Press Freedom Is on the Ballot

A vote for Trump is an endorsement of his continued crackdown on the media.

Fearless reporting, a behind-the-curtains look at how journalism is made — and an unabashed point of view. Welcome to Chills.

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Donald Trump and his people have actively worked to undermine the press for many years now while building up outlets that resemble state-controlled media. (Photo by ED JONES/AFP via Getty Images)

My five years working at the Committee to Protect Journalists taught me a lot about press freedom around the world, and what happens to a society that has this fundamental right oppressed. It’s a nightmarish picture, perhaps one not many Americans fully understand. It’s a complicated and dangerous venture to turn a country’s media into a purely state-controlled one, to mute the gadflies.

There are countries with outright bullies in leadership, like Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, who has murdered and imprisoned journalists who air truths he doesn’t like. Then there are what I think of as the legal manipulators, countries that criminalize journalism and use laws to silence reporters — such as Thailand, which has what is known as a “lèse-majesté” law, which makes it an offense to “defame, insult or threaten members of the royal family.” This one law is used so aggressively that just recently, a photographer and news reporter were arrested for simply covering anti-lèse-majesté graffiti at the king’s palace in Bangkok.

These are just two of countless examples of such oppression. Undermining press freedom can be done outright or sneakily. It’s the latter that really scares me.

A.G. Sulzberger, the publisher of The New York Times has laid out in an op-ed in The Washington Post today the playbook of “those trying to undercut independent journalism in democracies, the attacks typically exploit banal — and often nominally legal — weaknesses in a nation’s systems of governance.” He explains that there are generally five steps employed by leaders who want to undercut press freedom, one of which is using “the levers of power not just to punish independent journalists but also to reward those who demonstrate fealty to their leadership.”

Sound familiar?

Donald Trump and his people have actively worked to undermine the press for many years now while building up outlets that resemble state-controlled media. There is no reason to think he won’t continue working his way through the steps toward an even harsher crackdown on press freedom if reelected. In fact, he and his advisors have literally said they plan to do as much. A former senior Trump aide said last year that if the former president is voted into office again, his administration will retaliate against people in the media “criminally or civilly.”

Sulzberger explains how this works in a democracy like Hungary’s, where Prime Minister Viktor Orban “effectively dismantled the news media in his country”: 

His country is a democracy, so he can’t simply close newspapers or imprison journalists. Instead, he sets about undermining independent news organizations in subtler ways — using bureaucratic tools such as tax law, broadcast licensing and government contracting. Meanwhile, he rewards news outlets that toe the party line — shoring them up with state advertising revenue, tax exemptions and other government subsidies — and helps friendly businesspeople buy up other weakened news outlets at cut rates to turn them into government mouthpieces.

Trump has certainly set the media’s teeth grinding for many years now, but he has also incited violent rhetoric — and sometimes outright violence — among his supporters against the press. And while it’s important to understand the tactics authoritarian leaders use to control the media, it’s also important to recognize that, fortunately, we are not there yet in the United States. But we need to ensure it stays this way, no matter who takes the helm in the next election.

Just like women’s rights, the right to education or any other kind of human right, freedom of the press must be considered a critical and fundamental issue on the ballot this coming November.

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