Maybe a knock knock joke would have been better?

There are certain times when a joke will help lighten the mood, put a reporter at ease and make an interview go easier.

Then there are times when it can make you look insensitive and potentially divide a community.

This weeks example of 'What they should have said' has so many gaffs and mistakes in it, it's hard to know where to start.

We should probably start with a little background.

Mayor Joseph Maturo of East Haven, Connecticut, is being interviewed by Mario Diaz (WPIX-TV New York) because four officers were arrested and charged with civil rights abuses against Latinos in the local community.

Now this is a terrible situation, but it's not hard to give a good interview.  You apologize to the local community and you say what you are going to do to make the situation better.  Pretty simple right?

Lets see what the mayor says:

 

Now right from the start of the video it looks like either Mayor Maturo has gotten no PR training or has forgotten what his PR representative has told him.  In an interview, especially during a negative incident, you want to try and befriend the reporter.  This is someone you need on your side to get your story out.  

Imagine going into a doctors office and loudly announcing that all doctors are quacks and rip off artists, or going into a restaurant and loudly declaring that tips are a scam and the kitchen is probably filthy.  What kind of service would you expect?  Probably pretty poor.  This is true for reporters as well.  If you insult them and their entire profession, why should they try and help you get your message across?

I've seen interviews where it was obvious that the reporter was on the interviewees side and would even feed the interviewee good lines to say, like "Would you say this is a positive outcome for the local community" or "How will this positively impact your community?"  There are also interviews where the reporter is not on the interviewees side, which is where I believe Mayor Maturo finds himself.

Despite the Mayor being adversarial, the reporter feeds him a soft ball question.  "What are you doing for the Latine community today?"  This is almost the ultimate softball question, because you can cover almost anything.  You can offer an official apology, say what happened to the officers, say what is going to happen in the following days, talk about how you plan on meeting with local leaders of the Latino community to discuss the unique issues they might run into or even explain that an investigation into the incident is underway.  Unfortunately Mayor Maturo decides this would be a good time for a joke.

Reporter: "What are you doing for the Latino community today?
Maturo: "I might have tacos when I go home"

At best this is insensitive and at worst it portrays a picture that the office doesn't care about the civil abuse of the Latino community, is racist and is going to do nothing to change what's going on.

But then all is not lost, the reporter gives him an out.  The reporter says "That's not really the comment to say, I might have tacos tonight."  What an out!  All Maturo has to do is say "You are absolutely right, I apologize, please let me start over." 

If you've already watched the video, you know that isn't what he does.  He continues to talk about what different kinds of ethnic foods he might eat! 

By the three minute mark he's made no progress in getting a positive message out to the community and has reverted to once again attacking the reporter and the press.

He gave out some vague generalizations about being an open community and making sure the Latino community is safe, but gave no facts. 

So lets start from ground zero of this train wreck and talk about what they should have said.

"In 2009, a federal civil rights probe was launch to investigate complaints against members of the East Haven police department. We have fully complied with this investigation to try and collect all the facts. We take the civil rights of our citizens very seriously and I will be meeting with leaders of the local community to try and repair any damage that may have been done."

This is a very basic statement.  It says that you are taking the situation seriously, but aren't taking sides.  Even if the cops are found not guilty, there is going to be a perceived bias by the Latino community for quite a while.  You want to try and get ahead of that as quickly as possible.  Not only did Mayor Maturo not do this, his statements imply that his office is not taking this very seriously and have very little respect for the Latino community.