Trump is now one of the "world’s worst press freedom predators" per Reporters without Borders

Added: 2026-05-07

[00:00:00]And welcome back to the Dino Midal show.

[00:00:01]Right now, very happy to have on the show Clayton Weamers, executive director of Reporters Without Borders, an international not forprofit. Been working 35 years to promote defend journalism around the world. Clayton, thanks so much for being on, especially the day after World Press Freedom Day.

[00:00:15]It's perfect timing for you here.

[00:00:17]>> It is indeed. And in fact, it's it's more like World Press Freedom season. It seems to get longer every year.

[00:00:22]>> Yeah, you should at least have a week. I mean, it can't just be a day. This is too important what's going on. So I want to talk about a new report that came out. It's really alarming. Also reporting that you did for about Donald Trump being a predator on in terms of press freedom. But tell people what the work is of Reporters Without Borders.

[00:00:40]>> Yeah. So we're an international NGO. We call ourselves the world's largest organization devoted to the safety, independence, and pluralism of journalism. Uh in short, we work for press freedom. Um but we really believe that press freedom is a two-way street.

[00:00:53]It's not just about defending uh journalist safety. It's all about uh defending everyone's access to information. Press freedom is everyone's right. And so we are all over the place.

[00:01:04]We have 15 offices around the world in different countries. We have a network of 150 correspondents covering the rest of the world. Uh I run our office out of Washington DC that oversees North America. And you know these days that's quite a lot of focusing on the United States. I mean, considering that your organization is calling out people who are bad actors with the press, do you guys get incoming fire from some of these autocrats or aspiring autocrats and press?

[00:01:29]>> Oh, oh, de Oh, definitely. We have we have a nice tracking sheet of all the official responses to our uh our index every year. And you know, I think uh my colleagues who have it worse are my colleagues over in Taipei uh who are under constant attack by the Chinese Communist Party for their uh you know, very principled objective reporting on what's going on in Hong Kong especially.

[00:01:51]Uh one of my colleagues was actually expelled from Hong Kong last year. So you know it's I take it as a a badge of honor anytime one of these authoritarian regimes uh decides it's worth their time to attack us. Last year Russia officially designated us an undesirable organization. So that's really a sign that we're we're doing the good work.

[00:02:08]>> Yeah, very much so. So let's talk about there was a great report done by reports without borders on your website that noted Trump's second term increasingly repressive US president on track to join ranks of world's worst freedom of press freedom predators. Explain to people a little bit about what that would mean and what some examples that stand out because you have a whole long list in the article of things Trump has done.

[00:02:31]When people read them and I can't encourage them enough, it is startling.

[00:02:34]It does not look like the United States of America you're reading about, but you're reading about a country like Russia or China or some autocratic regime someplace else.

[00:02:41]>> Well, that's exactly right. And look, not not much of what Trump has done in his second term has been uh completely out of left field. And in fact, when he was reelected in 2024, we had a meeting and we put together a list of 24 discreet items that we were going to be watching out for threat potential threats to press freedom. and in that first year he checked off 20 items from that list. Uh so, you know, that's just to say that it's predictable. It's a playbook. They they keep copying each other. Um but what we really wanted to sound the alarm about with that report is that it can get it can get easy to lose sight of the big picture and the daily churn of the news and the constant stream of Trump's attacks on our institutions and our democracy. But it's worth stepping back and looking at it all together. And you can't escape the conclusion that what's happening is a concerted effort. It is a campaign to weaken press freedom in this country.

[00:03:41]And you know, you take any one of those items that we listed in that article and it in it of itself would be a scandal in normal times and we just kind of keep blowing right past them. Whether it's his banning the AP from the White House or whether it's completely defunding public media or weaponizing the DOJ and the FCC to go after the media he doesn't like. You know, these are these are the extreme steps of quasi authoritarian regimes and and we've seen this before.

[00:04:08]We've seen it in Hungary, in Turkey, in Russia. It's not new.

[00:04:13]>> No. And that's a point I made from since Trump came into power. It's rarely original. You know, it's sort of the idea like the benality of evil. It's also the benality of these wannabe tyrants. It's it's not original. It it's just typical things they copy from each other and certain things that you cited, everyone remembers the FCC going after Jimmy Kimmel last year. But Donald Trump again, you know, postating that report just a week ago called for in writing that Jimmy Kimmel will be fired. His wife called for it as well. And then Brendan Carr, the FCC chair, announces that as an early review of the owned and affiliates operated by ABC, Disney.

