Freedom of the Press

Dear Friend of Press Freedom,

After over 100 days in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody, Mario Guevara was deported today. Read on for more about this and other press freedom abuses, and take a minute to tell your lawmakers to stand up for journalists victimized by ICE.

ICE is on a violent rampage against the press

Federal immigration officers reportedly promised a “shitshow” last weekend in response to criticism from the mayor of Broadview, Illinois, who didn’t appreciate her city being invaded. They delivered, and journalists were well represented among their victims.

One journalist, Steve Held, was arrested. Others, including Held’s reporting partner at Unraveled Press, Raven Geary, were shot in the face with pepper ball rounds. According to lawyers on the scene, the protests the reporters were covering were peaceful and uneventful until ICE officers decided to unleash chaos.

A few days later at an immigration court in New York City, where ICE agents have been trying to intimidate journalists for months, agents assaulted at least three journalists, one of whom couldn’t get up and had to be hospitalized. You can read what we told Chicago’s The Triibe about the Broadview attacks and New York’s amNY about the New York ones.

More importantly, you can tell your lawmakers to speak out against ICE’s abuses using our new, easy-to-use action center. Take action here.

Journalist Mario Guevara deported to El Salvador

After months of hard-fought battles in both the court of law and the court of public opinion, the Trump administration deported journalist Mario Guevara today. This case wasn’t about immigration paperwork — Guevara had a work permit, and the administration argued in court that Guevara’s reporting on protests posed a national security risk.

“The only thing that journalists like Guevara threaten is the government’s chokehold on information it doesn’t want the public to know. That’s why he’s being deported and why federal agents are assaulting and arresting journalists around the country,” FPF’s Seth Stern said after Guevara’s family announced his deportation.

Read the statement here.

Guilty of journalism in Kentucky

Student journalist Lucas Griffith was convicted of one count of failure to disperse and fined $50 plus court costs after a jury trial on Thursday.

That’s unconstitutional — even the U.S. Department of Justice recognizes journalists’ right to cover how law enforcement disperses protesters.

But it also shows what a giant waste of taxpayer funds it is to prosecute journalists for doing their jobs. Before the trial, we led a coalition letter from press freedom advocates and journalism professors objecting to the charges. Read it here.

FPF and 404 Media sue DHS

FPF and 404 Media filed a lawsuit against multiple parts of the U.S. government, including the Department of Homeland Security, demanding they hand over a copy of an agreement that shares the personal data of nearly 80 million Medicaid patients with ICE.

It’s just one of several recent lawsuits we’ve filed under the Freedom of Information Act. We also surpassed 200 FOIAs filed in 2025 this week. Subscribe to The Classifieds newsletter for more on our FOIA work.

Read more from 404 Media.

FCC censorship moves from prime time to prison

Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr has taken a lot of heat for his “mafioso”-style extortion of ABC over Jimmy Kimmel’s show. But his latest censorship effort is even more dangerous. It could strip those inside America’s most secretive institutions — its prisons — of a tool that has proved extremely effective in exposing abuses.

We partnered with The Intercept to publish incarcerated journalist and FPF columnist Jeremy Busby’s response to the FCC’s efforts to allow prisons to “jam” cell phones. Busby used a contraband phone to expose and force reform of horrific conditions in Texas prisons during the pandemic. Read his article here.

Photography is not a hate crime

The arrest of Alexa Wilkinson on hate crime charges for photographing vandalism at The New York Times building has prompted hair splitting about whether they’re a journalist. It’s giving us flashbacks to the pointless obsession over whether Julian Assange was a journalist, and not whether his prosecution endangered press freedom.

Stern explains that regardless of how we categorize Wilkinson’s work, the charges set dangerous precedents that threaten the constitutional protections journalists depend on to do their jobs. Read more here.

What we’re reading

DC Circuit rejects Fox News reporter effort to duck subpoena over anonymous source (Courthouse News). “This decision does real damage to bedrock principles of press freedom, and we urge the Court of Appeals to re-hear this case with a full panel of judges,” FPF’s Trevor Timm said.

Can the US government ban apps that track ICE agents? (BBC). “That somebody might use the app to break the law doesn’t mean the app can be banned,” Stern told BBC. After the interview, news broke that the administration successfully pressured Apple to pull the app.

Reporter’s suit over access to Utah Capitol dismissed (U.S. Press Freedom Tracker). This dismissal is nonsense. FPF’s Caitlin Vogus explained why in the Salt Lake Tribune earlier this year.

Israel illegally boards humanitarian flotilla heading to Gaza (Dropsite). A U.S. journalist was on board. The U.S. Department of State should be all over this and it should be headline news. Neither is likely, because the government considers critics of Israel terrorists and the media often shuns reporters who oppose slaughtering their Palestinian colleagues.

FPF welcomes Adam Rose to bolster local advocacy

FPF is excited to welcome Adam Rose as the new deputy director of our advocacy team. Adam will primarily focus on protecting press freedom at the local level, where we have seen a sharp increase in arrests and assaults of journalists all around the country — many of which have not made national headlines.

Adam comes to FPF after serving as the chief operating officer of Starling Lab for Data Integrity and as the press rights chair of the Los Angeles Press Club, where he has been a tireless advocate for the press freedom rights of journalists in the LA area. He successfully lobbied for a California law that prohibits police from arresting or intentionally interfering with journalists as they cover protests. Most recently, as a plaintiff in multiple press freedom-related lawsuits, his efforts have resulted in landmark federal court orders against both the Department of Homeland Security and Los Angeles Police Department for violating the rights of the press. Read more here.

The arrest of Alexa Wilkinson on felony hate crime charges for photographing vandalism at the New York Times building has prompted hairsplitting about whether they’re a journalist. The New York Times explained that Wilkinson’s “lawyers described them as a journalist, but did not name any publications for which Mx. Wilkinson works.”

Wilkinson certainly has a track record as a journalist. Whether the content they were charged for is journalism or PR is, I suppose, up for debate. But should we even bother debating it? Regardless of how we categorize Wilkinson’s work, the charges set dangerous precedents that threaten the constitutional protections journalists depend on to do their jobs.

As we all learned — or should have learned — from the Julian Assange prosecution, obsessing over whether a particular defendant meets someone’s arbitrary definition of journalist is a waste of time. What that case left us with at the end of the day is a Trump administration armed with a bipartisan consensus that routine journalistic acts, like talking to sources, obtaining government secrets, and publishing them, can be prosecuted as a felony under the Espionage Act. Those who change their tune when the next defendant is someone they like better than Assange will be easily discredited by their hypocrisy.

The same dangers apply when Wilkinson’s photography is treated as a hate crime. Wilkinson’s case stems from a July protest in which activists doused the Times headquarters in red paint and spray-painted “NYT lies, Gaza dies” on its windows. In addition to charging the vandals, New York prosecutors charged Wilkinson, who photographed the scene, with aggravated harassment as a hate crime.

New York authorities should be combating these cynical attempts to use antisemitism to justify authoritarianism. Instead, they’re fueling the trend.

But there was no hate crime. Vandalizing a building to protest perceived pro-Israel bias in news coverage is a political statement, not an antisemitic one. The vandalism may well be illegal, and we condemn it, as news outlets large and small are under increased threat in this charged political environment. We even documented the vandalism itself in our U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.

But labeling actions that criticize a newspaper’s editorial decisions as a hate crime conflates political views with bigotry. Many journalists object to Israel’s slaughter of their peers in Gaza — and the U.S. media’s relative silence about it — for reasons having nothing to do with anyone’s religion. And many Jews themselves oppose Israel’s actions in Gaza and object to coverage they view as excusing or normalizing Israel’s conduct.

I’m one of those Jews, and I think what’s antisemitic is to assume that we monolithically share the politics of Benjamin Netanyahu and his ilk, who I consider the worst thing to happen to Judaism since the 1940s. As the saying goes, one day everyone will have been against this. When that time comes, efforts to conflate anti-Israel or anti-genocide views with antisemitism will leave Jews holding the bag for Israel’s reprehensible actions, America’s role in supporting them, and whatever blowback follows. That’s when the real antisemitism will start.

New York authorities should be combating these cynical attempts to use antisemitism to justify authoritarianism. Instead, they’re fueling the trend. Wilkinson’s case, in a blue state, legitimizes the Trump administration’s un-American actions, like its efforts to deport Mahmoud Khalil over his criticisms of Israel and Rümeysa Öztürk for co-writing an op-ed arguing for boycotts of Israeli products. The administration baselessly argues that their constitutionally protected speech constitutes support for Hamas and threatens national security. And several Republican attorneys general have floated the idea that reporting critical of Israel could be punished as support for terrorism. Wilkinson’s case only gives cover to those advancing these absurd arguments.

Israel showed us exactly where equating speech with violence leads. Last month, Israel killed 31 journalists in airstrikes on newspaper offices in Yemen — the deadliest single attack on the press in 16 years, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. Israel has justified the strikes by characterizing the targeted outlets as publishing “terrorist” propaganda.

Should we debate whether those massacred in Yemen (or Gaza) followed the Associated Press Stylebook or strictly adhered to journalistic codes of ethics? Or should we just acknowledge that militaries shouldn’t blow people to bits over what they say and write, regardless of whether it’s bad journalism or even propaganda?

Should we debate whether those massacred in Yemen (or Gaza)...adhered to journalistic codes of ethics? Or should we just acknowledge that militaries shouldn’t blow people to bits over what they write?

Even setting aside the hate crime charge, Wilkinson’s case has broader implications for the press that don’t hinge on whether they’re a card-carrying journalist. The complaint against Wilkinson reportedly emphasizes not just the photographs they took but also social media posts criticizing Times staff and alleged foreknowledge of the vandalism. This suggests prosecutors view Wilkinson as complicit in alleged crimes because of proximity or sympathy to those who committed them and awareness of their plans.

But objectivity is not a precondition for constitutional protection. It’s a relatively recently developed journalistic norm — with its share of critics — that would have been seen as ridiculous when the First Amendment was written.

