‘Enemy of the People’ or Defenders of Democracy?

The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or of the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

Background

Watch this confrontation between U.S. President Donald Trump and CNN’s chief White House correspondent Jim Acosta.

In November 2018, after this contentious encounter, the White House suspended Acosta’s press pass. CNN sued and won a temporary restoration of Acosta’s credentials before getting them back permanently. Read the full tracker entry here to familiarize yourself with the incident:

White House suspends CNN reporter’s press pass, leading to lawsuit — December 2018

Related Incidents

The revocation of Acosta’s press pass echoes other nationwide tensions over the potential consequences for journalists trying to do their job. Browse through the related tracker entries below. Is there a pattern or are these isolated incidents?

Student newspaper in Connecticut faces threats of defunding by student government — September 2015
Pennsylvania radio host resigns after being ordered not to criticize Trump — June 2017
Trump administration reconsiders legal protections for journalists — August 2017
DHS seeks to compile, and subsequently to monitor, a list of journalists, bloggers, and media influencers — April 2018
Denver student journalists reporting on teacher strike silenced by school officials — February 2019
A warning to ‘A Warning’: Trump directs US Dept. of Justice to send threat letter to author — November 2019

Serious Consequences

The stories below illustrate increasing hostility and violence toward journalists. The pattern indicates an increasing danger to those who speak truth to power.

Montana Republican pleads guilty to misdemeanor assault, wins special election — May 2017
Two Pittsburgh journalists fired over editorial disagreement — May 2018
Five dead in ‘targeted attack’ at Capital Gazette newspaper in Annapolis — June 2018
Denver police arrest reporter for recording — July 2018
Jamal Khashoggi, Saudi critic and Washington Post columnist, murdered in Saudi consulate in Istanbul — October 2018
San Francisco police raid journalist’s home, looking for information on his sources, later apologize — May 2019
Amid nationwide protests against police brutality, police crack down on the press — May 2020

The State of Press Freedom

A free press is necessary for a strong democracy, American Bar Association Journal
When the Newsroom Becomes a War Zone, Free Speech Today
5 takeaways from the Reporters Committee’s analysis of press freedom threats in 2018, Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press
The U.S. Now Ranks As A ‘Problematic’ Place For Journalists, NPR
Bannon called the media the ‘opposition.’ He’s right, and it’s a good thing, The Washington Post
Judge protects Chicago reporter from revealing his sources, Free Speech Project

Points of View

Choose an example from the options below and use it to analyze the issue. Do these points of view change yours? Complicate it?

It’s Time for the Press to Stop Complaining—And to Start Fighting Back, The Atlantic
The president’s phantom threats, Columbia Journalism Review
The Biggest Threat To Press Freedom Is The Media Itself, The Federalist
The Real Threat to Press Freedom, The Jacobin
The Times’ Lawyer on the Deepest Threats to Press Freedom Under Trump, The New Yorker

Discussion Questions

A free press is one of the five freedoms enshrined in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. What makes a free press so uniquely important to U.S. democracy? How is the press in a democratic society different from that in an authoritarian one?
Based on your answer to the first question, what do you see as the role of a well-functioning press? What do you think various media outlets are doing well, and what should they do better to fulfill this role?
In today’s digital age, anyone can be a self-published journalist. Should there be an official definition of who is protected by the First Amendment guarantee of a free press? Do long-standing newspapers of record, like The New York Times, deserve a higher standing than upstart media that do not respect traditional notions of objectivity? What are the pros and cons of instituting an accrediting organization? What should the requirements be?
Consider the article above, “It’s Time for the Press to Stop Complaining—And to Start Fighting Back,” from The Atlantic. Is Chuck Todd right? Does the press need to “start fighting back” and how? What risks would that pose to the media’s ability to do their job?
Are there ever good reasons for censorship of the media, such as national security?

Activity

Click on these themes below: Press, Legal Action

Discuss: What patterns emerge? What does this confluence of stories with these filters tell us about Free Speech and free press issues in the United States? What does it tell us about contemporary threats to press freedom?

Themes

Artistic Expression

A pro-Trump mural vandalized with the slogan “stop white supremacy.” A television reboot canceled after a racist remark from its star comedienne. A painter denied a venue after previous sex offenses came to light. University productions of vintage theater works canceled because of language that now seems insensitive. Artists are traditionally seen as having broad creative freedom to express themselves, yet the national climate and divisions along lines of identity have demonstrated just how political art can be. These cases underline that no art form — from theater to sculpture to music — is free from society’s battles about speech.

Foreign Policy

Though less so in recent years, the United States has often sought to expand freedom of expression beyond its borders as a condition of its relations with other countries. Is it right to do so? As speech freedoms are threatened abroad by increasingly authoritarian leaders — and those who embolden them — more and more individuals are likely to be prevented from telling the truth about conditions in their countries. Often inadvertently, U.S. leaders have also complained about Americans’ freedom to criticize, oblivious to the message this sends to foreign leaders.

Hate Speech

For decades, activists have proposed that hate speech — speech that disparages a particular group of people — be restricted in certain arenas. In some universities, for instance, student activists have sought to ban speakers who express openly racist or anti-LGBTQ views. While advocates of civil rights and social justice argue that Free Speech is often used to perpetuate stereotypes and hatred against long-marginalized communities, strict interpreters of the First Amendment tend to agree with a famous line from former Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, who wrote in a 1929 opinion that the principle of free speech is not “free thought for those who agree with us, but freedom for the thought that we hate.”