[00:04:52]What's your reaction to the latest thing? Because he's not slowing down. I mean, this is he might be getting less popular, but he doesn't care. He's leaning into this.

[00:04:59]>> Yeah, definitely. You know, kind of like a like a a cornered animal almost. But this latest threat from Brendan Carr in the FCC, I think it's probably the most serious overreach against the First Amendment. the FCC has ever undertaken in its history. And you know, I'm not I'm not the FCC historian or or the, you know, telecommunications lawyer, but I've talked to people who are, and they, you know, that's what they're telling me is they they can't they could never have imagined the FCC getting to the place it is today. The FCC is supposed to be an independent agency, a regulatory body, right? And when Brendan Carr was simply a commissioner on the FCC under President Biden, uh he would have agreed with that. In fact, I know he would have because he said so. He said that the FCC is an independent agency and that we shouldn't play political favorites. And as soon as he became chairman and President Trump uh or President Trump made him chairman, that tune has changed. Uh he has explicitly endorsed the idea that the FCC is not an independent agency and that exists to enact the president's policy. So that's why he's turned the FCC, which should be an independent agency, into a political arm of the MAGA movement.

[00:06:06]And you know, some of the things when reading it reminded me of little things that deserve more attention. I'm so glad you highlighted. For example, one, the Trump's DOJ rescended a policy that prevented reporters phone records from being searched. Why is that significant?

[00:06:21]So, there's been some little things happening behind the scenes at the DOJ that, you're right, don't get quite as much attention. And, you know, I understand why, but the the Biden administration issued some very good guidance when Merrick Garland was the attorney general to law enforcement agencies about how to handle uh the press in the field and how to interact uh with the media in the course of your investigations. Uh, and we saw that rescended by the Trump administration with really no particularly good reason except that a little while later we had Caroline Levit on TV talking about uh the raid on Hannah Nathansson's home uh the Washington Post reporter uh who was uh raided by the FBI and they took her devices and she pointed that uh policy as you know thank god that we got rid of that that Biden era policy that allows us to go after journalists and you know it's worth pausing on This the FBI busting in the door of a reporter who whose specific beat is on government whistleblowers should be really really scary to all of us. And they still have her laptops and her phones both personal and professional. They took her Garmin watch uh which tells me that they're trying to figure out where she was when and when she was talking to different people.

[00:07:39]This has an extraordinarily chilling effect on anyone in the government who's going to think about coming forward in the future to expose wrongdoing or or corruption in the government. I don't care which political party you belong to. That's a bad thing for American democracy. I think we can all agree on that. No. And I Clayton, I so appreciate that you you took it to the next step of where it goes because I don't want people to think this is just Trump or anyone being an authoritarian for that.

[00:08:05]The idea they just want to concentrate power. There's a goal less transparency, less having people people will not feel uncomfortable to go to the media and tell them as a whistleblower because they're g the Trump administration is going to find out who you spoke to, who your undisclosed your anonymous sources are that generally are protected. So that's very important. There's another thing you pointed out and this probably ring the bell for people, but that Pete Hex limited access for credentials per press to the Pentagon unless you agree to their policy essentially just printing what they approve of, which is outrageous stuff. And I know some journalists walked out last year and then they filled it with people who were like not journalists like Laura Loomer and stuff like that. Um what are your concerns there and where does that stand? Because I saw different things where the courts saying well they can have access and then Trump they countered that. So what's going on with that?

[00:08:53]>> Yeah there's ongoing litigation and as all things with the courts it takes a while you know and the you know reporters and media organizations don't really like being in this position to have to sue the government. They do it when it's absolutely necessary uh to protect their access to protect the first amendment. But by and large, you know, reporters don't want to be the story. They want to be telling the story. And so inserting themselves that way is really a last resort in any of these situations. But I am glad that in this case uh there is an ongoing lawsuit to restore access to the Pentagon. Uh it is I absurd on its face. You know, there's been a long tradition of reporters having offices in the Pentagon, having access to the briefing room, being able to walk the halls freely. It's not like they're walking into highly classified briefings and just wandering in and taking taking documents and and chatting with spies.

