Yesterday’s page 5A of The Daily Illini included a distasteful cartoon that depicted an individual on what is presumably Halloween climbing over a fence saying, “I’m going as an illegal immigrant.”

The Daily Illini would like to issue its sincerest apologies for the running of this syndicated cartoon. The cartoon was run with frivolous regard, and in no way represents our ideals as an organization, company or the individuals who work for The Daily Illini.

The cartoon we pull is one of the last things that is done during production before we send the page off to the printer. Each night, we print out final page proofs and our design, photo and section editors, along with our editor-in-chief look the page over. However, the cartoons are pulled after we’ve printed the proofs, disallowing a thorough review.

In the future, we will place cartoons for editorial review earlier in the production process to ensure that every inch of our product reflects the mission of our organization.

We are canceling our contract with the company Cagle Cartoons, the wire service from which we receive our comics.

We aim for diversity within our staff and coverage, yet it is decisions like these that set us back, and for that, we apologize. The person who selected the cartoon is currently on suspension due to regrets on the oversight. This choice was made out of carelessness, not out of malice. This student has learned an important lesson about carelessness.

We unfortunately cannot go back and erase it from yesterday’s paper, yet we hope this serves as a wake-up call in our decisions as an editorial staff. We apologize again, and hope that we can earn back the trust and confidence of our readers with each issue of The Daily Illini from here on.

We have reached out to the directors of the Native American House, La Casa Cultura Latina, Bruce D. Nesbitt African American Cultural Center and the Asian American Cultural Center and invited them to come in and talk with the staff about mindfully reporting on issues pertinent to underrepresented communities.

We recognize that a statement can not recognize the hurt that this cartoon may have caused and we apologize for the perpetration of this disgusting stereotype.

[email protected]