When Hurricane Katrina struck, it stirred up the already fragile racial and class tension among blacks and whites. This exploratory research examines how the Chicago Defender and the Minneapolis Star Tribune web sites framed their local news coverage of Katrina, as well as how the news frames were reflected on the publications' online discussion boards.

The Chicago Defender’s staff coverage of Katrina had a “minority” perspective and framed hurricane victims as one of their “family members,” whereas the Star Tribune staff stories framed victims more like “others.” Slowness of the government and class and race issues received the most attention in the Defender; the Star Tribune only had two local articles criticizing the government and none devoted specifically to race and class issues. The Minneapolis paper highlighted the economic impact more than anger or criticism.

The discourse in the Defender discussion board reflected issues covered in the news stories, focusing mainly on criticism of government leaders and anger related to inequality of race and class. But it is difficult to determine whether news frames in the Star Tribune were reflected in its discussion boards. Although criticism of the government was not one of the local news frames, Star Tribune discussion board users extensively criticized government leaders for their slowness and incompetence. But they did not talk about race and class issues, suggesting that some issues ignored in the paper's local news coverage were also ignored in the discourse.