[00:09:42]And that's that that is not what's happening. Uh what is happening is uh it's they're just kind of going out of their way to make life a little more inconvenient for these journalists. But, you know, let me tell you, uh, they no journalist needed to get into the Pentagon to get added to Pete Heads signal group, uh, planning bombings in the Middle East. Uh, no reporter had to have access to the Department of Defense's uh, facilities in order to report on the air strikes on fishing boats in South America uh, that were purportedly uh, drug boats. Uh, so at the end of the day, reporters are going to do their jobs. They're they're tenacious people. They don't get into this because they're easily pushed around. U but at the same time, we can't accept a government that is just going to shut itself off from the outside world. The press are the representatives of the public. There are eyes and ears in places that we cannot go. And you know, I think we lose sight of this sometimes because in talking about press rating, we're always talking about, you know, journalist this, journalist that.

[00:10:42]We don't defend journalists because they're special people. We defend them because of the social role that they fulfill in our in our in our world. And any attack on the press is actually an attack on all of our right to know, our right to have information.

[00:10:57]>> Absolutely. And it's a very important point. You another thing that you flagged that Trump purposely helped facilitate the sale of if it gets closed of CNN to the Ellison's and they already bought you know David Ellison's the head through his dad Larry Ellison funded it of CBS News which already has taken a really a a turn into being at least more proTrump I have to say objectively speaking. What are your concerns now if this deal closes and that the Ellison's not only own CBS News but CNN as well?

[00:11:27]The concerns are pretty widespread. I mean, you know, just on its face, we're going to see journalists get laid off and there's already an economic crisis in the news media industry.

[00:11:37]Consolidation has led to fewer jobs for journalists and then that is inevitably what happens in these mergers. Uh we're going to see fewer independent voices in the media with a handful of oligarchs being able to control most of the mainstream media. That that's deeply concerning to us. That's also, by the way, one of the things that we see happening in countries that are backsliding in democracy like like Hungary. Um, it's also deeply concerning that the president has inserted himself into a business deal in a way that suggests that he has clear expectations of softer coverage or more favorable coverage from an Ellisonowned CNN. And Pete Hexth has said so himself. He said, "I, you know, I can't wait until uh Ellison gets in charge of CNN." The last time a CNN reporter asked him a question he didn't like. Um, and you know, it's not just this Paramount deal either. Uh, Trump has been playing kingmaker on a bunch of different deals. One that gets a little bit less attention is the merger between NextStar and Tegna. These are two, uh, very large owners of television stations all around the country. Uh, these are the companies that actually own the local affiliate station that you watch. So, you may watch it as ABC, CBS, NBC. It's probably owned by Tegna. Nextar or Sinclair or or one of several other smaller companies, but NextStar and Teagna are merging to form a much larger company and the FCC has waved its own rules that limit broadcast consolidation. And so currently the rule stands that you can't have a company that can reach more than 39% of households in a market. Uh this new deal will bump up their reach to over 90%. So more than doubling what they can sorry more than 80% more than doubling what they can already reach. Um and it's not that they uh did away with the rule. They just ignored it for this one-time deal because these are companies that happen to be friendly to the president right now and that uh they want and they want to see this deal go through. But you know if if a future deal were to come along with media owners who perhaps the president doesn't like, I would expect they will not wave that rule. So, it's this very uh capricious style of regulation that is doing favors for the president's allies while kicking everyone else to the curb.

[00:13:58]>> Yeah. And it's very uh reminiscent of what happened in Hungary. Although the democracy worked and it still upheld and Orban was defeated, but by the end there, I saw estimates that Orban's oligarchs and people sympathetic to him are on his side own 75 or 80% of the mainstream media. Now, there's some independent media, a little bit, not as robust as America, but there were some.

[00:14:20]But that is just remarkable. Now, in a country this big, the good thing is it's a country this big. So, there's so many other small independent media outlets that are sprouting up all the time and YouTube shows and others. But I mean, are you concerned at some point Trump takes his attention and this DOJ and FC, not the FCC, doesn't apply, but DOJ tries to investigate companies like Alphabet, which owns YouTube and is a home for many things that are critical of Donald Trump. Maybe Twitch, maybe because I don't think it'll be individual shows as much as it will be the platforms themselves they go after, hoping they self-censor, even Substack where a lot of liberal voices go.