Heckler’s Veto

There is seemingly a script for Free Speech disruptions on college campuses: A political provocateur is invited to campus, and protesters agitate against him or her with the aim of precluding the speaker from delivering a talk. This kind of disruption — called “the heckler’s veto” — is repudiated everywhere by experts on First Amendment jurisprudence, who claim that this combative practice is not the way to settle disputes in our society. But some also argue that protesters are guaranteed the right to heckle or even silence a speaker by the First Amendment. Others still take issue with the idea that virulent racism or other threatening speech can be calmly discussed and analyzed.

Identity

Almost any aspect of one’s life can be considered a marker of identity: Beyond race and gender, people cite factors like ability, age, sexual orientation, citizenship or immigration status, and religion as definitional elements of who they are. And Americans today often speak of the communities that form around those identities with an astounding dearth of knowledge about the history that has shaped and informed those experiences. Sometimes, ignorance about these issues can lead to outright combativeness. As people grapple with how to live their identities in a public way, they may encounter the vitriol of those who don’t want to accept their place in society. Should the state protect the views of those who allegedly wish to invalidate the identities of others?

Legal Action

In September 2017, white supremacist Richard Spencer sued for a right to speak on the campus of Michigan State University, a public, land-grant college. Similar legal action took place, with varying results, at the University of Cincinnati, the University of Florida, and Penn State University. Because the right to Free Speech is enshrined in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, those initially denied a platform to speak — often because they appear to present a threat to public order — have had their way after arguing in court that a public space cannot deny anyone a soapbox. These disputes frequently result in civil lawsuits as well as administrative investigations.

National Security

Although the days depicted in Steven Spielberg’s film, “The Post” — with a war in Vietnam, an embattled White House, and the classified Pentagon Papers — are long gone, the government continues to claim it has an interest in keeping certain secret material from the public eye. Massive online leaks, such as the one undertaken by Edward Snowden, a former CIA employee and intelligence analyst, have led to the discovery of civilian surveillance programs orchestrated by the National Security Agency. Meanwhile, former President Barack Obama used the power of the executive to prosecute more leakers under the Espionage Act than all previous presidents taken together, highlighting the tension between the country’s interest in keeping the homeland secure and the public’s right to know how its business is being conducted.

Press

“The only way to assert the right to publish is to publish,” once said Ben Bagdikian, a Washington Post editor who played a pivotal role in keeping the Pentagon Papers public, after the New York Times had been temporarily restrained from publishing the documents. Just a few days later, the Post was also taken to court by the government for doing exactly that: exercising freedom of the press. The modern-era attacks on the media come from all corners, including the White House, which calls mainstream news outlets “fake news” and their journalists “enemies of the people.” Yet the press is one of the stalwart avenues for the defense of Free Speech, and individuals from all political stripes take to op-ed pages to express their (sometimes incendiary) opinions.

Professional Consequences

The concept of academic freedom is frequently invoked when to defend a professor’s incendiary comments in the classroom. But posted online, the same comments could cost the professor his or her position. Because not all universities are publicly funded, competing interpretations of exactly what speech is protected have emerged. Common disciplinary actions include removing professors from teaching, placing them on academic leave, or, particularly in the case of adjunct faculty, firing them outright. The career disruptions go beyond academia, too: in October 2017, a government contractor in Virginia was fired from her job after being photographed giving the middle finger to the presidential motorcade as she bicycled past.

Protest Politics

The First Amendment guarantees the right to assemble, but in recent years that principle has come under increased scrutiny. Whether it be state legislators who want to mitigate consequences for drivers who “accidentally” hit demonstrators or attorneys in the District of Columbia attempting to indict journalists and nurses for rioting they were not a part of, the protest scene in the United States is beginning to resemble the street battles that took place in the Vietnam War era. And as organized political movements have drawn millions for the Women’s March in 2016 or the Families Belong Together March in 2018, the politics of protest are not likely to mellow anytime soon. Does the state ever have a legitimate interest in restricting — or even punishing — protests?

Social Media

Social networks have proven to be the most difficult arenas in which to debate Free Speech. Are they supposed to be a replica of the public square, where nearly any opinion deserves amplification — and scrutiny? Or are they meant to provide a space free of hate speech and misinformation, where users can feel safe communicating their ideas about the world around them? Companies such as Facebook and Twitter have vowed to combat rhetorical bile on their platforms, but have not given the public much insight as to who decides what type of content should be censored. And social content can be permanent: if a user chooses not to delete a post, it can come back to haunt him or her years later, potentially causing career disruptions. How and where to draw the lines in these increasingly popular platforms are among the defining questions for Free Speech today.

Violence / Threats

Professors fearing for their lives as they receive death threats. Shattered storefronts in Washington, D.C., blocks away from a presidential inauguration. Bedlam in Charlottesville as a self-avowed neo-Nazi drives into a crowd of counter-protesters. The link between violence or threats thereof and Free Speech only seems to be getting closer in the United States, and it seems to defy all reason that these incidents continue to occur when the highest court has historically held that speech that incites or directly leads to violence can be restricted.

Type

Enhanced Entry (contains Podcasts, Videos, or Timeline)