This past summer, Mother Jones published a scathing longform investigative report about a Corrections Corporation of American — which has since rebranded as CoreCivic — prison in Louisiana after its reporter Shane Bauer went undercover as a prison guard for four months.
The tl;dr version of Bauer's story (which you really should just read, if you haven't already — it was also just nominated for a National Magazine Award for Best Reporting): Wow, things are really bad in, at the very least, the private prison run by CCA that Bauer worked for.
The rebranding came shortly after the investigation — and after the Justice Department sent out a memo indicating that it wanted to phase out private prisons altogether.
Today, Mother Jones published a story that sheds some light on the private prison company's rebranding — information they got because CoreCivic spokesperson Jonathan Burns accidentally cc'd a Texas Public Radio reporter on an email to PR firm Hillenby's chief operating officer Katie Lilley that included a one-pager called "Get the facts on on Mother Jones."
From the document:
The conduct of Mother Jones in its coverage of Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) reveals a deliberate effort by an activist reporter, Shane Bauer, to advance a predetermined premise at the expense of numerous laws, widely accepted journalistic standards, a fully informed readership and even the safety and security of a correctional facility. Time and time again, Mother Jones engaged in reckless, dishonest and illicit conduct and failed to demonstrate a serious interest in a genuine and productive exchange of information about the complex issues at hand.
Mother Jones reports, "Burns said he wanted to have the talking points, which CoreCivic originally issued last summer, 'handy' during a 'Metro Commission meeting,' and asked Lilley if she could have it 'CoreCivic-ified first,' referring to the company's recent decision to change its name and logo. The meeting Burns mentioned may be a reference to a meeting in Nashville, where CoreCivic is based and where it has a contract to run the Metro-Davidson County Detention Facility."
While the MJ report says CoreCivic and the PR firm have not yet responded to its requests about the nature of the one-pager, a large portion of the talking points on the one-pager were sent to the Scene this past June after we published a post about the Mother Jones investigation. It's also worth noting that when CoreCivic sent the email, they promised the Scene an interview. Several attempts by the Scene to follow up on that interview have not been responded to.