[00:14:58]I you know that that is a concern to me and I I think what's happening right now is a real test if if he he's allowed to to get away with these highly politically motivated investigations.

[00:15:12]It's only going to empower him to to go further with this. But you know, I'll also say he already has essentially won over the heads of major tech companies that control the information pipelines in our digital ecosystem. uh you know Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, uh these are guys who are regularly going to the White House, uh you know the the the big AI companies, all the Silicon Valley investors uh and venture capitalists, they all really seem to have fallen in line with the president for the most part. And even Google seems to have uh been pretty willing to to play ball here. And that's that's the real sign uh you know that these guys these guys understand what's going on. They're not stupid. They may or may not support him politically, and I think that's kind of beside the point. They understand that in order to get something done in a Trump administration, he won't tolerate any kind of disscent and and he wants he wants you to go and flatter him and by the way, maybe make a million-doll contribution to the library or to the uh to the uh transition committee, what have you. So, you know, they know how the game is played.

[00:16:17]>> Very much so. I mean, how concerned are you that and and tell us if you've seen this in other countries where some media ownerships, media outlets, they might not even like the leader, but they self censor to avoid any kind of in getting the wrath of that leader because that's a concern here I have in America where we watch sometime the coverage not being as objectively critical of things Trump is doing and and picking other stories to run that may seem Trump more more popular than he is right now. But but looking at other countries, is is that something that we see? So something we have to be on guard for here.

[00:16:53]>> It is and it's really hard to measure because if you're self-censoring by definition, that story didn't get out there. And so how do we know what we don't know? There is there are some instances of this though. I talk to international and uh and foreign reporters who are working here in the United States all the time and they are super concerned that if they just publish the wrong story, they're going to suddenly see that their visa has been suspended and they they ask me things like, you know, should I be pursuing stories like this or should I be passing them off to my citizen colleagues and and let them take the by line. Uh that that's super concerning, especially because the administration has also introduced a new proposal to severely restrict the visas for foreign correspondents. Uh right now there's a 5-year visa that you can get as an international journalist. They want to make it 8 months. Uh and you know, if you ever worked in journalism, you know, uh you can't do the job for 8 months.

[00:17:44]You know, settling into a new country alone is going to take that long to build your sources and get your bearings. Uh and so, you know, that's something that we're pushing back strongly against. But it's it it's tricky because, you know, this isn't something that is going to directly affect Americans and so there's not a huge political constituency here. Uh the people who it will affect are not likely to speak out because they're already vulnerable and not really sure what their what their rights are in this situation and and so that you know that's why this is one of the issues that we're working strongly with uh in order to push back against it.

[00:18:15]>> I so appreciate having you on Clayton to raise that issue about the work visa for foreign journalists. I never even heard about that. I mean, there's so much news all the time. We end up going to the gravitating to the bigger stories or things that I have a connection to. But the idea of taking a work visa down from 5 years to 8 months, we know why. You write articles critical of the Trump administration, you don't get renewed.

[00:18:33]You're gone. You have to leave the country. And that will cause at the very least self-censorship or overt censorship when they just throw them out of the country. And good luck reporting.

[00:18:41]You could report, but it's much better when your sources are here and you can speak to them.

[00:18:45]>> Exactly. And and by the way, that's what we see in Hong Kong. In in Hong Kong, the Chinese authorities don't expel journalists just because they didn't like a story. They just wait for the visa to uh be up for renewal and don't renew it and they don't give a reason.

[00:18:59]Uh that has happened, you know, a dozen times in the past couple of years um with foreign reporters. And the idea that we're now thinking about potential policies in the United States that mirror the Chinese Communist Party control of the media, that's scary to me. that that should not be the conversation we're having.

[00:19:20]>> You know, we can't answer this question unless you have some insight. I don't think it's a coincidence. Again, starting out from what I said earlier, the they copy each other. The the aspiring autocrat, the aspiring tyrant, they look at what's worked in other nations and they just try to replicate it in their own scenario that can work.

[00:19:37]So, does does Trump himself know what Chinese Communist Party's doing? No. Does someone in his administration see that?

[00:19:45]I am I would say very likely without being able to prove it. I'm a lawyer so I need some evidence but I think it's very likely that yes they see it. They read about and they go let's do that here. And it's deeply concerning as you said that the US government under Trump is following policies the Chinese Communist Party in terms of restraining robust freedoms for the press.

