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Narrative journalism is one of the most successful genres in the American press, as seen in the media coverage of immigration. Based on in-depth reports emphasizing the human dimension of this issue, it goes beyond the limitations of the dominant genres such as political journalism, to highlight social worlds that are traditionally invisible. The paper shows, however, that this journalistic genre hardly accounts for the complexity of the structural issues of migration (such as its social causes).A multi-genre approach commonly found in the French press—such the “événement” format launched in Liberation in 1981, may go beyond these limits. In order to cover major news events, this format mixes reports, portraits but also interviews, analysis, and editorials. This journalistic format can be described as a “debate format” as it confronts different points of view in the same pages. While American immigration coverage has increasingly focused on the dramatic humanitarian and public order contexts, French coverage continues to give ample space to the complex conceptual aspects of immigration, such as its links to the global economy.