Media outlets cave to threats as Trump's FCC launches new investigations

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11 February

Donald Trump gestures, as he attends a press conference on "Trump Will Fix It", at Mar-a-Lago, in Palm Beach, Florida, U.S., October 29, 2024.

We look at the Trump administration’s escalating attacks on press freedom, and how the media has responded with bended knee in some cases, with Jameel Jaffer, director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University. The Trump administration has threatened journalists and media outlets for their coverage, and the Federal Communications Commission is investigating PBS and NPR over its funding sources. Meanwhile, a number of major news organizations face accusations of surrendering to Trump’s threats. In December, ABC settled a defamation suit brought by Trump by making a $15 million donation to his future presidential library. CBS’s parent company Paramount is reportedly in talks to settle a multibillion-dollar lawsuit filed by Trump, who accused 60 Minutes of deceptively editing an interview with Kamala Harris. Trump initially sought $10 billion in the lawsuit and is now seeking $20 billion. “What I see here is media organizations that have the power to fight back against Trump but aren’t doing it. I think that’s a failure of courage,” says Jaffer. “Every time one of those media organizations settles a case, the next organization finds it more difficult to resist Trump.

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

AMY GOODMAN: As a constitutional crisis grows in Washington, we begin today’s show looking at the Trump administration’s escalating attacks on press freedom. Last week, the interim U.S. Attorney in Washington Edward Martin threatened to prosecute anyone, including journalists, who, quote, “target” or, quote, “impede” Elon Musk and DOGE — that’s the Department of Government Efficiency. Martin’s letter came a day after Musk claimed it was a crime to identify the young computer engineers who have helped him gain access to highly sensitive information at agencies across Washington.

Meanwhile, the FCC, the Federal Communications Commission, has opened an investigation into San Francisco-based KCBS over the radio station’s reporting on recent immigration raids. The FCC has also opened a broader investigation of NPR and PBS and their practice of airing underwriting announcements.

On Friday, Donald Trump openly called for The Washington Post to fire longtime columnist Eugene Robinson after he accused Trump of trampling the Constitution.

Meanwhile, a number of major news organizations face accusations of already bending a knee to Trump. In December, ABC settled a defamation suit brought by Trump by making a $15 million donation to his future presidential library.

CBS’s parent company Paramount Global is reportedly in talks to settle a multibillion-dollar lawsuit filed by Trump, who accused 60 Minutes of deceptively editing an interview with Kamala Harris. Trump initially sought $10 billion in the lawsuit, but he’s upped it now to $20 billion. Last week, CBS took the unusual step of handing over its unedited tapes to the FCC. While the tapes showed no wrongdoing on CBS’s part, many believe Paramount might still settle the lawsuit. This all is happening as Paramount seeks federal approval for its $8 billion merger with Skydance Media.

We’re joined right now by Jameel Jaffer, executive director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University. His recent New York Timesopinion piece is headlined “This Is Not a Moment to Settle with Trump.”

Welcome back to Democracy Now!, Jameel.

JAMEEL JAFFER: Thanks, Amy.

AMY GOODMAN: So, we just went through some of the cases, but if you can go through them in depth and explain what is happening here? Is the media obeying in advance?

JAMEEL JAFFER: Yeah. I mean, that’s how I see it. I see a kind of failure of courage among the largest and most powerful media organizations in the country. You know, you started with the ABC settlement. This is a case that arose out of George Stephanopoulos saying on TV that President Trump had been found liable for rape, when in fact the jury had found him liable for sexual assault. Trump sued, claiming that he had been defamed. I don’t think that there —

AMY GOODMAN: And let’s be clear: It was the judge who said, in common parlance, this would be rape.

JAMEEL JAFFER: That’s right. That’s right. I don’t think that Trump had any chance of winning that lawsuit. If ABC had contested it, ABC would have been protected by the New York Times v. Sullivan rule. New York Times v. Sullivan is a 60-year-old case that gives citizens broad power to — or, broad latitude to criticize government officials, makes it very difficult for public officials to recover in defamation actions. I don’t think there’s any way that ABC would have lost that case. But they settled the case.

Second one is Meta’s settlement with Trump. This is over Meta’s decision or Facebook and Instagram’s decision to deplatform Trump after January 6th. Trump sued, claiming that his First Amendment rights had been violated. This, I think, is a totally frivolous case. There’s no way that Trump would have won that case against Meta, but Meta settled it, as well, for $25 million — again, all going to Trump’s presidential library.

And then, finally, this reported CBS settlement, or possible CBS settlement, with Trump over the action — over the case that involved the editing of this Kamala Harris interview. I don’t think that CBS edited that interview in any unusual way at all. The kind of editing they did is routine for journalism, for media organizations. Trump knows that. Again, no chance that Trump would have won that case, but CBS is reportedly thinking about settling it.

So, what I see here is media organizations that have the power to fight back against Trump but aren’t doing it. I think that’s a failure of courage, and it has implications for those particular media organizations, because I think it affects their credibility and their prestige. But it has larger press freedom implications, as well, because every time one of those media organizations settles a case, the next organization finds it more difficult to resist Trump. And this is a moment in which we need these organizations to hold the powerful to account, hold Trump to account, and this is exactly what they should not be doing.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Jameel, what about this latest story this week about the FCC investigating a San Francisco —

JAMEEL JAFFER: Yeah.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: — radio station, KCBS, for its coverage of immigration enforcement in San Jose?