[00:20:05]>> Yeah, that's absolutely right. And you know, I don't think they'd ever say out loud that we would copy uh Chinese policy because that would be, you know, even politically toxic uh with it with their own base.

[00:20:15]>> But they do they are not shy about saying we really like what Victor Orban's doing in Hungary. We need to do a bit more of that here. And you know, there are times when they'll say, "We really like what Vladimir Putin's doing over in Russia. We like a little bit more of that over here." Like they, you know, they're not making us work to connect these dots. My my favorite example is actually going in the other direction uh in the very early days of Trump 2.0. 0 the uh Serbian authorities raided the offices of the country's largest fact checker and when the Ministry of Justice put out a press release to explain why they did it, they said, "Well, we know that this particular organization has taken money from USAD and USAD is a criminal organization, which we now know because of Elon Musk and Doge." So, they did not they didn't have to work hard, make us work hard to connect the dots there.

[00:21:02]They're telling us explicitly, oh, the United States is telling us that press freedom doesn't matter anymore. We can do whatever we want.

[00:21:08]>> It's unbelievable. And I appreciate you sharing that. So, let's talk about the new report that came out, Reports Without Borders, World Press Freedom Index. And now it's the average score, the lowest in 25 years in this survey and that countries are now falling into what's known as difficult or very serious categories for press freedom.

[00:21:26]What can you share that you found?

[00:21:28]Yeah. So, you know, the US is really not an outlier. Uh, seeing a decline in press freedom. We are at an all-time low in the rankings. We're now 64th out of 180 countries. That's hugely concerning.

[00:21:38]But we're not the only country that that's suffering here. And I think one of the alarming things also is that it's not just the authoritarian regimes are becoming more authoritarian. It's the democracies that are weakening around the world. Uh, we're seeing a negative trend in most countries. Uh, that's scary. And the the number one thing that stuck out to us this year compared to last year is and and we look at five different indicators on on how we measure press freedom, but the one that took the biggest hit is the legal indicator. Uh the things that measure the the legal infrastructure in place and we really are seeing two trends there. One is that the uh legal protections intended to safeguard journalism and access to information are being weakened or eroded in so many countries around the world. And then on the other hand, you have the increasing abusive use or weaponization of other types of laws against journalism. And this is especially true of national security laws being used in a way to stifle speech expression uh and the free press.

[00:22:39]>> It's and you're saying it's part of a global trend right now. And I mean this is there a pendulum swing that you've seen that Reports Without Borders has covered? I don't mean on its own. It has to people have to do something. I mean the victory in Orb in of defeating Orban in Hungary might have an impact in Hungary. Maybe it spills over to other countries but what should we be doing to protect the freedom of press?

[00:23:01]>> Yeah, look these things do change. Uh and we we have seen these things swing.

[00:23:06]A couple years ago, Brazil had an election and you know that changed the situation there quite a bit and Brazil has risen on the index as a result. Uh the country that rose the most this year was Syria. It went up 36 spots. Uh and that's almost entire it is entirely due to the fall of the Assad regime which was one of the most repressive in the world and they were among the top bottom three countries moving up 36 spots.

[00:23:29]They're still you know in in a tough spot on the index but that is a huge step in the right direction. So these things change, you know, it's not static and it is really up to us whether or not we're going to accept the deterioration of our freedoms. And you know, RSF is not the only organization that's noticing this. By the way, there have been a couple reports coming out in the past month uh that measure different indicators of democracy. Um the Freedom House annual report found largely the same results as we did. uh VDEM, this organization in the Varieties of Democracies Institute, uh put out a really great report that found that American democracy has now reached World War II levels. Um especially when it comes to freedom of speech and freedom of the press. Um that we have now gone back to a before the civil rights era uh with our democratic institutions. So, you know, this is not all happening in a vacuum. This is happening in the context of broader democratic backsliding.

[00:24:27]Sometimes I wonder it's a it's a chicken and the egg problem. Are we seeing problems in our democracy because freedom of the press is waning or is freedom of the press waning because we have such problems with our democracy?

