marine Cpl. Jorge Gonzalez. Telemundo apologized for briefly airing the footage, first distributed by the Arab network Al Jazeera.

As war intensifies, the audience for Spanish-language news broadcasts has grown, even among bilingual Latinos with easy access to English-language news. Data from the first days after the war showed NBC-owned Telemundo’s ratings soaring by an average of 22% nationwide. As Univision added more war coverage, its numbers improved. In Los Angeles, both KVEA and KMEX have posted gains with local and national broadcasts.

Maricarmen Rubio of Santa Ana has a nephew in the Marines near or in Iraq. She has flipped from Spanish-language channels to English-language CNN and Fox, praying that “I don’t hear his name.” If tragedy strikes, she said, she probably would seek out Univision.

“To me, that’s a home base,” she said, “a place where news begins, and everyone hears it.”

When U.S. troops fought in the Persian Gulf 12 years ago, Spanish-language broadcasting was such a minor presence that ratings firm A.C. Nielsen didn’t bother to track it. Today, Spanish-language broadcasting has grown in reach and influence. Univision, with an 80% share of the Spanish-language market, has seen its prime-time audience of viewers 18 to 49 years old double over the last decade while ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox have seen their share of that demographic drop.

For this war, the smaller Telemundo -- acquired for $2.7 billion last year by NBC -- set the agenda, going to round-the-clock coverage in the first three days after the war began. Univision responded quickly, sending its prime-time anchor, Jorge Ramos, to the Persian Gulf. Now, both networks are devoting extensive efforts to war coverage, with a particular focus on describing the Latino community’s pride and loss in human terms.

The coverage contrasts with English-language broadcasting, which includes segments on families and their emotions but has a much heavier focus on former generals and other talking heads discussing military tactics and geopolitics.

The tone of English-language coverage is “very rah-rah, let’s go get them,” said Roberto Orci, a partner at Latino market consulting firm M3 Alliance. The Spanish-language networks, by contrast, give the coverage a “much more personal nature,” he said.

What viewers are getting is an inside look at what one network calls “El Dolor Hispano” -- “Hispanic Pain.” A Radio Unica talk show host suggests that family members make journals for the troops, documenting daily life. A Univision show on Thursday titled “Voces de una Nacion en Guerra” -- “Voices of a Nation at War” -- focused on the effect on the Latino community and featured “reunions” via satellite between troops in the gulf and their families in the U.S.

KMEX has dubbed the conflict “La Guerra de Todos” -- “Everybody’s War” -- a pointed nod to Latino involvement. The station was the first to interview both the Garibays and the Gonzalez family.

Radio, too, has stepped up with emotional coverage, repeatedly playing the last recorded message of Garibay to his family, dedicating a Vicente Fernandez song, “El Hijo del Pueblo” -- “Son of the People” -- to his memory and opening the airwaves to callers who have read poems for the troops.

Telemundo kicked off its war-related coverage in January with a family’s tearful goodbye to a soldier son; a rolling series of mini-profiles from across the country now runs regularly.

Last week, reporter Azucena “Suzy” Gomez visited a Marine Corps recruiting station in Van Nuys, where a board is filled with dozens of photos of recruits, most of them Latinos. Among her questions to two young men: “How do your parents feel about your decision to join the armed forces during wartime?”

Daniel Serrato, a 21-year-old unemployed landscaper, said his mother was worried but now respects his decision to fight for a country that he entered illegally six years ago.

Serrato’s entry into the U.S. might have raised questions from an English-language reporter, but Gomez moved on to the effect on his life and on relatives.

“In the Latino community, family is the ultimate, the most important thing in life,” Gomez said. “We want [viewers] to feel it

The personal emphasis extends to both sides of the conflict. A recent Univision network special report explored the plight of Iraqi children caught in the line of fire.

The coverage “essentially is painting a war that has a high personal cost to everybody involved,” Orci said. “It’s not anti-American, it’s not pro-Iraqi. It’s just a very grim portrayal of the war, which maybe the general market isn’t getting.”

Both networks have aired lengthy interviews with family members of those captured and killed, even facilitating direct contact between loved ones.

Sitting next to Telemundo’s reporter in a Qatar studio on a recent morning was Army Sgt. Juan Navarrete of East Los Angeles, who serves in the 1st Battalion, 3rd Infantry Division. On the line with KVEA from her home was his mother.

After Juan relayed the life of a soldier waiting for combat, the local anchor addressed Teresa Navarrete: “You’re the mother,” she said. “Tell us. How is your son special?”

“What can a mom say about her son?” answered a weeping Teresa. “For me, he’s the best ... a very good boy, a very good son.... He’s always been respectful. He’ll always be in my heart.”

What will she cook for him when he returns? Mole, she answered, as Juan grinned half a world away.

“Ma,” he said, “I hope you can rest a little more peacefully now that you know that I’m OK.” Then he addressed his 5-year-old daughter, Erin.

“I want to tell you that I love you,” he said, “and do your homework!”

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Times staff writer Meg James contributed to this report.