Exclusivity and precision – both hallmarks of the AP – were on full display last week as teams of journalists covered the roiling immigration debate in the U.S. and the gripping story of the Thai boys soccer team trapped deep inside a flooded cave.
A day after America’s Independence Day, investigative reporters Martha Mendoza and Garance Burke revealed that some immigrant U.S. Army reservists and recruits who enlisted in the military with a promised path to citizenship were being discharged.
In Thailand days later, an AP team was first to accurately report that Thai authorities had freed four boys from the cave, rather than six as other media said. It was part of a two-week, around-the-clock multi-format effort that included unmatched live shots from the scene.
For exclusive reporting that forced readers – and customers – to take notice, Mendoza and Burke and the Thailand team of Tassanee Vejpongsa, Chris Blake, Yves Dam Van, Shonal Ganguly, Sakchai Lalit, Kaweewit Kaewjinda, Jason Corben, Grant Peck, Somphong Saisomboon and Preeyapa Khunsong share Beat of the Week awards.
As the immigration debate raged in the U.S., Mendoza received an email from an attorney about the case of a discharged Brazilian reservist who sued the Army, alleging that the Defense Department hadn’t given him a chance to defend himself or appeal.
Mendoza and Burke, consulting with Global Investigations Editor Mike Hudson, quickly found other recruits from Pakistan, Dominica and Iran who were in similar situations. The reporters found studies showing many service members recruited through the program had proven to be exemplary.
After dozens of calls and emails from the pair, Pentagon officials said they couldn’t comment on the discharges, citing the pending litigation. They said service members with an honorable discharge were protected from deportation.
Chinese-born doctoral student Panshu Zhao poses in uniform at a U.S. Army Reserve installation in Houston, Feb. 11, 2018. Zhao is among the immigrant military recruits and reservists struggling with often inexplicable discharges and cancelled contracts. They enlisted with a promised path to citizenship in exchange for their service. “It’s just like you’re dropped from heaven to hell,” Zhao told The AP.
Photo courtesy Panshu Zhao via AP
The story spread rapidly. The tweet from AP’s main account registered nearly 4.5 million impressions, driving more visitors to the story on APNews.com than any AP tweet has ever driven to any AP site. An editorial in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch asked: “Is this really how America wants to show gratitude to those who served honorably?”
Mendoza and Burke followed their scoop with an intimate portrait of a doctoral student who joined the Army Reserves after growing up in China dreaming of democratic ideals. He told the reporters his discharge was “like you’re dropped from heaven to hell.”
As the immigration story commanded headlines, another major story emerged half a world away. In Thailand, the AP team faced down intense competitive pressure as the world awaited any word about the fate of the boys soccer team trapped in a cave complex, a story that the AP had owned from the beginning largely due to Vejpongsa’s intrepid early reporting.
Relatives of the 12 boys and their coach missing in a flooded cave wait under a tented area for any updates on the search in Mae Sai, northern Thailand, June 26, 2018.
AP Photo / Tassanee Vejpongsa
Flood water fills the entrance to a cave, June 29, 2018, hindering the search efforts for 12 boys and their soccer coach who went missing nerlyu a week earlier in Mae Sai, northern Thailand.
AP Photo / Sakchai Lalit
Songpol Kanthawong, 13, left, sits with his father Noppadon Kanthawong, in a tent for families and friends, June 26, 2018, outside the cave where a youth soccer team went missing three days earlier in Mae Sai, northern Thailand. Songpol is a member of the missing team but didn't join them on the trip.
AP Photo / Tassanee Vejpongsa
Bicycles left by a group of 12 boys and their soccer coach line the entrance to a cave, June 26, 2018, three days after the team went missing in Mae Sai, northern Thailand.
AP Photo / Tassanee Vejpongsa
Rescuers carry water pipe to the entrance of the cave complex where 12 boys and their soccer coach had been trapped for more than a week in Mae Sai, northern Thailand, July 4, 2018.
AP Photo / Sakchai Lalit
Thai soldiers try to connect water pipes that will help prevent water from entering a cave where 12 boys and their soccer coach had been trapped for two weeks, in Mae Sai, Chiang Rai province, northern Thailand, July 7, 2018.
AP Photo / Sakchai Lalit
Emergency rescue teams gather in the staging area, June 27, 2018, as they continue the search for 12 young soccer team members and their coach, missing in a large cave in Mae Sai, northern Thailand.