As for embedding and foreknowledge, journalists routinely embed with groups whose members commit illegal acts. For example, the Israeli army, which, according to the United Nations, is committing genocide. Domestically, police reporters ride along with officers who may use excessive force. Investigative journalists cultivate sources involved in criminal activity. If foreknowledge of illegal acts or presence when they occur makes one legally complicit, journalism as we know it becomes impossible.

And for those concerned about journalistic ethics and objectivity, what impact do you think it’ll have if reporters are allowed to embed with government-approved lawbreakers, like soldiers and police, but not dissidents? Will that result in “fair and balanced” coverage?

Your opinion about Wilkinson’s work won’t change the trajectory of our democracy. But prosecutors in America’s biggest city validating the Trump administration’s criminalization of dissent very well might. Every journalist — and everyone who depends on journalism to hold power to account — should be alarmed.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Atlanta-area journalist Mario Guevara’s family announced today that he will be deported to El Salvador tomorrow, after spending more than 100 days in detention.

Guevara was initially arrested on June 14 while reporting on a “No Kings” protest near Atlanta. Although the charges against him were dropped, the government argued during deportation proceedings that his filming of law enforcement activities — a constitutionally protected activity — created a threat to public safety.

The following statement can be attributed to Seth Stern, director of advocacy of Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF):

“Mario Guevara was ripped from his family and community because the Trump administration punishes journalists to protect its own power.

“The only thing that journalists like Guevara threaten is the government’s chokehold on information it doesn’t want the public to know. That’s why he’s being deported and why federal agents are assaulting and arresting journalists around the country.

“The full impact on our freedom of speech may never be known. But what is certain is that Guevara’s deportation sends a chilling message to other journalists: Tell the truth, and the state will come for you.

“This is unconstitutional, un-American, and wrong. It’s an assault on the First Amendment, and it won’t stop until we all fight back by speaking out.”

Before today’s news, more than 100 writers, journalists, and scholars signed a letter calling for his immediate release. For more about Guevara’s case, visit https://freedomformario.com/.

Please contact us if you would like further comment.

It’s not every day a student newspaper takes on the federal government. But that’s exactly what The Stanford Daily is doing.

Backed by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, the Daily sued Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem in August over the Trump administration’s push to deport foreign students for exercising free speech, like writing op-eds and attending protests. The suit argues the administration’s actions violate the First Amendment by retaliating against foreign students for protected speech and chill press freedom by discouraging them from speaking to and writing for the Daily.

We spoke at the start of Stanford University’s fall term with Greta Reich, editor-in-chief of the Daily and president of Stanford Daily Publishing Corp., which operates the paper, about why the Daily is fighting back, even as many corporate media outlets stay silent or capitulate.

Why did The Stanford Daily decide to take this issue to court?

We decided to take this issue to court because we believe legal action would be best for the Daily. Our mission as an independent student paper is to represent the voices of the Stanford community. We cannot fulfill this mission to the fullest extent when a significant portion of students on our campus and in our newsroom are afraid to speak up. The decision ultimately came down to whether or not we felt we could handle the potential negative ramifications of a public suit against the government in order to stay true to our mission. We decided that we could, and we’re hoping for the best outcome.

What happens to your reporting when international students are afraid to talk to your reporters, or when staff quit or avoid covering certain stories because they’re worried about government retaliation?

As we said in our letter from the editors on the lawsuit, fear of government retaliation directly impacts the quality of the Daily’s work.

With every resignation, declined assignment, and refusal to speak on the record, we actively miss out on covering an entire group of students’ voices — as well as the many events and stories on campus that benefit from an international student’s perspective. We are simply not able to conduct our business when speech is chilled like this.

Journalism, and especially student journalism, depends on members of a community not only being able to speak on the record but actively wanting to, at least at times. When an entire subsection of the student population doesn’t feel comfortable speaking with or writing for the Daily, we can’t know what stories are being lost.

When an entire subsection of the student population doesn’t feel comfortable speaking with or writing for the Daily, we can’t know what stories are being lost.

How have people on campus responded to the lawsuit so far?

We only returned to campus this week, so I don’t think I’ve seen every reaction yet, but so far the biggest response has been curiosity. Many of my peers, both in and outside of the Daily, have questions about how the lawsuit is going.

In speaking more in depth with some students throughout the summer and hearing feedback on various social platforms, I know there is a somewhat mixed reaction, though I think it skews positive. Some students, understandably, are concerned about the attention the suit will draw to Stanford as a university. Others have expressed excitement about action being taken to protect First Amendment rights.

I hope that as the suit progresses, students, alumni, faculty, and community members will feel comfortable sharing any opinion with us — we want to hear what people have to say!

How does it feel to stand up for the First Amendment as student journalists when some in corporate media are utterly failing to do so?

It feels great! As student journalists, we definitely face a different set of obstacles and constraints than those in corporate media do. I think that, in a way, these different constraints give us the freedom to take actions like these (though it would be exciting to see more publications taking action too). I am incredibly grateful for all of the support I’ve received from professional journalists and mentors in corporate media, who have reached out with kind words for the Daily. It is not taken for granted one bit.

What outcome are you hoping for, both in terms of the law, but also inspiring student journalists or impacting the national conversation about press freedom?

In terms of the law, we are obviously hoping for the lawsuit to create a real change in how noncitizens are treated with respect to the First Amendment. Whether working for or speaking to our newspaper, no one should fear deportation for what they have to say. In any scenario, I hope those who hear about this lawsuit consider what it means to have a free press and why fear tactics like those the government is currently using have such an impact on it. A central tenet of my education at Stanford has been to form and express my thoughts and opinions with agility. The ability to state these thoughts and opinions publicly is not only being threatened but actively taken away.

And to other student journalists: I am constantly inspired by you and your work, and I hope you are getting through this year with support and engagement from your staff and readers.

When ABC suspended “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” last week following a shakedown from the Trump administration, celebrities, free speech advocates, and ordinary Americans voiced their outrage. They were right to sound the alarm — and it (mostly) worked. Kimmel’s back on the air.

But where is that same outrage against the government’s effort to deport Mario Guevara, an Atlanta-area journalist with a work visa who has lawfully resided in the U.S. for 20-plus years? His only “offense” is informing the public of protests against the government.

This week, a final removal order was issued against Guevara, who was arrested (with the baseless criminal charges since dropped) while livestreaming a July “No Kings” protest in Georgia. He might not have a late-night comedy show, but his right to report news is every bit as important as Kimmel’s right to tell jokes.

The stakes in Guevara’s case — both for him and for the country — are even higher than in the Kimmel fiasco that has dominated headlines. Guevara could be deported at any moment, likely to his birthplace, El Salvador, which he fled decades ago to escape political persecution.

Despite the extremely serious constitutional implications of Kimmel’s case, his worst-case scenario was moving from prime time to a podcast. There is no telling what fate might await Guevara if he’s thrown out of the country.

And if that happens, the chilling effect on journalists — particularly noncitizen ones, even those like Guevara with legal status — will be impossible to measure. After all, we only know what news we hear. We don’t know what news we don’t hear because journalists didn’t report it out of fear for their safety or freedom.

Kimmel‘s worst-case scenario was moving from prime time to a podcast. There is no telling what fate might await Guevara.

Kimmel’s professional peers — famous comedians and other celebrities — might feel relieved that Kimmel ultimately got his show back. But most journalists (or comedians, for that matter) aren’t famous and don’t have a Rolodex of Hollywood A-listers ready to come to their defense. Kimmel’s win offers them little comfort.

Independent journalists like Guevara also don’t have money for lawyers, lobbyists, or PR firms to make their case to judges, politicians, or the public (although fortunately, organizations like the ACLU, Free Press, the Committee to Protect Journalists, and others have stepped up).

Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr tried to manufacture plausible deniability in Kimmel’s case, arguing that it wasn’t his public ultimatum but pressure from local audiences that led ABC and its affiliates to pull Kimmel. That’s nonsense, but in Guevara’s case — much like the case against Rümeysa Öztürk, the Tufts University student facing removal for co-writing an op-ed critical of Israel — the government is hardly attempting to hide its agenda.

The federal government seeks to deport Guevara — despite his work visa and despite local prosecutors dropping their case against him for livestreaming in public — because, to them, his reporting makes him an “undesirable.” How did journalism, the only career protected by the Constitution, become a disfavored profession in America?

Guevara’s reporting often focused on immigration enforcement abuses. That earns him no friends in a government that considers U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to be secret police. From seeking to punish social media users who identify ICE agents to investigating radio stations that report on ICE raids to threatening whistleblowers who undermine the official narrative, the administration has made every effort to intimidate those who speak the truth about its immigration policy.

The secrecy is by no means limited to ICE — while Kimmel’s show was in limbo and Guevara wrote letters from his cramped jail cell, the Pentagon announced it would force reporters to pledge to only report authorized information.

What this administration cannot seem to comprehend is that the First Amendment exists for the sole purpose of protecting the right to publish information the government does not want published. There would be no need for a constitutional right to publish what the government wants. Everyone loves free speech when the speaker is on their side.

Guevara is exactly who the constitution was intended to protect — and his retaliatory deportation is exactly the kind of authoritarian censorship it was intended to prevent.

Kimmel will be all right with or without ABC, and with or without you. That doesn’t mean not to protest efforts to censor him — the FCC’s antics are unconstitutional, un-American, and fully deserving of contempt. Carr should be fired and disbarred, and the corporations that caved to him should be ashamed.

But free speech is not only for celebrities. The real battles for our rights are not fought in television studios and theme parks but at protests and in citizen journalists’ home newsrooms. And these days, in detention centers and immigration courts.

Dear Friend of Press Freedom,

It’s now been over 100 days since journalist Mario Guevara has been imprisoned for covering a protest, and Rümeysa Öztürk has faced deportation for nearly 200 days over an op-ed the government didn’t like. Read on for why cases like these deserve as much outrage as the Federal Communications Commission’s latest attempt at silencing free speech.

Journalist facing deportation deserves same energy as Kimmel

When ABC suspended Jimmy Kimmel Live! last week following a shakedown from the Trump administration, celebrities, free speech advocates, and ordinary Americans voiced their outrage. They were right to sound the alarm — and it (mostly) worked. Kimmel’s back on the air.

But where is that same outrage against the government’s effort to deport Mario Guevara, an Atlanta-area journalist who has lawfully resided in the U.S. for 20-plus years? His only “offense” is informing the public of protests against the government, but he faces imminent deportation.

