Future of the Press

The Trump administration’s approach to press access has sparked significant controversy, raising concerns about transparency and freedom of the press. In a recent move, the White House announced changes to how journalists gain access to presidential press conferences, shifting control away from the long-established White House Correspondents’ Association.

This decision, coupled with the administration’s extreme rhetoric on media oversight, has ignited debate over the role of the press in holding government officials accountable.

Freedom of the Press:

The First Amendment of the United States Constitution protects freedom of speech, which is the right to express oneself without government interference.

Within recent days, the White House announced that the Trump administration will now determine which news outlets will have access to the president’s press conferences. Originally, The White House Correspondents’ Association, made up of news outlets that cover the White House, determined how they would share coverage of President Trump at major events where space is limited.

On January 20, the first day of his new term in office, President Trump issued an Executive Order entitled “Restoring Freedom of Speech and Ending Federal Censorship” which “ensures that no Federal Government officer, employee, or agent engages in or facilitates any conduct that would unconstitutionally abridge the free speech of any American citizen;”.

But, not long after President Trump signed this order, he and his Administration began to violate it.

Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said that the association “should no longer have a monopoly” and that they will no longer be able to “dictate” who could report directly to the president. In their eyes, they were “returning the power to the people”.

This follows after the Associated Press resisted President Trump’s orders to rename the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America. With this, Trump announced that the AP would no longer be able to join said conferences until they refer to the body of water between Florida and Mexico as the “Gulf of America”.

The AP filed a lawsuit over the ban, saying the White House violated its First Amendment free speech rights and its Fifth Amendment procedural rights, as it had no opportunity to appeal the decision internally.

This is not the first time that Trump has protested the First Amendment, as the public has seen him countless times making comments about how news stations should be “shut down” because they said something negative about him.

DEI Exclusion:

The First Amendment protects free speech and assembly, but it doesn’t give businesses the right to discriminate. The Constitution also prohibits the government from passing laws that establish a religion or limit the practice of religion.

In an effort to stamp out “woke” racial and gender messages, critics say, the president and his cabinet are challenging the first amendment. Within his first two days of taking office, Trump fulfilled his promise to target diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs with a series of executive orders aimed at curbing what he described as “illegal and immoral discrimination programs.”

The order “Ending Illegal Discrimination and Restoring Merit-Based Opportunity” rescinded several past executive orders meant to curb discrimination, and it encouraged private sector employers to “end illegal DEI discrimination and preferences.”. Companies like Target, Lowes, and Meta have already stopped their previous DEI structures.

First Amendment precedent prevents the exercise of viewpoint discrimination by prohibiting permit schemes that give unchecked discretionary power to speech-licensing officials.

This statement means that under the First Amendment, the government cannot restrict or control speech based on the speaker’s viewpoint. Specifically, legal precedents prevent government officials from having unchecked power to decide who gets permission to speak or publish based on their opinions or perspectives.

The First Amendment does not permit the government to discriminate against grantees because it does not like some of the viewpoints they disagree with.

“You can claim that you are championing expression and are a free-speech supporter, but saying those things doesn’t change what are several steps that add up to government censorship,” said Michelle Deutchman, executive director of the National Center for Free Speech and Civic Engagement at the University of California.“

Fear in the Press:

The First Amendment of the United States Constitution protects freedom of the press, which is the right to publish and distribute information. This right is part of the freedom of expression, which is also protected by the First Amendment.

On his campaign trail and in interviews, Trump has suggested that since he is now in the White House, he will exact vengeance on news outlets that anger him. Specifically, President Trump has said he has threatened to “toss reporters in jail and strip major television networks of their broadcast licenses as retribution for coverage he didn’t like.”

According to NPR, one in three journalists say they have faced violence and or the threat of it from either President Trump or the White House. A newer survey conducted by the International Women’s Media Foundation says that 36% of women surveyed have been threatened with or experiencing physical violence while working as a journalist – especially at Trump campaigns or rallies.

In a post published on his Truth Social platform last Wednesday, Trump vowed to “sue some of these dishonest authors and book publishers, or even media in general,” saying that they make up dishonest stories about him and “a big price should be paid for this blatant dishonesty”.

Legal experts argue that such threats could have a chilling effect on free speech, discouraging journalists and publishers from reporting on political figures out of fear of legal retaliation. Despite Trump’s threats, media law experts suggest that successful lawsuits against journalists and publishers remain unlikely, because under the First Amendment, the government, including the president, cannot punish or suppress speech just because it is critical or unfavorable.

This begs the question, what does the future look like for free speech in America? Since we already see the President himself trying to block the media from their free press rights in just the first few months of his presidency, what is it going to look like a few years from now?