North Dakota Media Decides Not To Cover Heidi Heitkamp’s Decision To Skip Convention

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Written By:
Rob Port

Jun 27, 2012
10:31am

Yesterday evening news broke that liberal Democrat Senate candidate Heidi Heitkamp was skipping her party’s national convention. Heitkamp became part of a national trend – the 10th Democrat to announce skipping the convention – that has been making big headlines.

But if you’re the sort of person who gets their news from the local North Dakota media you probably had no idea Heitkamp had decided to skip. A search of the websites of the state’s four largest newspapers – the Fargo Forum, the Grand Forks Herald, the Bismarck Tribune and the Minot Daily News – revealed nary a mention of Heitkamp’s decision.

A Google News search for the story revealed several national and DC-based media outlets that covered the news, but not a single North Dakota radio station or other media outlet.

That’s kind of pathetic. This is a legitimate news story. Heitkamp’s efforts to distance herself from her party, from President Obama and from her past support for Obama and Obamacare have been a consistent narrative throughout this race. Heitkamp choosing to skip her party’s national convention – the convention at which she said Obama was “awesome” in 2008 in recorded remarks Democrats now don’t want you to see – is a significant development.

But the Heitkamp campaign apparently didn’t send out a press release about it or anything, so I guess it’s not news.

Earlier this year Forum Communications spent weeks trumpeting Grand Forks Herald columnist Marilyn Hagerty becoming an internet meme, but we can’t get a single story about Heitkamp skipping the convention.

Update: You know what else hasn’t gotten any coverage in the ND media? The Washington Post report tying Kent Conrad to insider trading.