Trump Resumes His Endless War Against the First Amendment

Donald Trump is taking fresh aim at the press before he is sworn in for his second term, asking Republicans to block a federal shield bill that would protect journalists from federal investigators. 

The New York Times reports that the president-elect attacked the bill Wednesday afternoon in a Truth Social post in which he cited a news article, writing “REPUBLICANS MUST KILL THIS BILL!” The measure in question is the Protect Reporters from Exploitative State Spying Act, or PRESS Act. 

The PRESS Act previously received unanimous, bipartisan approval by the House in January, but has since stalled in the Senate Judiciary Committee as Democrats in the upper chamber rush to approve President Biden’s judicial nominees before he leaves office and the GOP takes over the chamber next year. 

The bill would provide reporters with stronger protections regarding confidential sources, protecting them against prosecution. In his first term, Trump’s routine anger over leaks from his administration led to him secretly subpoenaing reporters’ private communications. Bipartisan support for the measure was probably fueled by the fact that attacks on journalists have, in recent years, been a bipartisan problem. 

Trump’s predecessor, Barack Obama, left his own checkered legacy on press freedom behind—the former president routinely deployed the Espionage Act to put “a number of people in jail for daring to help national security journalists report on classified government programs.”

President Joe Biden took a different tack. His attorney general, Merrick Garland, issued a Justice Department rule banning federal prosecutors from using such practices, including search warrants, to seize journalists’ information or force them to testify about their sources. But since the Biden administration’s actions could easily be overturned by a future administration, the PRESS Act was written to erect sturdier safeguards. 

But Trump has always been extremely hostile towards journalists, and his 2024 presidential campaign was no exception. He threatened news networks such as ABC and CBS with removing their broadcast licenses for what he considered unfavorable treatment and coverage. He joked to a rally audience in Pennsylvania only days before the election about a potential assassin having “to shoot through the fake news,  and I don’t mind that so much because I don’t mind. I don’t mind that.” 

Since at least 2017, Trump has called the press “the enemy of the people,” and when he is sworn in next year, he’ll have a pliant Congress behind him to treat the press as the enemy of the state. If passed, the PRESS Act might have protected at least some journalists from legal action under Trump’s second administration, but now it might be too late.