New York Times publisher: We’re facing 'the most frontal attack on the American press in a century'
“A vastly smaller, financially weakened and technologically disintermediated profession now finds itself facing the most direct challenge to its rights and legitimacy, as well,” New York Times publisher A.G. Sulzberger said in a talk at the University of Notre Dame Tuesday that the Times also ran in its Opinion section.
The Trump administration’s anti-press campaign, Sulzberger says, “threatens the special formula that has made the American model so successful for nearly 250 years.” He divides the campaign into “five self-reinforcing parts” and says each is “already being wielded against journalists in this country”:
- “Sowing distrust in and encouraging the harassment of independent journalists and news organizations”
- “Exploiting the civil courts to punish independent reporters and news outlets”
- “Abusing legal and regulatory authority to punish the parts of the press that exercise independence”
- “Amplifying the government’s attacks on the press by encouraging wealthy or powerful allies to join in”
- “[R]eplacing. It is not enough just to dismantle the independent press. It’s better still to replace it with government-friendly media controlled by supporters.”
Sulzberger describes the Trump administration’s pressure on the Times as “fairly predictable” so far: “Names called. Access restricted. Government subscriptions. Lawsuits threatened. Leak investigations opened.” But what troubles him most, he writes, is acquiescence from other leaders in both the private and public sectors:
Large companies, nonprofits and foundations long supportive of journalism now tell us they fear retaliation if they openly support news organizations. Leaders and academics who have long fiercely defended the rule of law now pull opinion pieces, lest their arguments attract the administration’s attention. The reaction has been dispiriting enough that we felt compelled to call our outside law firms to make sure they remained committed to defending our constitutional rights.
You can read the full piece here.
Related Knowledge Center: The White House vs. the press
Whether it’s the Des Moines Register’s publication of an unfavorable election poll, a routine edit of a 60 Minutes interview with Kamala Harris, or the Associated Press’s decision in its authoritative stylebook to continue to use “Gulf of Mexico,” Donald Trump and the White House have used executive authority and legal reprisals in an effort to punish and suppress press coverage that runs contrary to the administration’s preferred narratives.
Democracy and politics | Signalgate | The CBS submission | Voiceless America
Related Knowledge Center: Free speech and public protest
The First Amendment is facing challenging times: Crackdowns on campus protests prompted both-sides claims of intolerance. Attempts to head off dangerous health misinformation have been characterized as violations of free speech. Donald Trump is publicly punishing news outlets that deviate from his administration’s version of events while privately suing some outlets into submission.
The White House vs. the press | Voiceless America