Speaking of Kimmel, our advocacy director, Seth Stern, went on the “Legal AF” podcast on the MeidasTouch network to talk about our supplement to our July attorney disciplinary complaint against FCC Chair Brendan Carr. Read more about Guevara’s case here.

How noncitizen journalists can prepare for ICE

The immediate priority is getting Guevara’s case dropped, but we also don’t want there to be any more baseless deportation cases against journalists. Many newsrooms — not to mention freelancers — have little experience dealing with immigration authorities, though. Luckily, we know people who do.

We hosted a panel discussion featuring immigration lawyers, civil rights advocates, and journalists to talk about what to do when a journalist is detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement — and what must happen before that day ever comes. Read about it and watch it here.

Pentagon seeks to control the press

The Pentagon faced bipartisan backlash for its ridiculous policy requiring journalists to agree not to obtain or report “unauthorized” information. We called them out in The New York Times, CNN, The Intercept, and elsewhere. Stern also discussed the disturbing move on NPR’s Los Angeles affiliate, KCRW, and FPF’s Lauren Harper discussed this and other threats to press freedom on NPR’s 1A.

First, President Donald Trump tried to downplay the policy. Now, in a letter responding to an inquiry from the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, officials are trying to walk it back. Unfortunately, the response offers little reassurance that the Pentagon’s intentions are anything but censorial, and doubles down on restricting routine constitutionally protected newsgathering. Read more here.

Drop charges against Cincinnati journalists

Jury trials of journalists arrested while reporting news are exceedingly rare in the United States, but the next two are coming next week unless prosecutors come to their senses.

Journalists Madeline Fening and Lucas Griffith, both of whom were arrested while covering a protest on July 17 for Cincinnati-based CityBeat, are set to be tried Sept. 30 and Oct. 2, respectively. In an unfortunate irony, the protest was in opposition to the recently dropped immigration case against Ayman Soliman, who himself fled Egypt to escape persecution for his journalism. We led a letter to prosecutors from rights organizations and local journalism professors urging them to drop the baseless charges. Read more here.

Proposed ‘safety’ bill would undermine accountability for lawmakers

FPF’s Caitlin Vogus writes for The Minnesota Star Tribune that a bill sponsored by Sens. Amy Klobuchar and Ted Cruz to protect lawmakers won’t fully stop data brokers from trafficking their personal information but will stop journalists and watchdogs from holding them accountable.

Use our action center tool to tell Congress to reject this bill.

Police records must stay public in California

A searchable public database known as the Police Records Access Project has made public for the first time more than 1.5 million pages of previously secret records about the use of force and misconduct by California police officers.

The California legislature, however, is trying to put police misconduct back under wraps. This month, it passed AB 1178, a new bill that would make it harder for the public to access these records. The bill is awaiting Gov. Gavin Newsom’s signature or veto. Read more here.

What we’re reading

Urgent ideas for defending press freedom in Gaza (Columbia Journalism School). Columbia followed up on last month’s important article in Columbia Journalism Review with a discussion about finding creative ways to help journalists in Gaza despite anti-press regimes both here and in Israel. FPF Executive Director Trevor Timm and board member and Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Azmat Khan were both on the panel.

Israel killed 31 journalists in Yemen strike, press freedom group says (The Washington Post). It’s not just Gaza. The Committee to Protect Journalists says the strike in Yemen was “the deadliest strike on journalists in the Middle East” it has documented to date.

Letter from ICE detention facility (The Bitter Southerner). Guevara recounts the harrowing details of his detention in an Atlanta federal prison. You can also read his son’s plea for his release.

Investors rejoice over looming TikTok deal despite political concerns (Al Jazeera). Days after Trump said frequent criticism of his administration should be illegal, he is finalizing plans to steer control of TikTok to his billionaire friends. “It would be naive to think they won’t censor Trump’s critics while boosting content that pleases him,” Stern said.

It’s 2025. Do you know how secure your newsroom is? (Neiman Lab). “What’s really important is that sources know where to reach you in a way that helps them stay secure,” FPF’s Davis Erin Anderson said.

Trump signs order labeling antifa ‘domestic terrorist organization’ (The Hill). Trump’s executive orders on domestic terrorism and threats to use racketeering laws against protest movements can and will be used to threaten journalists and sources. Journalists who cover “antifa” or report on ICE must now risk being accused of terrorism.

Judge strikes down Trump’s $15 billion suit against The New York Times (The Washington Post). We’re glad a judge tossed this ridiculous lawsuit, but the attorneys behind it should have been sanctioned.

The Pentagon faced bipartisan backlash for its ridiculous policy requiring journalists to agree not to obtain or report “unauthorized” information. Now, in a response to an inquiry from the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, officials are trying to walk it back.

They claim the rules were intended to restrict Pentagon staffers from giving unauthorized information to journalists, not to restrict journalists from printing “unsolicited” tips they’re given. We’re not buying it. We commend RCFP for getting the Pentagon to elaborate on the policy — but, despite lots of legalese and doublespeak, its clarifications are mostly meaningless.

As an initial matter, a policy solely aimed at government employees would not need to be distributed to or acknowledged by journalists. To the extent that the government is permitted to keep information secret, the Supreme Court says that’s the government’s responsibility — officials aren’t entitled to shift the burden to reporters to keep their secrets for them. Even crediting the Pentagon’s explanation, the memo was clearly intended to do exactly that. It sends a message to the press, and that message is “tread carefully.”

Nor can the government restrict the press to publishing unsolicited tips. News doesn’t fall from the sky into reporters’ laps. Reporters are entitled to ask questions, cultivate sources, and seek out news (otherwise known as reporting), as long as they don’t break the law in doing so. That’s the job description — they’re journalists, not stenographers.

Journalists should not agree to this ridiculous policy in exchange for … what, exactly? The honor of being lied to at news conferences?

The Pentagon’s position seems to draw from the Supreme Court case Bartnicki v. Vopper, which held that journalists can obtain information given to them by sources that obtained it illegally as long as the journalists didn’t themselves participate in the illegality. By soliciting information from sources, the Pentagon’s reasoning apparently goes, journalists participate in the sources’ violations of Pentagon policy.

But nothing in Bartnicki limits constitutional protection to unsolicited information — the only exception it acknowledges is when journalists participate in a source’s illegal acts (in that case, an unlawful wiretap). There is no analogous underlying illegality here.

The whole purpose of the First Amendment is so that the government can’t stop journalists from publishing what the government does not want published. We wouldn’t need a constitutional right to publish what the government authorizes to be released — the government would have no reason to try to prevent that.

That’s the fundamental point that seems entirely lost on this administration. The press exists to hold it accountable, not to keep its secrets or do its bidding.

The other point Pentagon officials are missing – as their response to RCFP makes clear — is that they’re not entitled to scream “national security” like magic words when they want the First Amendment to disappear. The response, disturbingly, reserves the right for the administration to unilaterally deem reporting a national security danger after the fact and punish reporters for it.

But as the Pentagon Papers case made extremely clear, that’s not how it works: “The word ‘security’ is a broad, vague generality whose contours should not be invoked to abrogate the fundamental law embodied in the First Amendment.” And that was a case involving a specific set of documents alleged to pose a danger — not a vague reservation of rights to declare hypothetical documents a threat.

Of course, an administration headed by a president who just called upholstered furniture a national security threat cannot be trusted to invoke national security responsibly. It has claimed the right to deport journalists, activists, and op-ed writers who disagree with, or merely report or comment on its policies. The president has said that when officials want a journalist to give up sources, they can just “tell the reporter, ‘National security’.”

The Trump administration considers anything that threatens to harm its reputation or expose its lies (or, apparently, makes office chairs more comfortable) a threat to national security. It considers the First Amendment and free press themselves threats to national security.

The Pentagon is essentially shifting its position from, “You can’t report anything we didn’t authorize you to report” to “You can’t report anything we didn’t authorize you to report unless we decide after the fact in our sole discretion that it’s OK.” That should not provide much comfort to journalists. They certainly should not agree to this ridiculous policy in exchange for … what, exactly? The honor of being lied to at news conferences?

A searchable public database known as the Police Records Access Project has made public for the first time more than 1.5 million pages of previously secret records about the use of force and misconduct by California police officers.

The California Reporting Project, a collaboration between news outlets, universities, and civil society organizations, began collecting and organizing the documents after the passage of SB 1421, a landmark law that made them public records. The law was expanded in 2021 to give the public even greater access.

Now, however, the California legislature is beginning to reverse course. This month, it passed AB 1178, a new bill that would make it harder for the public to access police misconduct records. The bill is awaiting Gov. Gavin Newsom’s signature or veto.

We spoke to journalist Lisa Pickoff-White, who is the director of research at the California Reporting Project, about what the CRP has accomplished so far and what AB 1178 could mean for transparency and accountability.

What are some of the most impactful stories journalists in the CRP have published using these records?

The project had impact from the beginning. A district attorney dropped charges against a woman who was wrongly arrested for allegedly misusing 911, after an investigation into one of the first cases released under SB 1421.

Reporters documented where departments failed to investigate police killings, found a homicide detective whose dishonesty upended criminal cases, and uncovered a pattern of excessive force at a state prison. We identified 22 people who died after officers held them face down, including two people who died after a state law banning the practice.

The governor is expected to sign a law barring agencies from using secret deals to conceal misconduct, prompted by an investigation exposing how 163 departments signed “clean-record agreements.”

What were some of the biggest challenges in collecting, reviewing, and standardizing these records and launching the database?

Obtaining records continues to be a major challenge. Just days before SB 1421 took effect, Inglewood destroyed records, for instance. In August, we sued San Joaquin County over the cost of autopsy reports related to deaths caused by law enforcement officers. We’ve made more than 3,500 record requests and maintain relationships with hundreds of agencies.

Once we have the records, assembling them is a challenge. There’s no standard police report, and we receive a great variety of files, from PDFs to surveillance video. We built tools to extract information, which researchers use to match files into a case. Then we reextract information from each case, some of which is published, and then also used to help us identify places where we need more records.

Now that the database is public, what should journalists know about using it? How has the public responded to the database since it launched?