JAMEEL JAFFER: Yeah. I mean, here, too, I think you see the Trump administration trying to use its regulatory authorities in a way that chills press freedom, chills legitimate reporting. No question here that that radio station was within its rights to report what it did. And what Trump is trying to do or what the FCC is trying to do here is chill not just that radio station, but other radio stations and other media organizations, from engaging in reporting that is inconvenient to the administration.

I mean, I mentioned the CBS case. You know, another aspect of that case involves the FCC, with the FCC having demanded from CBS that it turn over unedited transcripts of its interview with Kamala Harris. And I don’t think in another —

AMY GOODMAN: And they released them.

JAMEEL JAFFER: And they released them. And they released them. I don’t think in another — in any other era a news organization would have just turned over those transcripts without at least trying to get a judge to narrow the request or look at the transcripts in camera before turning them over. But CBS just turned them over.

And, you know, I think that there’s a real risk here that, on paper, we’re going to have all the First Amendment rights in the world. The First Amendment is going to look great on paper. But the organizations that we need to assert their First Amendment rights, to defend press freedom, are increasingly just not doing it.

I mean, I’ve named a few of the settlements, but even before we got to the settlements, there were the L.A. Times and The Washington Post, which quashed editorials that would have been — that would have provoked Trump. This happened before the election. Then there were the Big Tech companies that all made million-dollar donations to Trump’s inaugural fund. You know, I think what we’re seeing is media organizations, including social media organizations, lining up to ingratiate themselves with President Trump. And that is an extremely troubling thing at this particular moment.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, of course, it’s not just media organizations. Universities. Talk about the free speech rights that are endangered, increasingly endangered, at universities by the Trump administration, for instance, threatening to deport pro-Palestinian students.

JAMEEL JAFFER: Yeah, I mean, I think this is — it’s a larger issue across society. Many of the institutions that we need to serve as checks on government power at a moment like this are not doing their jobs.

Now, this question about, you know, in what circumstances can the government deport noncitizens for exercising their First Amendment rights, I think, is a hugely significant question. And I want people to understand that the First Amendment protects noncitizen students at American universities just like it protects everybody else. The government cannot constitutionally deport people simply because they have exercised their First Amendment rights, simply because they have criticized a war overseas or criticized our government or criticized another government. Those are not constitutionally permissible justifications for deporting somebody.

So, you know — and you don’t have to take my word for it, because a couple years ago, the Knight Institute, my institute, filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the Biden administration, and we were able to get two memos, two legal memos, in which the Trump administration had considered its authority to engage in these kinds of deportations based on First Amendment activity. And Trump administration lawyers wrote memos that acknowledged that noncitizens at universities in the United States are protected by the First Amendment and that deporting them on the basis of their speech would almost certainly be unconstitutional.

AMY GOODMAN: And then, Jameel Jaffer, talk about what happened Friday night with the casino magnate Steve Wynn asking the Supreme Court to revisit the Times v. Sullivan defamation rule, the Supreme Court decision, one of the two most important press freedom cases.

JAMEEL JAFFER: Yeah, so, I mentioned New York Times v. Sullivan already. This has been a campaign by some conservatives over the last few years to try to get the Supreme Court to narrow or overrule New York Times v. Sullivan, which would be a very big deal because it’s The New York Times v. Sullivan, more than any other case, that protects our ability to criticize government officials, which is core to our democracy. And this —

AMY GOODMAN: What was it established under, New York Times v. Sullivan? What case was that?

JAMEEL JAFFER: So, it’s called New York Times v. Sullivan. It’s a case involving — The New York Times was sued by a Southern police official who was concerned about civil rights activism in the South and complained, in particular, about an ad in The New York Times that he said — he said accurately — was inaccurate. The ad included some inaccuracies in it. And he said, because the ad included inaccuracies, The New York Times was liable. I think it was for $500,000, which at the time would have been crushing liability even for The New York Times. And if he had won that case, other news organizations reporting on the civil rights movement would have been crushed, as well. But the Supreme Court said, if you’re criticizing government officials, you have to have broad latitude, even to get things wrong. So, unless the public official can show what’s called actual malice, so unless the public official can show that the newspaper or the writer recklessly published false information or deliberately published false information, there’s no recovery possible. The First Amendment forecloses recovery.

So, now some conservatives are pushing to get the Supreme Court to overrule that decision. I think it’s a misguided campaign, even, you know, if you want the things that these conservatives want. I think this is going to backfire on them. But this cert petition that was filed on Friday night, this request that the Supreme Court hear the case, is another effort in this longer campaign to get the Supreme Court to either scale back or overrule New York Times v. Sullivan.

AMY GOODMAN: Jameel Jaffer, thanks so much for being with us, director of the Knight —

JAMEEL JAFFER: Thank you.

AMY GOODMAN: — First Amendment Institute at Columbia University. We’ll link to your piece in The New York Times, “This Is Not a Moment to Settle with Trump.”

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