Jesse Watters – the guy who routinely allows vile and racist comments on Fox Nation (not to mention death threats to our President and First Lady) – did what passes for a report on Fox News about Chicago’s soaring murder rate and gang violence last week. Without offering any evidence, Watters told Bill O’Reilly that the gang fights are “all black,” suggested that the spike is the fault of Arabs and that white people are spared because they’re the drug customers. He also threw in a gratuitous suggestion that Democratic Mayor Rahm Emanuel was at fault, too. O’Reilly didn’t question any of those claims, Watters’ tactics, or the validity of his sources.

In his report, which aired April 5, 2012 on The O'Reilly Factor, Watters conducted a series of man-on-the-street interviews about frightening gang activity described by one person as, “World War 17.” Watters asked another of the interviewees, “And these murders have spiked during Rahm's watch. How do you think the mayor has handled it?”

The man said that the murders had “spiked during Mayor Dailey's watch.” 

But rather than do any actual investigating into how Emanuel has handled it, what steps he has taken, what the effect has been, Watters pulled out his ambush interview act – and confronted Emanuel with a hostile question during a public appearance: “Murders are at a record rate under your watch. How do you feel about that?" Watters "asked." When Emanuel said he had just answered the question, Watters sneered, “Is that the kind of message you want to send to the victims’ families? 

Immediately before Watters’ question, viewers saw a clip of Emanuel in a panel discussion saying, “If we can deal with the (gang-related) reprisal shootings, we can start to make an impact on both the shooting and the homicides.” For all his supposed concern about the victims’ families, Watters made no effort to determine what efforts Emanuel was making to deal with reprisal shootings or how likely that was to be effective.

Watters suggested President Obama might be at fault, too, by asking some of his interview subjects whether Obama’s community organizing worked. And Watters got someone on camera calling (Democratic) Congressman Bobby Rush “hypocritical” for going on the floor of Congress wearing a hoodie in support of Trayvon Martin and, presumably, ignoring his own district.

Again, Watters never bothered to investigate whether the accusation was true about Rush. Watters didn't even contact Rush for a response, as far as we know. 

Then it was back to the O’Reilly Factor studio to discuss this “report.”

O'REILLY: Now what are these gangs fighting about? Do they sell narcotics? Are they drug gangs?

WATTERS: Yeah, it's mostly drug gangs and they are fighting over smaller and smaller scraps because the economy is bad. And white people aren't buying as many drugs now. So the profits are down. So they're trying to fight over turf, property and respect.

O'REILLY: All right so most of their fighting and murders are -- I want to be on this block and I want you off this block.

WATTERS: Right.

O'REILLY: And if you don't get off this block we are going to kill you.

WATTERS: Exactly.

O'REILLY: So drug dealers are killing drug dealers.

WATTERS: Right. 

Watters never interviewed anyone saying anything like this. So where did that information come from? O’Reilly never asked. Instead, his next question was: 

O'REILLY: Is it all black?

WATTERS: Yeah, it's all black. And that's the deal. And one of the main beefs, actually. Arabs are buying up all the stores in their communities and they are employing all the gang bangers. So they are running drugs in and out of these Arab-owned stores and they are just fronts and the cops for some reason aren't raiding these stores.

Wait a minute: Arab-owned stores are fronts for drugs that the cops are ignoring? Why wasn’t that in the report?

Watters’ “all black” claim is suspicious, too. In the video, the only gangs mentioned are the two branches of the Gangster Disciples, suggesting that Watters never left their turf. If he had, he might have discovered the Latin Kings, a powerful gang of – you guessed it – Latinos. Or a simple Google search might have turned up this news report about the shooting of a Hispanic child by a Hispanic gang member.

Nevertheless, Watters insisted he was safe because he's white. "They said, 'We don't shoot white people. You're our biggest customer.'"

By the way, if anyone is interested in some fascinating work being done to combat gang violence in Chicago, check out PBS’ Frontline documentary: The Interruptors. It’s embedded underneath the O’Reilly Factor video. Compare and contrast!