So far, people have searched our archive more than 1 million times. We’ve heard from people who have lost loved ones to police violence that this database makes it easier to access records.

Expanding the search can help. Multiple agencies may have records about the same incident. If an officer shoots and kills someone, the police, the district attorney, and the medical examiner or coroner may hold records. A review board may have files. The state attorney general could investigate. Sometimes, agencies also investigate cases for each other; a local sheriff may investigate a shooting for a police department.

Officers can also appeal disciplinary charges. If you’re looking at a misconduct case, it might also be worth searching local administrative agencies or the state personnel board.

A new bill awaiting the signature or veto of Gov. Newsom, AB 1178, could lead to more redactions when officers claim their duties require anonymity. What would it mean for transparency and accountability if misconduct records become harder for the press and the public to obtain?

Without AB 1178, agencies can already redact the names of undercover officers. Our records show that agencies across the state continue to improperly redact the names of officers. Meanwhile, the bill’s authors have yet to cite any harm that’s come from releasing the names of officers involved in use-of-force and misconduct incidents.

Our reporting, and other investigations, revealed that agencies can and do hire officers who previously violated policies. These officers are more likely to receive complaints again. For instance, Derek Chauvin had 18 prior complaints in the Minneapolis Police Department, two of which led to discipline, before killing George Floyd.

What lessons can journalists and advocates in other states learn from CRP’s work?

There is a vast amount of work to do and collaboration is the key to doing it. More than 100 reporters have worked on the project for the last seven years, and we needed people with a wide range of expertise to make requests, build tools, and report.

That mix of skills allowed us to build tools to spot the gaps between what cases agencies disclose and incidents listed in other data sources about shootings and sustained complaints. We’ve gained thousands of cases through this kind of check. Having a group of people with request aptitude, coding ability, and domain knowledge allowed us to identify what we needed and the incremental steps to take to get it.

Atlanta-based journalist Mario Guevara has been detained for nearly 100 days and is facing imminent deportation from the United States. His crime? Doing his job.

Guevara was detained first by local police and then by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, in what experts say was retaliation for his reporting on immigration raids and subsequent protests.

Guevara’s case is a disturbing example of how ICE can target non-American journalists, with or without legal status. Recently, Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF) hosted a panel discussion featuring immigration lawyers, civil rights advocates, and journalists to talk about what to do when a journalist is detained by ICE — and what must happen before that day ever comes.

Here’s what we learned.

Why are journalists being detained?

Non-American journalists in the United States—especially those covering immigration or working in vulnerable roles like freelancers or independent journalists—are at serious risk as a result of the Trump administration’s anti-immigrant and anti-press policies.

President Donald Trump’s campaign to retaliate against journalists who contradict the government’s preferred narrative, plus his administration’s promise to ramp up deportations, has created a “perfect storm for those, like immigrant reporters, who are on the front lines,” said Nora Benavidez of Free Press.

“This administration has made it very clear that it considers the public and press documenting immigration enforcement to be a threat,” explained American Civil Liberties Union’s Scarlet Kim, who is part of Guevara’s legal team.

What can be done? Advanced preparation is key.

The experts we spoke to agreed: Newsrooms can’t wait until a journalist is detained to act. Here are key steps newsrooms and reporters can take before it happens.

1. Create an action plan before you need it.

Journalist and Investigative Reporters and Editors board member Alejandra Cancino has been working with fellow reporters to create a checklist to help newsrooms prepare for the potential detention of one of their reporters by ICE.

The checklist includes steps like gathering key information ahead of time, such as about medical needs, emergency contacts, and immigration attorney contacts (more on that below).

Cancino also encouraged newsrooms to talk with non-American reporters about their concerns and how to mitigate them. “We obviously don’t want any reporter to be taken away from their beat,” she explained, but creative risk-mitigation measures can work, such as having a journalist facing heightened risks report from the newsroom based on information being provided from others in the field.

2. Get local immigration counsel — now.

Journalists at risk need an experienced immigration lawyer in place before they’re detained, experts said.

Newsrooms should consider keeping local immigration counsel on retainer. “Getting a roster of vetted attorneys together is the first important step,” explained Marium Uddin, legal director of the Muslim Legal Fund of America and a former immigration judge.

News outlets should also consider having non-American journalists they work with sign a retainer agreement with an immigration attorney in advance, paid for by the newsroom, so that representation of the journalist could be immediate if they were detained, Uddin said.

To build their rosters of immigration attorneys, newsroom lawyers should seek referrals from those in their networks who may already have strong reputations and experience with the local immigration courts. They can also seek referrals by contacting organizations like the American Immigration Lawyers Association, the Immigration Advocates Network, and local legal aid offices.

Unfortunately, asylum cases can be expensive to litigate. In Texas, where Uddin is based, they can cost $10,000 to $20,000. While some immigration attorneys may offer free or low-cost services, newsrooms should budget for the cost of legal defense of non-American journalists detained by immigration authorities. Protecting journalists “is the cost of doing business,” said Cancino.

3. Act immediately to locate the detained journalist.

If a journalist is detained, one of the first steps will be to locate them, a process that can be made difficult by an opaque detention system and strategic shuffling of people around detention facilities.

Newsrooms should first determine if a detained journalist is in local custody, said Samantha Hamilton of the Atlanta Community Press Collective and Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Atlanta, since people who are arrested are often taken first to the county jail before being transferred to ICE.

If they have been transferred to ICE, Hamilton recommended searching for them with the online ICE detainee locator, using the person’s alien registration number and country of birth. If you don’t have that information, you can also search using their last name and country of origin. Hamilton recommended using all variations of the name, especially if the person has multiple names or uses a nickname.

Once a newsroom locates the journalist, it will want to figure out how to contact them. Each facility can have different communication rules, explained Uddin, which can often be found on the facility’s official website or ICE’s general detention center directory. Legal visits may require special steps, like completing a legal notice of representation.

4. Consider all the legal options.

In addition to challenging the journalist’s detention and deportation in immigration court, a legal petition known as habeas corpus may present another way to challenge the detention in court if a journalist is detained in retaliation for their reporting, said ACLU attorney Kim. A habeas petition asks a federal judge for an order that a person in custody be brought before the court to determine if their detention is valid.

A successful habeas petition can free someone from immigration detention. However, it cannot resolve their immigration status or stop deportation proceedings altogether. Those legal issues must be addressed separately in immigration court.

Habeas is especially important in cases where immigration detention is being used to punish people for their speech or journalism. The ACLU has brought habeas petitions in Guevara’s case and also to challenge the detention of students by immigration officials based on their political speech.

One of the biggest challenges in bringing a habeas petition is timing. Kim warned that strategic transfers of detainees between ICE facilities without warning can make legal action harder, because petitions must usually be filed in the jurisdiction where the detainee is being held. That’s why it’s so important to have legal counsel lined up and to file a habeas petition as soon as possible, ideally before any transfer occurs.

The bigger picture

A recent court ruling in California reminded the public that “a camera and a notepad are not threats to the public,” said Uddin. Unfortunately, however, government retaliation against non-American journalists remains a real threat.

So it’s not enough for newsrooms and journalists to prepare. People outside the media industry need to see how detentions of non-American journalists and other attacks on the press impact us all and speak up against them, explained Benavidez. “Because if it is one of those other people today,” she said, “it could be one of us tomorrow.”

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

The Washington Post reported today that officials plan to require Pentagon reporters to pledge not to gather or report any information that the government has not authorized for release, whether classified or unclassified. Violators risk having their press credentials revoked.

Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF) Director of Advocacy Seth Stern issued the following statement:

“The Supreme Court has made clear for decades that journalists are entitled to lawfully obtain and publish government secrets. That is essentially the job description of an investigative journalist. The law is also clear that the government can’t require people to contract away a constitutional right, like the right to obtain and publish secrets, in exchange for a benefit, like access to government buildings or press credentials.

“This policy operates as a prior restraint on publication, which is considered the most serious of First Amendment violations. As we learned in the Pentagon Papers case, the government cannot prohibit journalists from public information merely by claiming it’s a secret or even a national security threat. This is worse in a way, because the government isn’t only seeking to restrain specific documents it contends pose a unique threat, it’s seeking to restrain everything it doesn’t want the public to know. That is fundamentally un-American.

“In the meantime, journalists will need to decide whether they’re so dependent on physical access to the Pentagon that they’re willing to trade away their independence to retain it.

“I hope they won’t, and will find other ways to gather news. Agreeing not to look where the government doesn’t want you to look and, by extension, not to print what it doesn’t want you to print, is propaganda, not journalism. Caving to these kinds of demands would in some ways be the most outrageous capitulation yet, and there are plenty to choose from.

“Virtually every time this administration (and past ones) has tried to justify secrecy by claiming it’s protecting national security, its real agenda turned out to be saving itself from embarrassment or from having its lies exposed. There is no reason to think this is any different. Perhaps there are so many embarrassing documents at this point that it’s too difficult to keep finding bogus reasons to keep each of them secret. Maybe that’s why the administration is taking more of a wholesale approach to concealing records that may show wrongdoing, corruption, and incompetence.”

Please contact us if you would like further comment on the dangers this policy poses to press freedom in the United States.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Jury trials of journalists arrested while reporting news are exceedingly rare in the United States. The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, a project of Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF) that maintains data on press freedom violations nationwide, has documented only nine in its history.

The next two are scheduled to take place in Kenton County, Kentucky, in just a couple weeks. Journalists Madeline Fening and Lucas Griffith, both of whom were arrested while covering a protest on July 17 for Cincinnati-based CityBeat (Griffith is a student journalist at the University of Cincinnati who interned at CityBeat), are set to be tried Sept. 30 and Oct. 2, respectively. In an unfortunate irony, the protest was in opposition to the immigration detention of Ayman Soliman, who himself fled Egypt to escape persecution for his journalism.

A coalition of press freedom organizations and Cincinnati journalism professors sent a letter to the prosecutor, County Attorney Stacy Tapke, urging her office to drop the case. As the letter explains, when journalists are mistakenly arrested while covering protests, prosecutors usually decline to bring charges because they recognize that protests and their aftermath are newsworthy and journalists reporting on them are just doing their constitutionally protected jobs.

