Graulau on independent journalism, anti-colonialism, generational divides, AI and yes, Bad Bunny
Emmy-award winning Puerto Rican journalist Bianca Graulau studied broadcast news at Syracuse University and spent 8 years working as a reporter in local TV news. Since leaving that world in 2020, she’s built an audience of 700,00 on TikTok and 350,000 on Instagram for deeply reported video explainers on global conflicts and pressing social issues. She gets millions of views on her stories, including on a doc she made for Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, AKA Bad Bunny that accompanied one of his music videos. The doc — “Aquí Vive Gente” — went viral. Graulau shared some of the insights she’ll likely offer to the next generation of journalists in the Class of 2026 this weekend.
Q. You started out in traditional broadcast news, but something shifted. What happened?
Bianca Graulau: I was taught how to do news for a traditional corporate newscast, and we were taught how to do every aspect of our story. So we learned how to write, how to interview people, how to record our video, edit it, and present it. And I thought my path was going to be a traditional one. I was going to start in a small market. I was going to work my way up to a bigger local market, and then maybe eventually I was going to make it to network, because that’s what we’re told is the ultimate goal in this kind of career.
I really loved being a reporter, and I also started getting disillusioned with some of the things that happened along the way. I started pitching stories that my producers did not approve, and a lot of times I was steered into covering stories that I wasn’t passionate about. I really wanted to cover stories about communities that I cared about, about topics that felt important, and I wanted to go deeper into those stories.
And a lot of times I was told that either our audience didn’t care about that or that it was gonna take too much time and too much money to produce those kinds of stories, and that that’s just not something that our newsrooms could do.
Q. Was there a story that made you feel like, ‘Okay, I can do this?’
BG: There were many. I would say the first time in 2016. I was publishing on Facebook because that’s what was cool at the time. And I did multiple stories. I did one on immigration. I did one that was a feature on a local piragüero, as we call them in Puerto Rico — people who sell shaved ice. I did a story on a trans woman in California, and her personal story. So all those stories touched people and garnered a lot of attention. I knew there was something there.
Q. Was it unnerving or freeing or both to go independent as a journalist?
BG: It definitely felt freeing. It felt like I could finally do the stories I wanted to do in the format that I wanted to do them. It did feel a little scary, especially that first time, because I was enjoying it so much, but I just had no idea how I was going to pay my bills. And the side jobs I had were, you know, feeding me, but I still had a lot of student loans. I was racking up credit card debt. So it was scary. By the time I did it again in 2020, it felt a lot more comfortable because I had been thinking about it for so long and preparing myself.
Q. I think some people don’t grasp that what you do is journalism and that you use the same kinds of news-gathering skills and ethics you’d use at a traditional news organization. How important is it to you that you’re doing journalism and not some other kind of commentary or influencing?
BG: My journalism now has more rigor than it did when I was working at those jobs. For so long, I wanted someone to push back on my journalism to make it stronger. I wanted fact-checking, I wanted to go deeper, and I wanted to do more investigative. But it seemed like we kept going back to ‘he-said she-said’ journalism, and called it objective.
Now, I actually hire fact-checkers, and what I ask them to do is to tear my script apart. I write something with the information I have and the research I’ve done, and I want those fact-checkers to find the holes in that script so that we can make it stronger. And we make it a point to include primary sources to back up everything we’re saying. Of course, we can make mistakes, and if we do, we will correct those publicly.
But now I am able to have what I always wanted to have when I worked in those newsrooms, which is stronger journalism. That, of course, takes time and takes money, but I’d rather do one of those stories every few months than do a single story every day where I’m not going deeper and giving people answers that help them understand the world better.
Q. You describe one of your beats as “colonialism.” What does that mean to you and how does having an anti-colonialist perspective influence your journalism?
BG: I will say that now that I am out of corporate media, I get to fully integrate my experience as a Puerto Rican. I am not objective, and I know that. I don’t think other journalists are objective either. I think that our lived experiences shape the way that we communicate with the world, but I don’t think that is a liability. I think that is an asset. If we are aware of our biases, then we can sort through the information and present stories that are fair. So when I say that I do journalism that covers colonialism, it means that I am incorporating my experience as a Puerto Rican, as someone who was born, raised, and still lives in what I consider to be a colony of the United States.
