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Dear Friend of Press Freedom:

U.S. journalist Alex Colston was detained by Israel for a second time while on board an international aid flotilla to Gaza, along with French and Turkish Al Jazeera journalists and almost 200 activists. He reports that he and other abductees were held for two days in shipping containers, in stress positions and under floodlights, while some endured further torture. Most of them have been released, but the U.S. State Department was of no help. It opted to condemn the flotillas rather than defending Americans illegally abducted in international waters.

Read on for more press freedom news. But first, tell your lawmakers to help put a stop to domestic surveillance by reforming FISA Section 702.

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Bootlicking Brendan’s back at it

Days before the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner, comedian Jimmy Kimmel made a joke about President Donald Trump’s mortality. No one protested until after a gunman unsuccessfully attempted to evade security at the dinner. Trump then feigned outrage, claiming Kimmel called for his assassination. Because there’s no other reason to joke that a 79-year-old whose own health secretary says it’s a wonder he’s alive might not be long for this world.

The following day, Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr and his Donald Trump lapel pin ordered Disney’s ABC, which airs Kimmel’s show, to seek early renewal of its broadcast licenses. It’s the latest escalation in Carr’s never-ending quest to kiss up to his boss by attacking free speech.

We said in a statement, “The FCC is neither the journalism police nor the humor police. This is nothing but illegal jawboning intended to intimidate ABC into kissing the ring.” And Carr’s claims that his attack on ABC is really about diversity, equity, and inclusion — not censorship — is an insult to our intelligence. That he felt the need to cite a pretext only further demonstrates that he knows full well that his prior threats of content-based retaliation were frivolous.

ABC needs to fight back to make clear that Carr’s new tactic won’t work. Otherwise it’s entirely possible he’ll try it again next time a news show inspires a late night rage tweet from his boss.

• Read more

It’s almost World Press Freedom Day. Someone forgot to tell the world

For years, World Press Freedom Day on May 3 has helped spotlight global press freedom violations. It’s a day to demand justice for journalists murdered in Gaza and Lebanon, or to celebrate the release of wrongfully detained reporters like Ahmed Shihab-Eldin.

Holding foreign regimes accountable for press freedom is essential, and it’s been a rough year for journalists’ rights all around the globe. But this year, the U.S. — which dropped to 64th out of 180 countries in Reporters Without Borders’ World Press Freedom Index — needs to take a hard look in the mirror, too.

• Read more

FPF sues for White House texts

FPF joined Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington in a lawsuit seeking to establish that federal agencies must abide by the Presidential Records Act, including the provision that presidential papers become subject to release under the Freedom of Information Act five years after the end of the president’s term. The suit follows the Justice Department’s nonsense memo claiming the PRA is unconstitutional and contests the White House’s internal guidance allowing deletion of text messages, despite the act’s requirements.

• Read The New York Times’ report

Hear from experts on the SEC gag rule

Those seeking to settle regulatory actions by the Securities and Exchange Commission are prohibited from publicly disputing the SEC’s claims against them. It’s a dangerous prior restraint, especially as financial regulators deal with new technologies from cryptocurrency to prediction markets. They’re sure to make mistakes, and you deserve to be informed.

We’ve assembled a group of experts, including legendary First Amendment lawyer Floyd Abrams and attorneys from the New Civil Liberties Alliance, the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, and the law firm Quinn Emanuel, to talk about the dangers of the “gag rule” and current efforts to challenge it at the Supreme Court. Join us on Tuesday, May 5, at 2 p.m. ET.

• Register here

Any longer term extension must include reforms to stop illegal surveillance of journalists and other Americans. Maybe this will help: Sen. Ron Wyden said he “secured a deal that a long-term extension would not move forward without a secretive court opinion being made public, which he says reveals abuses of Americans’ rights through section 702.”

Israel’s excuses for barring international press from entering Gaza were nonsense at the height of the war. They make even less sense now. It’s clearer than ever that Israel doesn’t want the world to see the truth and Americans to see what they’re bankrolling.

“Some executives are asking not, ‘Is the story true?’ But, ‘Is it good for business?’”

News companies have caved to Carr and Trump in the past, but times have changed — Trump is highly unpopular and loses in court regularly. We hope ABC not only defends itself but goes on offense to put a stop to Carr’s jawboning for good.

It’s impossible to look at the firing of FOIA officials after the release of a declassified memo to FPF as “anything other than inappropriate retaliation for a lawful FOIA release,” FPF’s Lauren Harper explains.

Kentucky’s legislature needs to step in and fix this. Government officials can’t be allowed to evade transparency by using personal devices to discuss government business.

