‘WE ARE SORRY’

Kansas City Star Apologizes for Racist Past

“Today we are telling the story of a powerful local business that has done wrong...That business is The Kansas City Star.”

The Kansas City Star published an apology for a racist past on Sunday. The newspaper had a team of journalists conduct a “full-blown” examination of its coverage of the Black community all the way back to its founding in 1880 and says the reporters “were frequently sickened by what they found.” The coverage, the paper said, “depicted Black Kansas Citians as criminals living in a crime-laden world. They felt shame at what was missing: the achievements, aspirations and milestones of an entire population routinely overlooked, as if Black people were invisible.” The paper said it “disenfranchised, ignored and scorned generations of Black Kansas Citians. It reinforced Jim Crow laws and redlining. Decade after early decade it robbed an entire community of opportunity, dignity, justice and recognition.” The article, the first of a six-part series, contained three words it said are long overdue: “We are sorry.”