TV ad: "I’m Tom Emmer..." Now you’re probably already tired of hearing
ads for November’s election. TV ad: "I’m Tom Horner..."
But there are some people who haven’t heard any of them yet.
TV ad: "Mark Dayton learned his values..." Seriously. They haven’t heard them and it’s
not because they don’t want to. "Hello, my name is Elise Knopf"
Elise Knopf is one of thousands of Minnesotans who are deaf or hard of hearing.
With people like Elise in mind, the 2008 Minnesota Legislature passed a law
requiring candidates who take public subsidies to close caption their TV ads.
TV ad: "Mark Dayton learned that lesson well. As State Auditor..."
When we checked, it appeared all of the candidates running for Governor were
doing that. But the law also requires that those ads,
if they are two minutes or less, be captioned on the web.
We looked at all of the web videos that Mark Dayton, Tom Horner, and Tom
Emmer produced on their websites. TV Ad: "The Republican candidate for Governor
only looks too far to the right..." We found that both Tom Horner and Tom Emmer,
who take public money and are required by law to caption their videos,
are not doing so. TV ad: "Mark Dayton will close the tax loopholes
for the rich..." Mark Dayton, who is not taking public financing,
has captioned more than half of his videos, but his most recent ones are not
captioned. If you can see the campaign ads on TV, with
captioning, why is it important to have them captioned on the web too?
"Well, for...there’s many reasons actually. Consumer choice for one. Some
people don’t watch TV. Some of the younger generation, they’re online all the
time. Deaf blind people use different programs that they prefer to go online to
access, to have access. It’s consumer choice, but I think the important thing is it
doesn’t matter where the ad is being advertised, if it’s TV or internet or radio, the
issue is access. If hearing people can access those three media, why deaf and
hard of hearing people cannot access them?" To get thousands of dollars in public subsidies,
candidates must file a form here at the Campaign Finance Board. Now that form,
which I have here, is a very simple two page document. On it it says that
they agree that they are going to caption their videos on TV and on the web.
And that they’re going to do transcriptions of their radio ads on their
website as well. Both Tom Emmer and Tom Horner signed those
forms. It’s possible to opt out from the captioning
law before the ads start running. None of the Gubernatorial candidates has opted
out this year. In 2008 several Minnesota House campaigns were able to opt
out from the law because they did not have a website or it was difficult to
close caption the TV video. Close captioning video, however, is easy and
free. At The UpTake we’ve been closed captioning the Gubernatorial debates,
with a lot of help from our volunteers by using a free tool that’s available
on You Tube. Just put your text in a document, upload it,
wait for You Tube to process it, and voila, the captions automatically appear in
the right place. Debate audio: "but because you already spent
the money!" There’s a link at The UpTake with detailed
instructions on how to do this. So if it’s so easy to do, then why isn’t
it happening? Mary Hartnett: "I can’t really answer that.
Only the candidates would be able to answer those questions. I know that our office
has contacted or done outreach to all of the offices and offered assistance.
We’ve also let them know about ‘video captioning essentials’ - our online course.
And we know that they’ve also received handouts, flyers, when they register
with the Campaign Finance Board they’re informed of this obligation that
they have." State Rep: "Section six, is the section dealing
with captioning" It certainly isn’t a partisan issue.
State Rep: "Members I should say we worked with the Governor on the sections
of this bill and we anticipate that the Governor will also sign the bill."
When the law was passed in 2008, only three people in the house of
representatives voted against it : Representatives Sarah Anderson, Mark Olson
and Tom Emmer. One other possible reason is that there’s
no teeth in the law. The Campaign Finance Board has told me that there is no
fine, no penalty per se, for not following this particular law. Now on top
of that, for them to take action, usually somebody has to file a complaint. And, on
top of all of that, there’s a lot of special interest money now that’s being spent on
campaign ads because of the recent Supreme Court decision -- "Citizens United"
And that means those ads since they’re NOT coming from the candidates,
don’t have to follow this law at all.
But law or no law, there is one very good reason why all of these campaign ads
should be captioned on TV and the web. Elise Knopf: "Well, the main reason is for
access. 10 percent of the population are deaf or hard of hearing. And they have
no access to information that is heard on the ads.
I just want to add that I think it’s so important for candidates to make a good faith
effort to reach all people in the country. And really, it’s something that’s not
expensive. It’s something that’s not hard to do. It’s not rocket science. I think
it’s important to show that you care about what
people in this country think and believe and understand. If it was you who
became hard of hearing, lost your hearing, wouldn’t you want that access too?"