RSF Reporters wo Borders

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Global Press Freedom Hits Record Low, U.S. Drops to 64th in the World: Reporters Without Borders}:

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Support our work: https://democracynow.org/donate/sm-de...Reporters Without Borders warns press freedom has fallen to its lowest level since the group began publishing its annual World Press Freedom Index in 2002. The index has charted how press freedoms have deteriorated in the United States and elsewhere over the past 25 years.

The U.S. was ranked 17th in the world in 2002. In the latest index, the U.S. is down to 64th, falling seven places since last year. "It's tempting to lay all of this at the feet of President Donald Trump, and to be clear, he is the single biggest threat to American press freedom today," says Clayton Weimers, the North America director for Reporters Without Borders. "But the mere fact that we fell from 57th last year tells us that this isn't just a Trump problem. We have structural deficiencies that are imperiling the future of press freedom in this country.

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Whistleblowers and leakers, many constitutional scholars argue, play an important role in safeguarding democracy. When conservative Miles Taylor was serving as chief of staff to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) in 2018, he wrote an anonymous op-ed for The New York Times that was famously headlined "I Am Part of the Resistance Inside the Trump Administration."

Now, President Donald Trump is calling for the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi to investigate Taylor for potentially "treasonous" conduct. And his defenders are arguing that the ex-DHS official turned Never Trumper did the U.S. a huge favor by anonymously drawing attention to his national security concerns.

Trump and Bondi are also taking aim at journalists and media organizations that use whistleblowers and leakers in their reporting.

In an article published by Salon on May 12, journalist/historian James Thornton Harris explains why he finds this so disturbing.

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Bondi, Harris warns, is making a forceful, if underreported, "effort to suppress reporting by seeking to collect the phone records of reporters and trying to force their testimony in court, all in pursuit of government 'leakers.'"

:{:{"Attorney General Pam Bondi announced (a) new policy which replaces a Biden Administration rule restricting federal agencies from intimidating reporters in this manner,}:

" Harris explains. "In 2021, Biden's Department of Justice revealed that in 2017, the Trump Administration had secretly obtained the phone records of reporters from both the New York Times and Washington Post. It also tried unsuccessfully to obtain the reporters' e-mails. The (DOJ) said no legal action was taken against the reporters."}:

Harris adds, "Trump appears eager to pick up where he left off in his first term. Reporters Without Borders described Trump's current campaign as an attack on 'the credibility, independence, and sustainability of the news media.' Despite this disturbing all-out war on the press, which goes directly against First Amendment protections of freedom of speech, most Americans do not seem to care…. A recent poll by the Pew Research Center found that just 36 percent of Americans reported hearing 'a lot' about the Trump Administration's relationship with the news media."

Harris notes that according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, Trump's attack on freedom of the press is "happening rapidly, and, apparently, many Americans don't know, haven’t heard, or are choosing to look away."

"Free speech advocates are particularly concerned about Bondi's new policy," the journalist/historian warns. "Her directive states the new measures are needed to protect 'classified, privileged and other sensitive information.' By including the vague term 'sensitive information,' the new policy potentially covers a wide range of government information; it goes far beyond the federal criminal code, which focuses on protecting classified information…. Democratic President, John F. Kennedy, a former journalist, spoke out for press freedom and warned that 'without debate, without criticism, no administration and no country can succeed — and no republic can survive.'"

*James Thornton Harris' full article for Salon is available at this link.

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U.S. President Donald **Trump on Thursday signed an executive order calling for an end to taxpayer funding for NPR and PBS, an escalation of his assault on the media that could shutter hundreds of local stations across the country.

The president's order, which he signed behind closed doors, echoes a section of Project 2025, a far-right agenda that called for stripping public funding from NPR, PBS, and other broadcasters on the grounds that they "do not even bother to run programming that would attract conservatives."

Trump's order instructs the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB)—a private nonprofit corporation created and funded by Congress—to "cease direct funding to NPR and PBS, consistent with my administration's policy to ensure that federal funding does not support biased and partisan news coverage."

The executive order, which is expected to face legal challenges, also directs all federal agencies to "identify and terminate, to the maximum extent consistent with applicable law, any direct or indirect funding of NPR and PBS."

Trump's move was expected, and it came in the wake of reports that the administration intends to ask Congress to rescind previously approved funding for CPB, which is already engaged in a court fight with the president over his attempt to fire several of the organization's board members. The Associated Pressreported Thursday that the rescission request "has not yet been sent to Capitol Hill."

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According to the organizations' estimates, federal funding accounts for roughly 1% of NPR's annual budget and 15% of PBS's yearly revenue.

In a letter to congressional leaders earlier this week, a coalition of civil society groups led by Reporters Without Borders (RSF) warned that, if enacted, Trump's proposed funding cuts for public broadcasting "will result in the shutdown of dozens, if not hundreds, of local, independent radio and television stations serving Americans in every corner of the country."

"As it stands, public media journalists are often the only reporters attending a school board meeting, or a local zoning hearing, or at the scene of a crime," the groups wrote. "They are the journalists most likely to hold local public officials accountable and expose

corruption. Faraway digital media outlets will not replicate this coverage, and the American public will lose out."

Trump's attack on public broadcasters is part of his administration's broader effort to undermine journalism in the United States and around the world.

RSF said in a report published Friday that Trump's "early moves in his second mandate to politicize the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), ban The Associated Press from the White House, or dismantle the U.S. Agency for Global Media, for example, have jeopardized the country's news outlets and indicate that he intends to follow through on his threats, setting up a potential crisis for American journalism."

"After a century of gradual expansion of press rights in the United States," the group said, "the country is experiencing its first significant and prolonged decline in press freedom in modern history, and Donald Trump's return to the presidency is greatly exacerbating the situation."

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