President Donald Trump is keen on stripping journalists and news outlets of their voice. According to the ACLU , the Trump Administration has cut $1.1 billion in public broadcasting to NPR and PBS. He is making dangerous moves that go against our Constitution, and our right to freedom of press.
He has issued a $10 billion defamation lawsuit against the Wall Street Journal over a piece that claimed his name was on a 2003 birthday card to Jeffery Epstein. The card had a suggestive drawing and referenced many things that were kept behind closed doors between the two. The Trump Administration is clearly violating our first amendment rights by taking legal actions against large news outlets based solely on the fact that he doesn’t agree with what these outlets are reporting on.
Donald Trump banning the Associative Press from the White House Press Pool was just one of many. He settled in a $16 million lawsuit against Paramount and CBS for their coverage of Kamala Harris’ 2024 presidential campaign on “60 Minutes.” He claimed that it was intended to mislead the public, according to CNN. These unlawful and frivolous attacks on news outlets is jeopardizing journalists’ freedom of press. This causes instability in what should be reported in fear of being silenced by the Trump Administration.
What we are seeing now is a prime example of a political leader using power and fear to control their population, and sway people to believe that what he’s doing is right. PBS says that the tactics that are being used by President Trump represents past dictatorships and authoritarians that he has publicly praised in the media.
Not only has he been targeting larger news outlets, he has also been sending a string of attacks against smaller independent news outlets. In December of 2024, Trump sued the Des Moines Register over a poll that was published that predicted Kamala Harris would win the presidential election. In the lawsuit, he said the poll was “election interference and fraud.” This is a blatant example of silencing journalists for power over the media, and proves that he is willing to dismantle our freedom of press, further violating the Constitution. For someone who so proudly wants to defend our gun rights, based on the idea that it’s in our Constitution, it is purely hypocritical that he directly goes against our first amendment right to freedom of press.