Q. I was struck by one of your stories on Haiti where you gave a vast amount of historical context in less than 10 minutes.
BG: These are the stories that I lament we have not been presented in our education system, in the media we consume. How is it possible that a lot of U.S. Americans don’t know that the United States invaded Haiti, and that it was one of the longest occupations in U.S. history, and how that has shaped the story of the country of Haiti? I think that’s an important part of the history that people should know, and that people in the U.S. should know because it is their government taking these actions and affecting other people’s lives. So in my reporting, I aim to bring that information to people, and then they can draw their own conclusions about the U.S. intervention in Haiti.
Q. How would you characterize mainstream media coverage of Puerto Rico?
BG: I think in mainstream media, unfortunately, we only hear about Puerto Rico when there’s a huge natural disaster or when there’s something terrible happening in politics, when we can’t pay back the debt, et cetera. Every day, there are examples of how U.S. colonialism affects people’s lives, and those are often not covered. I will say that thanks to independent journalism, there has been a lot more coverage of these dynamics. I think it’s a disservice to people to talk about a hurricane and what happened after the hurricane without talking about the conditions that have left us unable to respond properly and to come to people’s rescue after a natural disaster. So I think talking just about the hurricane without talking about the structural violence and abandonment of Puerto Rico is an incomplete story.
Q. So, Bad Bunny. You created a documentary about gentrification, lack of electrification and displacement in Puerto Rico called “Aquí Vive Gente” to accompany one of his music videos, which has now been seen by millions. What does Bad Bunny mean to people in these times?
BG: His art has definitely given people a way to express so many things that we’ve been feeling for a long time. In his most recent album, he talks about displacement. He incorporates parts of our culture that are very important to us, like bomba, plena. And I think for people it was huge to see that on an international stage, and, and to experience that joy in a way that we could share it with the rest of the world. He’s put words to a lot of feelings that Puerto Ricans have had for so long.
Q. What’s on your mind right now politically and journalistically?
BG: I am so interested in seeing the solutions that have been put in place in other parts of the world. I think we have a lot to learn from other movements, worker cooperatives, groups of people who have resisted terrible things and have created something beautiful out of that. So I’m really interested in looking to other countries and learning from their experiences so that we can bring some hope and inspiration back home.
Q. Are you worried about AI and all that it could mean for journalism?
BG: There is a concern that I have that instead of using these tools to better think and investigate, that we’re offloading the work to these tools so that it’ll become more and more rare that we will write our own scripts, that we will structure our own stories. That’s a big concern that I have, because so much of the joy and satisfaction that I get from my work is from going through that friction and those hard parts of looking at a blank page and getting stuck, and then finding my way out. That is so much of what makes my work worth it that I worry that in the future we’ll go straight for the tools and have them do the work for us, and we’re going to miss out on that important experience that contributes so much to our growth. That said, I also know we’re fully capable of using these tools in a way that is helpful and to further our work, rather than in a detrimental way.
So I worry, but I also have a lot of faith that there are going to be people resisting the temptation to get these tools to do all the work for us, and instead use them in a way that is conscientious and helpful. But to continue to have that authentic connection with our audience…that cannot be replaced by artificial intelligence.
Q. Is there a generational divide in how we consume news and information, and is it a problem?
BG: There is a difference from generation to generation in how people consume information. But rather than seeing it as a problem, I see it as an opportunity. It challenges us to be more creative with the way that we communicate, and I have found that to be a joyful and cool way to adapt my journalism to meet a younger generation. And if you’re able to bring those stories to people in a way that’s relatable and makes sense to them, they’re going to be interested. So that’s why I do videos on TikTok that reach millions of views, because people want to know this information. You just need to be able to know how to present it while still doing journalism.
—Andrea Lampros
Upcoming Events
24 Jun
Sacramento Alumni Meetup