[00:24:38]And lastly I just want to touch on because we've talked about some repressive actions but you know thankfully in the US we had not had journalists killed um the way is in Gaza. I mean reports about borders noted more than 200 journalists. seen some more than 260 killed by the Israeli military and we don't see any kind of consequence for the killing of these journalists. And what is the concern that you have when this takes place?

[00:25:05]>> It's unfathomably cruel what is happening in Gaza? And you know, in a certain sense, journalists are victims of the war like many of the other civilians who have been killed in vast numbers by the Israeli military. Um but in the case of journalists you know we've been able to document many cases where the journalist is almost certainly being targeted uh that they are known to the IDF u because the IDF will carry out a slander campaign in the media for months before they target a journalist in order to label them as a Hamas terrorist and then they will carry on that slander after they've killed them and they will that is how they justify the killing of so many journalists is they say these aren't journalists these terrorists that were taking out. Uh but we know them, you know. Uh I think of like Isam Abdalah who was just on the other side of the Lebanese border in the first weeks of the war who was targeted with a double tap air strike, but he was just standing among a bunch of journalists with cameras and press painted on the top of their car on a hillside far away from any of the fighting. There was there's no chance that they were accidentally targeted. Uh it was it was intentional. or just a couple weeks ago, you know, they killed another journalist in Lebanon across the border and we were aware of it in real time and she did not die in the initial blast. She survived for several hours, but the IDF also blocked the Red Cross's access to the area. Uh, and we, you know, the international community was pleading with the Israelis to let up the the air strikes so that the Red Cross could get through and save her, but they never did.

[00:26:38]>> And that was the case of Amal Khalil.

[00:26:40]>> Exactly. And that was and I see it, you know, on my feed all the time. I have many Lebanese American friends who were flagging that all over. It's it's heartbreaking. And again, no consequence. So, it'll just be repeated over and over. But, >> well, no consequence yet. Uh, you know, one of the things that we believe strongly in is is reinforcing international justice mechanisms. And so, we do work with the ICC. We've been furnishing evidence, collecting uh everything that we can and and turning it over to the ICC prosecutor who, you know, they have also come under quite a bit of pressure from the United States and from the Israeli government uh over over this. But um you know, all we can do is keep doing the work and hope that one day, you know, the politics of all of this can change and we can seek accountability. Uh you know, things are not set in stone. It doesn't always have to be this way. And so we just have to prepare for that moment. You know, I do want to talk about one other aspect of this war that I think gets a little bit less attention obviously than the uh the horrific death toll, which is the blackout that has happened in Gaza since the start of this war. No international journalist has been permitted to access Gaza freely since the war started. And it it is outrageous that Israel has managed to maintain a complete blockade uh and has even arrested the journalists who are trying to to go into Gaza. The only images and stories we get out of that place are from brave gazin journalists themselves who are also being targeted in this war. And so, you know, I am not going to uh I I you know, we want the Israeli army to stop killing journalists. Uh but we also want the Israeli army to let journalists in and relieve the Gazan journalists who are doing all of the work. Let the international press. If you really have nothing to hide about what's going on in Gaza, what are you so afraid of letting the press see?

[00:28:27]>> I agree. And we've had numerous doctors who have been involved with doctor's reporters on the show who have served who've been there in Gaza who in a way become like reporters just sharing on my show over the last couple of years the horrors and tragedies they've seen. It's just been things I've never could believe could happen in our time here on the earth that you think would be something from World War I where there's a lack of humanity and it's happening there. So Clay, before I let you go, if people want to find out more about Reporters Without Borders, where can they go?

[00:28:53]>> They can go to rsf.org.

[00:28:56]We use our French acronym just to make it extra confusing for Americans or just Google reporters about borders.

[00:29:02]You'll find our website pretty easily that way. We're on most of the social media channels these days. Uh you can find us there too. And I really definitely check out the report. You know, we only really talked about uh basically three countries, the US and uh Gaza. Uh but we cover 180 countries with this report and we have data on all of them. We have uh descriptions of the situation in all of them. There's a ton of different ways to break down the data and interact with it. So, highly encourage folks to go check it out.

[00:29:30]>> Well, Clay, it was great meeting you and I hope you come back on again. You're doing phenomenal work. Stay strong. I'm I can only imagine the incoming that you get in other countries. You might even get from Trump going forward. But I look forward to chatting with you in the future.

[00:29:42]>> Thank you.