When prosecutors nonetheless push forward with these kinds of censorial charges, the cases often end in a dismissal and a civil settlement paid to the reporter, and those responsible are forced to explain why they wasted taxpayer funds trying to criminalize journalism.

Below are comments from representatives of several press freedom organizations that signed the letter, as well as from journalism professors at the University of Cincinnati (speaking in their individual capacities).

Comment from press freedom advocates

Seth Stern, director of advocacy at FPF, said, “With no end to civil unrest on the horizon, it’s more important now than ever that journalists are allowed to cover how police respond to protests. Officers engaged in misconduct have every incentive to disperse the press, which is precisely why the Department of Justice and courts have said that they can’t be allowed to do so. Even temporary detainments have a chilling effect, but putting journalists on trial for routine newsgathering is simply un-American. We hope prosecutors do the right thing without further delay.

Mickey Osterreicher, general counsel for the National Press Photographers Association (NPPA), said, “Despite the National Press Photographers Association having spent over a decade providing training to police regarding the First Amendment rights of journalists, it is disturbing that some officers and agencies have not learned to respect those rights. We sincerely hope that the county attorney will remedy this wrong by heeding our request to dismiss the remaining charges and not add insult to injury.”

Anne Marie Tamburro, press freedom strategist at the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ), said, “It is inexcusable that journalists in the United States are being put on trial for exercising their First Amendment rights. We urge Kenton County officials to drop all charges and ensure that journalists can do their jobs of keeping the public informed without unwarranted interference from law enforcement.”

Katherine Jacobsen, U.S., Canada, and Caribbean Program Coordinator at the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), said, “It is concerning to see that two journalists are facing jury trials in relation to their reporting activity. Journalism is not a crime, and reporters should not be punished for covering matters of public interest.”

Comment from journalism professors

Alfred J. Cotton III, director of undergraduate studies, associate professor-educator, journalism at the University of Cincinnati, said, “Lucas Griffith is one of the best student journalists on this campus. He’s a former student of mine, and I believe wholeheartedly in his integrity and dedication to pursuing the truth. I stand with the call to drop the charges against him and Madeline Fening.”

Victoria LaPoe, department head of the Department of Journalism at the University of Cincinnati, said, “While I cannot speak on behalf of the university, I can speak for myself and my personal views. As a former journalist — specifically a television producer who would get out of the newsroom and on the ground to cover trials, protests, and breaking news — I witnessed firsthand how quickly situations can turn chaotic. I believe what is truly at risk here are core constitutional freedoms. The precedent this could set is deeply troubling. Journalists serve as the eyes and ears of an event, allowing citizens to be informed and make their own decisions. I hope it is beyond question that, in this situation, a journalist — and a student intern — should not face such severe charges for simply attempting to serve their community.”

Jenny Wohlfarth, a professor-educator in the Department of Journalism at the University of Cincinnati, added, “Newsgathering is a protected right under the First Amendment. What’s at stake here is not just these two reporters’ fates, but also the fundamental constitutional rights of a free press that are protected for all of us under the First Amendment. In helping prepare the journalists of tomorrow, we educators must teach our students the value of a free press, why it’s so critically important in a democracy, and how they must uphold the highest ethical standards in covering news events, both near and far. Without journalists to cover events like this, the public loses access to credible and accurate information that members of a free press routinely provide to help the public stay informed.”

The charges against the journalists originally included felony rioting, but that charge was dropped in July. The remaining misdemeanor charges against Fening include disorderly conduct, obstructing an emergency responder, failure to disperse, unlawful assembly, and obstructing a highway or public passage. Griffith is charged with those offenses plus resisting arrest.

You can read the letter here or below. If you have questions or would like further comment, please reach out to FPF at media@freedom.press, NPPA at lawyer@nppa.org, SPJ at chendrie@hq.spj.org, or CPJ at press@cpj.org.

Federal attacks on free speech are rightfully getting most of the headlines, but Georgia’s unprecedented attempt to prosecute dozens of “Stop Cop City” protesters as members of a racketeering enterprise was as frivolous as the worst of the Trump administration’s antics.

This week’s dismissal of conspiracy charges against these opponents of the Atlanta police training facility is welcome news. But it’s alarming that these charges lingered over 61 people’s heads for two years. And their ordeal likely isn’t over.

Ridiculous indictment

Rather than filing charges aimed at individual alleged acts of arson, vandalism, or other actual crimes, prosecutors tried to rope together dozens of activists into one sprawling case under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. The indictment didn’t even attempt to connect the dots between most defendants’ constitutionally protected speech and a handful of defendants’ alleged bad acts.

Why would prosecutors want to do that instead of just charging the lawbreakers? Primarily, because the prosecution wasn’t intended to punish illegality but to kill a movement. Charging only those who broke actual laws wouldn’t achieve that aim, so they got to work making up new ones.

Secondarily, because they’re vindictive dirtbags. To prove it, they chose the date of George Floyd’s murder as the start date of their fabricated “conspiracy,” even though plans for Cop City hadn’t even been announced yet when Floyd was killed.

Prosecutors pointed to the defendants’ alleged anarchist political philosophy, their publications, their social media posts, their constitutionally protected recording of police, their use of encryption and VPNs to communicate securely, and even their holding news conferences and talking to reporters — all as “proof” that they were each part of a criminal enterprise.

The theory goes that, if one anarchist writes an essay about the environmental impact of Cop City and another anarchist sets a police car on fire, then both anarchists effectively struck the match together. Or something like that. It’s too incoherent to make any sense of.

Chilling effect on both journalists and sources

By the prosecution’s logic, journalists who covered the protests could be portrayed as helping to “advance” a RICO conspiracy simply by giving activists a platform. Write about the movement, and you (and your sources) might become part of the case file. This time, they only went after writers who participated in the Stop Cop City movement, but what about next time?

The harm extends beyond direct impact on reporters. Newsmakers and whistleblowers will surely be wary of talking to journalists if they know prosecutors view doing so — and particularly doing so securely via encrypted messaging — as an act in furtherance of a conspiracy.

This week’s win doesn’t undo the harm, either to free speech or to the defendants’ lives (many say they’ve been unable to find housing or jobs due to the long-pending case). The court’s forthcoming dismissal order seems likely to be limited to procedural grounds — prosecutors neglected to get required authorization from the governor to bring the charges. Deputy Attorney General John Fowler, the lead prosecutor on the case, said he’ll appeal.

Prosecutors must know they’re unlikely to ultimately secure a conviction, much less one that higher courts will uphold. Even if the appellate courts give them a path to get past this week’s procedural dismissal, they’ll still have to reckon with the Constitution and the fact that their legal and factual theories are as flimsy as they come.

But the longer they can stretch the case out, the longer uncertainty will linger about whether a law intended to counter organized crime can be distorted to stifle protest movements. And the more reluctant critics of Cop City will be to speak to journalists whose reporting might clarify the goals of their movement and contradict law enforcement narratives.

Plenty of experts have explained how RICO laws are rife with abuse, even when used for their intended purpose. The Cop City case makes clear that the need for reform isn’t just a criminal justice issue; it’s a free speech one as well.

Dear Friend of Press Freedom,

For 171 days, Rümeysa Öztürk has faced deportation by the United States government for writing an op-ed it didn’t like, and for 90 days, Mario Guevara has been imprisoned for covering a protest.

Our newsletters are taking a short break next week, but we’ll be back. Explore our archive for more press freedom stories.

Take action to stop attacks on journalists and transparency

People often ask how to support the causes we fight for other than donating. Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF) has a new action center to allow you to do just that by writing or calling members of Congress to tell them that the public cares about press freedom.

This week we launched the first two actions — one to tell lawmakers to stop the decimation of the Freedom of Information Act and the other to encourage them to do something (besides the same old empty expressions of concern) about the massacre of journalists in Gaza. We plan to expand the action center, including by taking on locally targeted initiatives. Please use this easy, new tool to help us make a difference — and still donate if you can, of course.

CBS’s real bias monitor is Donald Trump

CBS announced this week that it’s hiring Kenneth Weinstein — a career partisan — as its “bias ombudsman.” FPF Director of Advocacy Seth Stern wrote for The Guardian that while CBS has a constitutional right to monitor bias as it sees fit, it’s a different story when the government gets involved.

The creation of the ombudsman role was one of many capitulations CBS’s owners made to the Trump administration to persuade the Federal Communications Commission to approve the Paramount-Skydance merger. And based on comments from the administration, it fully intends to use its foothold inside CBS’s newsroom to bend its reporting to its liking. Read more here.

‘Cop City’ case’s threat to press freedom persists despite win

Federal attacks on free speech are rightfully getting most of the headlines, but Georgia’s unprecedented attempt to prosecute dozens of “Stop Cop City” protesters as members of a racketeering enterprise was as frivolous as the worst of the Trump administration’s antics.

This week’s dismissal of conspiracy charges against these opponents of the Atlanta police training facility is welcome news. But it’s alarming that these charges lingered over 61 people’s heads for two years. Their ordeal likely isn’t over, and neither is the chilling effect on journalism and whistleblowing that the case has caused. Read more here.

Will 9/11 records be declassified?

Next year marks the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, and “a substantial body of records” about the event remains classified.

In theory, these records should automatically be declassified when they turn 25 in 2026. But this won’t happen with the 9/11 records, just as it hasn’t happened with other historically significant records, like the John F. Kennedy assassination records, which the public had to wait over 60 years to read.

It doesn’t have to be this way. Read more in The Classifieds.

Judge isn’t buying excuses for attacks on LA reporters

A group of journalists and others won a preliminary injunction in federal court on Sept. 11, 2025, placing new restrictions on the Los Angeles Police Department’s violent tactics while policing protests. The day before, they won a similar order against the Department of Homeland Security.

U.S. District Judge Hernán Vera outlined the decades-long history of press freedom abuses at protests in LA and said that “the First Amendment demands better.” We couldn’t agree more. Read more from FPF’s U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.

What we’re reading

Investigative reporter told to stop contacting police in California city (U.S. Press Freedom Tracker). You’d think police would’ve learned to stop messing with journalist Ben Camacho after the City of Los Angeles had to cut him a check for wasting his time with a frivolous lawsuit for publishing public records that they gave him.