AP Photo / Sakchai Lalit
Thai soldiers march out of the Tham Luang Nang Non cave in Mae Sai, northern Thailand, June 29, 2018, nearly a week into the search for 12 young soccer players and their coach.
AP Photo / Sakchai Lalit
Soldiers connect water pump hoses in the mud to help drain the cave where a young soccer team and their coach are believed to be missing in Mae Sai, northern Thailand, June 28, 2018.
AP Photo / Sakchai Lalit
A rescuer makes his way down to the entrance of a cave complex where 12 boys and their soccer coach were trapped in Mae Sai, Chiang Rai province, northern Thailand, July 4, 2018.
AP Photo / Sakchai Lalit
Family members hug after hearing the news that 12 boys and their soccer coach have been found alive after more than a week trapped in a flooded cave in Mae Sai, northern Thailand, July 2, 2018.
AP Photo / Sakchai Lalit
Family members pray near a cave where 12 boys and their soccer coach had been trapped for two weeks in Mae Sai, northern Thailand, July 7, 2018.
AP Photo / Sakchai Lalit
Family members pray in front of a Buddhist statue near a cave where 12 boys and their soccer coach had been trapped for two weeks in Mae Sai, northern Thailand, July 7, 2018.
AP Photo / Sakchai Lalit
The body of Saman Gunan, a former Thai Navy SEAL who died during the cave rescue mission, is carried during a ceremony at Chiang Rai Airport in Mae Sai, northern Thailand, July 6, 2018. The diver, working as part of the effort to rescue 12 boys and their soccer coach from a flooded cave, died from lack of oxygen, underscoring risks of extracting the team.
AP PHOTO
International rescuers prepare to enter the cave where a young soccer team and their coach were trapped by flood waters in Mae Sai, northern Thailand, July 5, 2018. With more rain expected, rescuers were racing against time to extract 12 boys and the coach.
AP Photo / Sakchai Lalit
International rescuers prepare to enter the cave where a young soccer team and their coach were trapped by flood waters in Mae Sai, northern Thailand, July 5, 2018.
AP Photo / Sakchai Lalit
An emergency team believed to be carrying one of the rescued boys from the flooded cave heads to the hospital in Chiang Rai province, northern Thailand, July 9, 2018. One day later the operation was completed with the last of the 12 boys and their coach rescued.
AP Photo / Vincent Thian
A helicopter believed to be carrying one of the boys rescued from the flooded cave lands in Chiang Rai as divers extracted the remaining boys and their coach trapped at Tham Luang cave in northern Thailand, July 10, 2018.
AP Photo / Vincent Thian
Journalists listen as Chiang Rai province Gov. Narongsak Osatanakorn addresses a news conference in Mae Sai, Chiang Rai province, northern Thailand, July 10, 2018.Thai Navy SEALs said all 12 boys and their soccer coach were rescued from the cave, ending an ordeal that lasted more than two weeks.
AP Photo / Sakchai Lalit
After the rescues finally got underway, Reuters and AFP reported that six of the boys had been extracted from the cave. The AP team couldn’t get immediate confirmation and stuck with what they knew for certain: that two ambulances had left the cave entrance.
With freelance editor Chris Blake leading the text report, another freelancer, Jason Corben, got information from the Thai Navy SEALS’ Facebook page that four of the 12 boys had been rescued. Blake filed the alert. Reuters and others had to issue corrections. AFP clarified in its story.
That scoop capped off a week of strong, multi-format reporting in Mae Sai led by Bangkok-based video journalist Vejpongsa. The team battled grueling rain and mud to deliver photo and video, including unmatched live shots from outside the cave that captured the work of the rescue teams.
On the day the first four boys were rescued, Sakchai Lalit, who was the lone photographer at the scene, walked a kilometer through rain and mud to get to a vantage point where he could capture shots of the ambulance that would move the boys – a detail that was also used on the text report.
Video edits about the rescue and moments leading up to it dominated the top 10 in Teletrax. On AP Direct, the top eight live shots were all from the Thai cave.
For their enterprising work to deliver scoops on two divergent and intensely competitive stories, Mendoza and Burke, and Vejpongsa and the Thailand team, each earn the Beat of the Week award.