Blocking reporters to cover news events in the Oval office. Expose journalists from their work spaces in the Pentagon. Investigating public media companies that are often the objective of conservative attacks.
In the three weeks since he returned to the White House, President Donald Trump and his administration have moved beyond his usual rhetoric of the media to take a variety of actions that have limited the access of some media while hitting To others with demands and directives that critics say that there are naked attempts to fold the coverage of news to their will.
“I don’t know if Trump himself has a ‘game plan’ per se, but it is clear that the general image is an administration that despises a free press,” said Rebecca Hamilton, a law professor at the American University, in an email electronic. “His point of view, and this is evident for Trump’s rhetoric, his previous demands, the memorandum of the Pentagon office space and the FCC investigations, is that any means of communication that is not aligned with the agenda of Trump is the enemy. This reflects a fundamental lack of respect for the underlying principles to a democratic commitment to a free press. “
In what can be the most obvious example of that, Associated Press reporters were blocked from covering Trump in the White House events for two days in a row after the AP continued to refer to the body of water south of the states United as the Gulf of Mexico instead of the Gulf of America, the new name that Trump gave in one of the many executive orders he has signed since he assumed the position. The AP Stylebook, who use many media, including NBC News, published an update two days after Trump renamed the Gulf on January 21 that said the AP will continue to call it the Gulf of Mexico “while recognizing the new name Trump has chosen.
“Punish journalists not to adopt the terminology ordered by the State is an alarming attack on press freedom,” the foundation for individual rights and expression, a non -profit group that advocates the rights of the rights of the rights of the rights of The first amendment. “President Trump has the authority to change the way in which the United States government refers to the Gulf. But he cannot punish a news organization for using another term. The role of our free press is to hold people in power, not act as their spokesman. “
But Trump’s White House Secretary, Karoline Leavitt, did not apologize on Wednesday and said: “It is a privilege to cover the White House.”
“And it is a fact that the body of water off the coast of Louisiana is called the Gulf of America, and I am not sure why the media do not want to call it that,” Leavitt said.
The White House did not respond to a request for comments.
The AP battle is only the most recent of a series of actions that Trump and his administration have taken, a significant escalation even beyond his first mandate, when he remained mainly to verbal spikes, although he prohibited Jim Acosta from CNN from White House. 2018.
This time, Trump has been using all the power, and pushing the limits, of the presidency, installing some administrators who seem eager to act in his name.
The most active has been Brendan Car, the newly installed president of the Federal Communications Commission, which has not lost time to launch investigations against many of the media companies that Trump often criticizes.
Carr has launched research on NPR and PBS, two media companies often aimed at a conservative rhetoric on perceived liberal prejudice and government financing, for the air recognition of financial sponsors and in a San Francisco radio station by Its transmission of live federal locations. Immigration agents. The FCC has also reopened a CBS probe for the “news distortion”, which are rules about the “intentional falsification of the news” that has rarely taken advantage of in the past, and reopened an ABC probe on how it handled a debate between Trump and the Democratic presidential nominated Kamala Harris.
Carr has also opened an investigation into Comcast, the owner of NBCuniversal, the NBC News parent company, on its promotion of diversity, equity and inclusion programs.
“The FCC will take new measures to ensure that each entity that regulates the FCC complies with the protections of civil rights enshrined in the Communications Law … even when closing any program that promotes forms of Deli discrimination,” said in a Letter of a letter. To the CEO of Comcast, Brian Roberts, according to Reuters.
A Comcast spokesman said in an email: “We have received a consultation from the Federal Communications Commission and we will cooperate with the FCC to answer your questions. For decades, our company has been built on a basis of integrity and respect for all our employees and clients. “
Trump has long demonized Dei programs, which recently implies that they were somehow responsible for the mortal collision of a commercial plane and a military helicopter last month on the Potomac River.
Experts said the pressure is increasing.
“The idea that the FCC investigates a means of communication for its Dei programs is certainly in line with the orders of President Trump” that is by taking Dei measures within the federal government, said Daxton “chip” Stewart, professor of Journalism at the Christian University of Texas. “I think it’s extremely worrying. But Carr seems anxious to initiate investigations in any medium that is not appropriate for President Trump. “
Trump has threatened in the past with revoking the transmission licenses, which the FCC repairs (decides which local television stations can transmit but not to license the main networks).
While the government does not license national networks, a license of local television and radio stations that use public waves (including NBC affiliates). And even the threat of action of the FCC could make journalists who do not have the resources to fight their blows, experts said.
“It is also important to recognize here that any issuer is stripped or not on its license, or any reporter is sued, the mere threat of said action, backed by the power of the State, prevents the capacity of the press to freely inform and runs The risk of emerging from self -censorship, ”Hamilton wrote.
The media guards and other journalists have already accused some of the most respected media of inclination in the country to Trump’s will.
Before the elections, the Washington Post and Los Angeles Times were criticized hard for stretching their planned Harris backups for president.
After the elections, ABC agreed to pay $ 15 million as part of a legal agreement with Trump and to bed a dispute that focused on an interview on which, according to Trump, the presenter George Stephanopoulos defamed him. Trump has also sued CBS for personal quality for his issuance of an interview with Harris in “60 minutes”, which Trump said he was edited deceptively. CBS denied the accusation.
Meanwhile, CBS, under pressure from Car and the FCC, revealed the transcription of the interview “60 minutes.”
On January 31, the Department of Defense announced that it was instituting a new “Annual Media Rotation Program” and evicted several media, including NBC News, of its Pentagon’s office spaces.
Taking their places were three conservative news organizations and a progressive news attire that does not even have a Pentagon correspondent.
“There is no doubt that President Trump has an intimate understanding of the importance of the relationship between the media and the public,” said Hamilton. “That is why it is constantly reducing the access of the outputs whose reports do not like and expanding the space for the outputs with coverage it likes.”