For years, World Press Freedom Day on May 3 has helped spotlight global press freedom violations. It’s a day to demand justice for journalists murdered in Gaza and Lebanon, or to celebrate the release of wrongfully detained reporters like Ahmed Shihab-Eldin.

Holding foreign regimes accountable for press freedom is essential. But this year, the U.S. needs to take a hard look in the mirror, too.

Since last year’s World Press Freedom Day, our U.S. Press Freedom Tracker has documented hundreds of press freedom violations in the United States, the equivalent of more than one per day. Taken together, these incidents are evidence of an unprecedented, coordinated assault on press freedom being led by the highest levels of our government.

From the streets of Minneapolis to the halls of the Pentagon, the Trump administration is dismantling the First Amendment right to gather and report the news.

Criminalizing the messenger

The majority of press freedom incidents cataloged by the Tracker since last May 3 are of journalists being assaulted and arrested while covering protests.

Most reporters arrested at demonstrations have their charges dropped later. But not journalists Don Lemon, Georgia Fort, and Junn Bollman. They now face bogus charges under federal prosecution for engaging in obviously constitutionally-protected reporting while covering a protest at a St. Paul, Minnesota, church in January.

They’re not the only journalists being prosecuted for covering anti-immigration enforcement protests in Minnesota. Photographer John Abernathy — who was pictured tossing his camera to another photographer to protect it, while being surrounded and arrested by federal agents at a different protest in a Minneapolis suburb last January — is also facing federal criminal charges.

Targeting routine reporting

Outside the context of protests, multiple federal agencies are also trying to redefine routine journalism as wrong or illegal.

Perhaps most notoriously, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth tried to ban reporters from the Pentagon unless they signed what amounts to a loyalty pledge promising not to ask sources for information. Even after a court said the ban (and a subsequent rewrite) was unconstitutional, the government continues to fight for the right to exclude reporters who aren’t interested in acting as Pentagon stenographers.

Former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and former Attorney General Pam Bondi have tried to chill reporting by accusing journalists of “doxxing” or fomenting violence against federal immigration agents by naming them or photographing them in public. They’ve threatened to prosecute CNN for reporting on an ICE-watching app and coerced app stores into removing that software, a clear violation of the Constitution.

At the FBI, Director Kash Patel launched a retaliatory “stalking” investigation into New York Times reporter Elizabeth Williamson because Williamson did her job: reaching out to Patel’s girlfriend Alexis Wilkins to ask for a comment on reporting that Patel was using government resources on Wilkins’ behalf. Even the Department of Justice thought that was too much, concluding there was no legal basis for the investigation of Williamson.

But perhaps no government official has done more to target journalism on Trump’s behalf than Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr. By threatening to punish broadcasters for reporting and editing news, and encouraging media mergers meant to benefit the Trump administration, Carr has shown he’s willing to trade the First Amendment (and whatever dignity he has left considering he wears a gilded bust of Trump as a lapel pin) for political points.

Waging war on whistleblowers

The Trump administration is also moving aggressively to shut down journalists’ relationships with their sources.

In January, the FBI raided the home of Washington Post journalist Hannah Natanson, the “federal government whisperer” who’d written about the hundreds of her confidential sources from within the government. When the agency asked a court for the search warrant allowing the raid, the government purposefully omitted any mention of the Privacy Protection Act of 1980, a federal law that prohibits such raids in almost all circumstances.

More recently, the DOJ used the Espionage Act to charge Courtney Williams, a former Army employee who spoke to reporter Seth Harp about sexual harassment and discrimination in the military. Like most Espionage Act cases involving reporters and sources, this case doesn’t seem to be about national security. It’s about hiding government misconduct by retaliating against journalists and sources who expose it.

A pattern of persecution

This is only the tip of the iceberg. We haven’t even gotten into the SLAPP lawsuits, the attacks on immigrant journalists, the threats to jail journalists who refuse to burn sources, the yanking of funding from public media, and so much more.

In other words, the U.S. is rapidly joining the ranks of the world’s worst press freedom offenders.

But it’s not too late to fight back.

Newsrooms can sue over press freedom violations and win. Lawmakers can reform the Espionage Act and Privacy Protection Act, and pass a federal shield law protecting journalists and their sources. Journalists can and should write and speak out about press freedom violations. The public can take action to demand that the Trump administration stop treating the First Amendment like a suggestion.

The United States can’t lead the world in defending press freedom on World Press Freedom Day when it’s actively dismantling it at home. It’s time to stop asking the Trump administration to respect the First Amendment. We need to use the courts, Congress, and the power of the people to force it.

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