China didn’t want you to see this video of Xi and Putin. So Reuters deleted it (The Intercept). When news outlets don’t resist censorship, “journalism’s independence “sinks to the lowest common denominator whenever news of global importance breaks in a country governed by a repressive regime,” Stern told The Intercept.

A tipping point at CBS News (Columbia Journalism Review). An alarming account of corporate meddling in CBS News’ editorial decisions, under new and old ownership alike, to appease the Trump administration and avoid criticizing Israel. And with CBS’s ownership now looking to buy CNN’s parent company, it’s unlikely to stop.

Cindy Cohn is leaving EFF, but not the fight for digital rights (WIRED). A giant in the civil liberties field! We all owe a debt of gratitude to Cindy Cohn for her indelible leadership at the Electronic Frontier Foundation for so many years (and for being our legal counsel at FPF since our founding in 2012).

Kansas prisons reject newspaper subscriptions, blindsiding publishers and cutting off information (Kansas Reflector). We can’t wait to hear Kansas prison officials explain how newspaper subscriptions threaten incarcerated people’s safety.

Boos of Donald Trump heard on ABC’s broadcast of US Open. Good (USA Today). Shame on the U.S. Tennis Association for demanding broadcasters to censor crowd reactions to Trump’s attendance of the U.S. Open men’s tennis final in New York on Sunday.

We were pleasantly surprised when congressional Republicans introduced our farewell article to the former president, titled Biden’s press freedom legacy: Empty words and hypocrisy, into the record at a House Judiciary Committee hearing this week.

That’s great — it’s always nice to have our work recognized. But if Republican lawmakers agree with us that former President Joe Biden was bad on press freedom, someone should really tell them about this Donald Trump character who’s in office now. All the abuses we identified in the article Republicans cited have (as the article predicted) worsened under the new president, and he’s come up with plenty of new ones too.

We wrote a letter to let the committee know that if it’s serious about addressing the issues our article discussed, regardless of who is in the White House, we’re here to help. We’ll let you know if they reply (but don’t hold your breath). Read the letter here or below.

Dear Friend of Press Freedom,

For 164 days, Rümeysa Öztürk has faced deportation by the United States government for writing an op-ed it didn’t like, and for 83 days, Mario Guevara has been imprisoned for covering a protest. Read on for more, and click here to subscribe to our other newsletters.

Recording police is not ‘violence’

It was bad enough when government officials claimed that journalists are inciting violence by reporting. But now, they’re accusing reporters of actually committing violence.

The supposed violence by reporters? Recording videos. At least three times recently, a government official or lawyer has argued that simply recording law enforcement or Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers is a form of violence. Read more here.

Thanks for citing us, House Republicans. Now do something

Congressional Republicans introduced our farewell article to the former president, titled Biden’s press freedom legacy: Empty words and hypocrisy, into the record at a House Judiciary Committee hearing this week.

That’s great — it’s always nice to have our work recognized. But if these lawmakers agree with us that former President Joe Biden was bad on press freedom, someone should really tell them about this Donald Trump character who’s in office now. All the abuses we identified in the article Republicans cited have (as the article predicted) worsened under the new president, and he’s come up with plenty of new ones too.

We wrote a letter to let the committee know that if it’s serious about addressing the issues our article discussed, regardless of who is in office, we’re here to help. We’ll let you know if they reply (but don’t hold your breath). Read the letter here.

Will secret law prevail in drug boat massacre?

The Trump administration has not provided any legal justification for blowing up a boat carrying 11 alleged Venezuelan drug traffickers on the Caribbean Sea. We filed a Freedom of Information Act request to find out if lawyers at the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel were consulted before the slaughter and, if so, what they said.

If there is an OLC opinion about the targeting of the Venezuelan boat, the public and Congress should be able to debate it right now. Unfortunately, the government has long taken the position that OLC opinions should be secret, even though there should be no such thing as secret law in the United States. Read more here, and, if you want to learn more about government secrecy and what we’re doing to combat it, subscribe to The Classifieds.

Stop the judicial secrecy bill

An amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act would allow lawmakers to scrub information about themselves from the internet. The bill fails to achieve its stated purpose of keeping lawmakers safe — except from investigative journalism.

This week we helped lead a letter to senators from press freedom and civil liberties organizations objecting to the misguided legislation. Even if the NDAA amendment does not succeed, it’s likely that this bill will be back, and we’ll be ready to fight it. Read the letter here.

ICE revives contract for spyware

In 2023, Biden issued an executive order limiting government use of commercial spyware. Subsequently, the Biden administration issued a stop-work order on a $2 million contract between Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Paragon, a spyware vendor that makes products that have reportedly been used to spy on journalists.

It now appears ICE is reinstating this contract. Read more here and subscribe to our Digital Security Tips newsletter.

Trump’s anti-press rhetoric is “not bluster; it is not a personality trait. It is deliberate,” our U.S. Press Freedom Tracker’s Stephanie Sugars said. “It is very much at the cost of the strength of our social fabric and our shared reality.”

Great work by our friends at Reporters Without Borders organizing this response to Israel’s slaughter of journalists in Gaza. It’s unfortunate that more U.S. outlets did not participate. If the outlets you support were not among the few, ask them why.

We spoke to The Dissenter about the Illinois Supreme Court’s ridiculous ruling that the state’s law against strategic lawsuits against public participation doesn’t protect reporting, and the recently passed bill to repair the damage.

We talked to the Times about influencers replacing journalists at the White House. Yes, it’s awful that Trump won’t grant reporters the honor of getting lied to at press briefings. But the decimation of FOIA — a source of facts, not spin — is even more concerning.

Kristi Noem’s complaints underscore why news outlets can’t settle frivolous lawsuits. Now, the door is wide open for government officials to question every editing decision news outlets make, whether to shorten an interview for time or to not air lies and nonsense.

When rules restrict police body cameras from being used to provide transparency, the only use left for them is surveillance.

A good recap of why “originalist” attacks on the actual malice standard — which limits defamation claims by public figures — are so disingenuous.

It was bad enough when government officials claimed that journalists incite violence by reporting. But now, they’re accusing reporters of actually committing violence.

The supposed violence by reporters? Recording videos. At least three times recently, a government official or lawyer has argued that simply recording law enforcement or Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers is a form of violence.

In July, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem proclaimed during a news conference following ICE raids on California farms that videotaping ICE agents performing operations is “violence.” Noem lumped video recordings in with other forms of actual violence, like throwing rocks or Molotov cocktails at agents.

Then, in August, Justice Department lawyer Sean Skedzielewski argued, during a court hearing over the Los Angeles Police Department’s mistreatment of journalists covering protests, that videotaping law enforcement officers “can be used for violence.” He claimed recording is violent because it can reveal officers’ identities, leading to harassment, and can encourage more protesters to join the fray.

Also in August, the government applied similar logic as it fought against the release of Mario Guevara, the only journalist in U.S. custody after being arrested for newsgathering. Guevara, who is originally from El Salvador, was detained while covering a protest in Georgia and turned over to ICE for deportation. In a bond hearing before an immigration court in July, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, the government argued that Guevara’s recording and livestreaming of law enforcement “presents a safety threat.”

At the risk of stating the obvious, videotaping someone is not the equivalent of throwing a firebomb at them. Actually, recordings of law enforcement officers made by journalists and members of the public allow the public to see what the police are up to and hold officers accountable for abusing their authority or breaking the law.

That includes holding officers who are violating the First Amendment accountable in court. Adam Rose, chair of the press rights committee for the LA Press Club, said that Skedzielewski also denied in court that DHS officers had pointed weapons at journalists, despite video evidence submitted to the court of them doing exactly that.

Skedzielewski “wound up making our case for us,” Rose told us. “His own argument showed how the government can try to lie in court, and why filming in public is critical to ensure the truth comes out.”

Video recording police in public is also protected by the First Amendment, as both Rose and Mickey Osterreicher, the general counsel for the National Press Photographers Association, point out. “The claim that journalists and others video recording police are engaged in ‘acts of violence’ is not only absurd on its face but flies in the face of the law and common sense,” said Osterreicher.

That constitutional right applies even if officers would prefer not to be identified. The government often claims that officers must not be identified because they’re at risk of (real) violence or harassment. But the correct response to those threats is to prosecute and punish those who actually break the law by harassing or physically attacking police, not make up crimes to go after those who exercise their First Amendment right to record them.

The government claims at other times that officers should not be recorded because they’re undercover. The government has been known to abuse this argument, including by making bizarre claims that any officer who may, at some point, go undercover should be treated as undercover at all times. Plus, journalists have no way of knowing whether a particular agent participating in an immigration raid or officer policing a protest is undercover at the moment they’re recording. The responsibility of preserving officers’ cover is on the officer and the government, not journalists and the public who can observe them working in plain view.

These justifications, however, are mere pretext for the government’s true purpose. Officials want courts and the public to believe that recording agents and officers is a violent act because it justifies officers’ own violent response to the press.

In LA, government attorney Skedzielewski didn’t just argue that video recording is violent. He said that meant that justified officers in using force against people videotaping them. This claim—made in a court that’s already restrained police from attacking journalists after they were documented violently assaulting and detaining reporters repeatedly —should seriously alarm journalists and anyone who wants to record police.

“For an officer of the court to conflate the use of recordings to reveal police officers’ identities with the actual making of those recordings, in order to justify the use of excessive force against those doing the recording, shows complete ignorance of the law, disregard for the Constitution, a blatant attempt to demonize those who would dare risk their health and safety to provide visual proof of police behavior, or all three,” said Osterreicher.

That demonization is working, unfortunately, especially when it comes to ICE officers’ beliefs about how they can respond to being recorded. In recent months, ICE officers have knocked phones out of the hands of those recording them, pulled weapons on people photographing or videotaping them, and even arrested U.S. citizens for filming them.

The escalating attacks on journalists and citizens who are recording police show the danger of the government’s rhetoric. All who care about press freedom and transparency must push back on claims equating filming to violence.

When officials say at news conferences that video recording is violent, journalists should challenge that assertion and cite the law.

When attorneys argue that recording police justifies violence or arrest, they should have their arguments confronted by opposing counsel and the judge, who has the power to sanction lawyers who ignore First Amendment jurisprudence to make frivolous arguments on behalf of the government.

And when ICE officers harass or detain someone for videotaping them, everyone else should take out their phones and hit the record button.

Recording the police isn’t violence. Don’t let officials get away with loud, incorrect claims to the contrary to diminish our First Amendment rights.

A couple of years ago, a judge in Arizona issued a restraining order against journalist Camryn Sanchez at the behest of a state senator, Wendy Rogers. The ordeal was alarming, but press freedom advocates were able to breathe a sigh of relief when the order was struck down by another judge a few weeks later. That Rogers is, well, out of her mind, made it easier to hope that the whole thing was an isolated incident.

Unfortunately, that doesn’t appear to be the case. A Maryland journalist, Will Fries, was recently served with a “peace order” that would’ve barred him from city hall in Salisbury. The order, requested by the city’s communications director (allegedly in coordination with higher-ups), followed Fries’ reporting on the city’s purported policy requiring media inquiries to be routed through its communications office — which officials cited to restrict Fries from asking questions during a committee meeting.

Fortunately, a judge ultimately declined to issue the order. But after the Arizona restraining order and plenty of other instances of local officials claiming bizarre grounds to punish routine newsgathering, it would be a mistake to dismiss Fries’ case as a one-off.

We talked to Fries about the experience via email. Our conversation is below.

Tell us briefly about your background and the kind of reporting you do for The Watershed Observer.

For over a decade, I’ve worked to counter disinformation and malign influence across communities. I’ve done investigative work for nonprofits and tech companies, served on major presidential campaigns, and overseen digital strategy for former Portland (Oregon) Mayor Ted Wheeler (where things got interesting). Most recently, I launched The Watershed Observer to provide communities with faithful reporting at the intersection of local and global issues.

We want to talk about the “peace order,” or restraining order, that a government employee sought against you in Salisbury, but it looks like there’s a bit of press freedom “Inception” going on — that ordeal arose from your reporting on another press freedom issue. What happened on August 6 in Salisbury, Maryland?

Salisbury’s Mayor’s Office claimed the Human Rights Advisory Committee advised him to remove a rainbow crosswalk. In reality, the committee had voted against that and gone on public record disputing the mayor’s communications. I received reports, tips, and outreach, and I reviewed the committee’s approved May meeting minutes.

As a courtesy, I let the committee know ahead of time that I planned to take part in the open, public forum section of their August 6 meeting. After being recognized, when I raised questions about the mayor’s false statement, the mayor’s liaison blocked both me and the committee from discussion, falsely claiming a city policy barred journalists from participating. No such policy exists. Later, the mayor’s comms director sent an email exclusively targeting the Human Rights Committee and their ability to speak with the press and public about their public work, the same group that had raised concerns about the mayor’s misinformation.

The kind of policy that the mayoral staffer cited, that city employees are required to route all media inquiries to a communications office, has been referred to as “censorship by PIO,” or public information officer, because of how it limits the information obtainable by journalists. They’ve repeatedly been held unconstitutional. Putting aside that the commission members weren’t actually city employees subject to the policy — and that even if a city policy could restrict employees from answering certain questions, it certainly can’t block reporters from asking them — how have you observed these policies impacting the press?

The city’s actions had a tangible chilling effect. After the comms director’s email, some committee members hesitated to go on record, while others only spoke confidentially. In practice, this limited the committee’s ability to speak publicly about human rights issues or potential concerns regarding the mayor and his staff.

“If someone is a nongovernment actor who produces media to be consumed by the public, they are press. The idea of official versus unofficial press is a ridiculous invention.”

I say actions, not policy, because there is no legitimate city policy banning journalists from participating in public meetings, and such a rule would serve no legitimate purpose. The false claim and creation of policy was fabricated in the moment to intimidate and coerce members of the public body, and me, in order to suppress participation in further discussing the mayor’s office’s gross misrepresentation of the committee’s public work. Its only purpose was to block accountability and prevent scrutiny.

I noticed in some correspondence, the comms director seems to refer to you as someone who claims to be a member of the media, and distinguishes between what she sees as official and unofficial press. As an independent journalist, how do you think city officials should determine who is or isn’t really the press? Or should they at all?

If someone is a nongovernment actor who produces media to be consumed by the public, they are press. The idea of “official” versus “unofficial” press is a ridiculous invention, completely at odds with constitutional protections and civic norms. The city of Salisbury has no legitimate policy distinguishing “real” from “not real” press, nor could it. That notion exists only to imply the city can ignore questions or accountability from anyone they don’t consider “official press.” They can’t. In Maryland, our Declaration of Rights explicitly extends the freedom of the press to “every citizen,” and many states have similar protections.

Talk about the follow-up reporting you did, or tried to do, after the August 6 meeting.

After the August 6 meeting, I did what any responsible journalist would do: I followed up. I gave the city employee a chance to clarify. I reached out to the mayor’s comms director for confirmation and comment. I also shared my reporting with the committee, inviting them to add their perspectives. Instead of engaging, the comms director issued an email exclusively to the Human Rights Advisory Committee, discouraging members from speaking to the press or the public. They spread falsehoods about me and my reporting in retaliation, rather than investigate the reality themselves or address the underlying facts of the mayor’s misinformation about the Human Rights Committee and mayor’s staff improperly interfering at the August 6 meeting. I also filed public records requests to learn more about the city’s processes and policies.

Then you got the peace order from the mayor’s comms director. Which allegations in the peace order application do you contend were factually false, and did the city ever present any evidence that those allegations were, in fact, true?

The comms director falsely claimed I was behind a nonthreatening and fact-forward whistleblower email that raised serious ethical concerns about her conduct, and petitioned that this, combined with my public records requests, somehow were grounds for a peace order. Those allegations were unfounded, baseless, and unsupported by any evidence. The petition functioned solely as retaliation against protected activities and now fits into an observable pattern of the city disregarding realities.

I’ve had a long investigatory career, and I am aware of other instances where peace orders have been misused as tools to discredit reporters and witnesses, or to intimidate people participating in serious investigations. At the same time, it’s important for everyone to recognize that lawful peace orders serve an important and serious purpose: They protect individuals from genuine threats and ensure safety in difficult circumstances. I believe that misuse and abuse of peace orders is rare.

So stripping away the allegations you dispute, what’s left is essentially that you sought comment for stories from the comms director, filed public records requests, and voiced your displeasure with how officials had characterized your reporting. That all sounds like routine journalistic conduct (especially when city policy doesn’t allow you to talk to anyone else besides the comms director) and a pretty open-and-shut case. Was it easy to get this thrown out?

Once all false statements and disprovable allegations are removed, what remains is professional conduct and routine journalism: seeking comment, filing records requests, and following up on city actions, activities documented by journalists every day. It’s concerning that it went as far as a court proceeding, but the judge ultimately ruled there was no basis for the petition.

Do you think higher-ups at the city had anything to do with the effort to obtain a peace order against you, which, incidentally, would have restricted you from entering city headquarters?

During sworn testimony, the mayor’s comms director acknowledged she pursued the peace order with encouragement and guidance from the city solicitor’s office and the Police Department. If that testimony were false, it would amount to perjury. In addition, I have received reports from trusted sources that an elected official may have personally participated. All of this indicates the effort wasn’t an isolated action by one employee, but part of a broader institutional attempt to retaliate against a reporter and restrict reporting access.

The U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, a project of Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF), only has one case documented in which a judge knowingly entered a restraining order against a journalist (the Tracker is not documenting your case because the court declined to issue the order). That case involved a state senator in Arizona who objected to a reporter knocking on her door, and the order was later overturned. But there have been plenty of cases involving reporters being arrested, ticketed, investigated, sued, raided, or criminally charged over routine journalism. How do you think what happened to you fits into this broader national trend of local authorities retaliating against the press for doing its job?

We are seeing instances in which some people with public responsibilities respond to journalists with resistance or retaliation rather than openness. These actions rarely arise from legitimate concern and more often reflect institutional reluctance to confront reality or uphold accountability. In some cases, public officials entrusted with serving their communities treat engagement and transparency as risks rather than obligations. The healthiest communities are built on leaders who stay open, accountable, and ready to face tough questions from the public and the press.

Everyone has a responsibility to support press freedom, including journalists, city employees, and members of the public. Sometimes that responsibility is as simple as subscribing to a news outlet. Other times, it involves asking hard questions and sharing difficult truths with the public. And in some cases, it requires taking personal risks, including facing arrest or accusations, to advance public interests.

In this climate, we all have a responsibility to ask ourselves the hard questions about what we each can do to strengthen a free and transparent society.

Dear Friend of Press Freedom,

For 157 days, Rümeysa Öztürk has faced deportation by the United States government for writing an op-ed it didn’t like, and for 76 days, Mario Guevara has been imprisoned for covering a protest. Read on for more, and click here to subscribe to our other newsletters.

Government excuses for Öztürk secrecy are insulting

A recent court filing suggests the U.S. government is abusing the Freedom of Information Act to hide potentially damning evidence about its March arrest of Öztürk over her co-authorship of an op-ed criticizing Israel.

The government told Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF), in response to a lawsuit we’ve filed for Öztürk’s records, that releasing them would be an invasion of privacy, although it’s not clear whose. Read more here. And to learn more about our FOIA work, subscribe to our secrecy newsletter, The Classifieds.

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Stop congressional secrecy bill

A new legislative proposal – almost identical to one we opposed in 2023 – would allow members and even former members of Congress to compel the censorship of a broad range of information that journalists and others are constitutionally entitled to publish.

It would impede journalists’ and watchdogs’ efforts to, for example, check property, vehicle or travel records to investigate bribery allegations, monitor lawmakers leaving their districts during emergencies, scrutinize potential financial conflicts impacting policy positions, and a myriad of other newsworthy matters. We collaborated with our friends at Defending Rights & Dissent on a petition to lawmakers to stop this censorial proposal. Contact your senator here.

Police: Don’t impersonate journalists

We told you last week that police in Eugene, Oregon, said they’d stop putting their videographers in “PRESS” vests. Great.

But the practice was disturbing enough that we thought police in Eugene and elsewhere needed to understand the dangers of government employees posing as journalists — from providing propagandists with greater access than real journalists to exposing journalists and police officers alike to the risk of assault.

We led a letter from press and liberties groups to Eugene’s police chief, copying national associations of police communications personnel.Read it here.

Another journalist restraining order

A couple years ago, a judge in Arizona issued a restraining order against journalist Camryn Sanchez at the behest of a state senator, Wendy Rogers. That ordeal was alarming, but press freedom advocates were able to breathe a sigh of relief when the order was struck down by another judge a few weeks later. That Rogers is, well, out of her mind, made it easier to hope that the whole thing was an isolated incident.

Unfortunately, that doesn’t appear to be the case. Maryland journalist Will Fries was recently served with a “peace order” that would’ve barred him from city hall in Salisbury. Fortunately, a judge ultimately declined to issue the order, but after the Arizona restraining order and plenty of other instances of local officials claiming bizarre grounds to punish routine newsgathering, it would be a mistake to dismiss Fries’ case as a one-off.

We talked to Fries about the experience via email. Read the conversation here.

What we’re reading

Israel’s killing of six Gaza journalists draws global condemnation (Al Jazeera). We told Al Jazeera that “Any story that quotes an Israeli official or references Israeli allegations should say that Israel does not allow the international press to verify its claims and kills the local journalists who try.”

Homeland Security tells watchdog it hasn’t kept text message data since April (The New York Times). We told the Times that “Agencies cannot get away from responding to FOIA requests by intentionally degrading their capabilities … This is like a fire department saying, ‘We don’t have a hose, so we’re not going to put out the fires anymore.’”

Accepted at universities, unable to get visas: inside Trump’s war on international students (The Intercept). “An intrepid reporter who wants to use his time in America to become an even more effective watchdog against government corruption is an undesirable in the eyes of a corrupt government like ours,” we told The Intercept about journalist Kaushik Raj’s student visa denial.

News groups ask judge to increase protections for journalists covering LA protests (Courthouse News). The federal government apparently believes that assaulting journalists covering protests is legal because “videotaping can lead to violence.” The First Amendment says otherwise.

The student newspaper suing Marco Rubio over targeted deportations (The Intercept). “It does not matter if you’re a citizen, here on a green card, or visiting Las Vegas for the weekend — you shouldn’t have to fear retaliation because the government doesn’t like what you have to say,” Conor Fitzpatrick of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression told The Intercept.

Lack of local news tied to government secrecy, new report says (Medill Local News Initiative). A new study by the Brechner Center for the Advancement of the First Amendment shows that states with more newspapers are more likely to respond to records requests, and states with fewer papers are more likely to ignore them.

Public broadcast cuts hit rural areas, revealing a political shift (The New York Times). Rural stations in Alaska and elsewhere may no longer have the bandwidth to send emergency alerts. That could be the difference between life and death.

Opinion: D.C. must invest in local news (The 51st). Funding local news by directing public grants through consumer coupons is a creative way to address the local news crisis. Local governments must act to keep community news from dying.

Dear Friend of Press Freedom,

For 150 days, Rümeysa Öztürk has faced deportation by the United States government for writing an op-ed it didn’t like, and for 69 days, Mario Guevara has been imprisoned for covering a protest. Read on for more, and click here to subscribe to our other newsletters.

​​New strategies to help journalists in Gaza

Letters and condemnations have their place in press freedom advocacy, especially when dealing with a persuadable audience. But that playbook isn’t working for journalists in Gaza. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his arms supplier, President Donald Trump, don’t care about journalists’ lives, let alone their freedoms.

Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF) board member and Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Azmat Khan and her colleagues, Meghnad Bose and Lauren Watson, spoke to over 20 journalists and activists, including FPF Executive Director Trevor Timm, in search of novel ideas to stop Israel’s slaughter of journalists and concealment of war crimes. Read more in Columbia Journalism Review.

FPF complaint opposes U.S. attorney’s retaliation against press

It’d be journalistic malpractice for reporters to ignore a prominent public official listing a boarded-up house as his residence to claim eligibility for his position. But that’s not how John Sarcone III, acting U.S. attorney for the Northern District of New York, sees it.

He was reportedly “incensed” by reporting from the Times Union of Albany and ordered the paper removed from his office’s media list. In response, FPF, Demand Progress Education Fund, and Reinvent Albany filed a complaint with New York’s Attorney Grievance Committee. Read more here.

Oregon cops cosplay as journalists

Eugene police threatened documentary filmmaker Tim Lewis with arrest if he didn’t back up while filming them. But Lewis noticed another reporter wearing a vest marked “PRESS” filming without police harassment.

Turns out he wasn’t a reporter at all — he was a police public information program coordinator. As FPF Advocacy Director Seth Stern told Double Sided Media, “Police officers obstructing lawful journalism and giving their own publicly funded propagandists the exclusive right to record them up close is unconstitutional, un-American, and absurd.”

Eugene police have reportedly said they will replace the word “press” with “videographer.” Read more here.

Kansas school district fails to censor student journalists

A group of students sued Lawrence Public Schools in Kansas over the district’s use of surveillance software against students, including student journalists. Naturally, the student newspaper wanted to report on the case. But the principal ordered them not to, and the students believed their faculty adviser would be fired if they disobeyed.

Major news conglomerates have caved to official pressure, but not these kids. They sought a court order prohibiting the school from censoring them, leading the principal to drop his censorial directive and a judge to remind the district that the adviser was legally protected from retaliation. Then they published their story. Read it here.

Puerto Rico’s fake news law is unconstitutional

A district court rightly struck down Puerto Rico’s “fake news” law, which criminalized raising “false alarms” about public emergencies. Now, FPF and other rights organizations are urging an appellate court to affirm the ruling in a legal brief authored by the University of Georgia School of Law’s First Amendment Clinic.

The brief explained how the law could be selectively enforced to chill reporting that officials dislike. Read more here.

What we’re reading

Pritzker signs bill to protect freedom of press, Illinois journalists (WCIA). A nonsensical court ruling excluded news reporting from the protection of Illinois’ law against strategic lawsuits against public participation. FPF worked with local organizations and lawyers to help fix the mess.

Human rights groups to university administrators: Dismantle surveillance to defend free speech now (Fight for the Future). Surveillance technology has no place on college campuses and especially in student newsrooms. We joined a letter calling on universities to dismantle these dangerous tools.

Lawyers ask judge to order ICE to free Spanish-language journalist from immigration detention (The Associated Press). Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s targeting of Mario Guevara — a lawful U.S. resident — based on his journalism is a flagrant First Amendment violation. He must be released.

US: Excessive force against LA protesters (Human Rights Watch). HRW usually focuses on wars and atrocities. Now, they’re investigating LA cops’ violence against protesters and journalists. It’s not because it’s a slow atrocity news week — it’s because the situation in LA really is that bad.

Israel says it killed a Hamas commander. It killed a Pulitzer-winning journalist (The New York Times). “The military made no attempt to obscure this brazen strike on civilians, which is a war crime.” And as +972 Magazine explained, it’s far from the first time Israel smeared journalists as terrorists to justify killing them. Its army has a unit tasked with linking journalists to Hamas.

Watchdog or ‘witch hunt’? Highland releases final review of town clerk’s office (River Reporter). Good for the upper Delaware region’s River Reporter for not letting an embattled town supervisor’s veiled threat of a SLAPP stop it from doing its job.

Journalists planning to cover McCormick, Perry event in Pennsylvania must prove their US citizenship (Penn Live). “Journalists who are citizens should decline to attend if their peers are excluded. They should spend their Tuesday investigating politicians and arms manufacturers rather than covering their photo ops,” Stern said.

For the Record is MuckRock’s weekly newsletter that keeps you informed on public records transparency battles, threats and wins. Sign-up to get original reporting, access to FOIA trainings and more.

Any serious journalist would tell you that it’d be journalistic malpractice for a local journalist not to report that a prominent public official listed a boarded-up house as his official residence in order to claim eligibility for his position. But that’s not how John Sarcone III, acting U.S. attorney for the Northern District of New York, sees it.

He was reportedly “incensed” by reporting from the Times Union of Albany and ordered his subordinates to remove it from his office’s media list. In response, Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF), Demand Progress Education Fund, and Reinvent Albany have filed a complaint against Sarcone with New York’s Attorney Grievance Committee.

As the complaint explains, “Sarcone is the chief legal officer charged with enforcing federal law in a district that covers over 30,000 square miles and is home to 3.4 million people. And yet he either does not know or does not care about the ‘practically universal agreement that a major purpose of [the First] Amendment was to protect the free discussion of governmental affairs.’”

The complaint requests that the Committee open an investigation to determine whether Sarcone's conduct violates New York’s Rules of Professional Conduct, and exercise its power to impose sanctions, which can include disbarment.

FPF’s Director of Advocacy Seth Stern said: “All licensed attorneys — but especially top prosecutors entrusted to protect the public, not just their clients — should know better than to retaliate against newspapers for basic public-interest journalism. Sarcone has repeatedly abused his office in his brief tenure. The committee should ensure he can no longer undermine the Constitution and embarrass the legal profession.”

Demand Progress Education Fund Special Advisor Kate Oh stated: “A prosecutor who so flagrantly disregards his ethical and professional obligations and tramples over the First Amendment rights of the press should not be empowered to enforce the laws of our nation. Sarcone’s professional history is littered with red flags and must be investigated. No less than the public’s faith in the rule of law is at stake.”

Reinvent Albany Executive Director John Kaehny said: “With great power comes great responsibility, and U.S. Attorneys like John Sarcone are among the most powerful people in America. Unfortunately, Mr. Sarcone has grossly abused his authority and betrayed the public trust. Mr. Sarcone's flagrant misuse of his authority to retaliate against the Albany Times-Union and his repeated, well-documented dishonesty are completely unacceptable, unethical, and violate basic democratic norms and rules of professional conduct. The Times Union is one of the most respected newspapers and civic institutions in New York, and it's chilling to see it attacked by an unethical U.S. Attorney with a personal grievance.”

You can read the complaint here or below. If you’d like further comment, please contact media@freedom.press or eric@demandprogress.org ,or info@reinventalbany.org.