Donald Trump has made no secret about his disdain for a free and independent press, as guaranteed by the First Amendment to the Constitution.
During his 2016 presidential campaign and subsequent time in the White House, Trump castigated the mainstream media as the “enemy of the people” regarding any coverage he deemed critical of his own political viewpoints — or which he simply did not like for whatever reason.
Trump’s animosity toward journalists is well documented. He’s been raging against the news media unabated for the past decade.
Trump has threatened to jail reporters, shutter news organizations and punish big tech companies that don’t comply with his mandates.
During his presidency, Trump threatened Google, Facebook and Twitter over questionable political censorship for allegedly silencing conservative voices. Nonpartisan fact checkers proved Trump wrong.
The question now is whether the First Amendment can survive a second Trump presidency?
Trump’s threats to the media should be of serious concern to voters because they are anathema to the fundamental freedoms at the foundation of American democracy.
The new normal of government-controlled media
Based on Trump’s repeated words and actions it’s a real possibility that government-controlled media could become the new normal if he wins again.
An iteration of Fox News might become the only broadcast network. Trump News could force-feed propaganda and conspiracy theories of news events to hundreds of millions of Americans, and with no alternative journalism sources.
Long-time media outlets such as MSNBC, CNN, ABC News, NBC News, CBS News and others might become relics. Publicly financed independent programming, like National Public Radio, could become nonexistent.
The same goes for traditional print/digital media such as The New York Times, The Washington Post and dozens of other trusted news organizations which Trump classifies as “left-wing” and “fake news” or worse.
Trump recently asserted the broadcast license of CBS should be revoked and the news program “60 Minutes” should be banished from the airwaves (after he canceled a scheduled interview). Trump has threatened just about every media organization nationwide which has dared to be critical of him at one time or another.
Trump has also threatened to jail journalists. That’s why it’s instructive to recognize that autocratic regimes throughout history have resorted to the same corrosive phraseology which Trump has weaponized against the media, labeling it:
- The enemy of the people.
- The enemy of the state.
- The enemy from within.
If Trump returns to the White House, the American media landscape could radically shift to closely resemble an Orwellian massive government propaganda machine, as depicted in the iconic book “1984” (George Orwell’s prescient novel).
Do voters want the American media to resemble that of authoritarian countries like China, Russia and North Korea, with censorship of opposing viewpoints being the norm?
Warnings from Vice President Kamala Harris
Vice President Kamala Harris said the following last week (October 16th) during a campaign appearance in Bucks County, Pennsylvania:
- Trump’s threat “to use the military to silence political dissent will start with journalists” — who he has repeatedly maligned as “the enemy of the people” while in office and campaigning.
- “We know who he would target first because he has targeted and attacked them before: journalists whose stories he doesn’t like.”
- “He considers any American that doesn’t support him or bend to his will to be an enemy to our country, and he will use the military to go after them.”
- “Donald Trump is increasingly unstable and unhinged…and he is seeking unchecked power”.
Harris also described Trump’s authoritarian governing style as fueled by “chaos and instability” which is dangerous to democracy as we know it.
Harris cautioned that Trump is “unfit to serve” — a statement with which many Republicans who served under him agree, from Cabinet secretaries to White House senior advisors.
“When you listen to Donald Trump talk, it becomes increasingly clear that he has no idea what he’s talking about,” Harris said regarding Trump’s recent self-proclamation, “I’m the father of IVF.”
VP Harris predicts that Trump “will sit in the Oval Office plotting retribution, stewing in his own grievances, and think only about himself and not you.”
Watchdog, not lapdog
Trump’s reckless relationship with the news media — and with the truth generally — is unprecedented for any former president or candidate for the presidency.
The Founding Fathers intended the news media to be a watchdog, not a lapdog, on government malfeasance. This was the case before and after the invention of an advanced printing press during the Industrial Revolution.
It’s important to recognize that there has always been historical tension between the federal government and the free press.
For example, during the late 1890s newspapers were accused of “yellow journalism.” In the early 20th century, investigative reporters were dubbed “muckrakers.”
Fast forward to the Watergate era. The Nixon Administration lashed out at the press, castigating the media as “nattering nabobs of negativism.”
To reiterate, the adversarial nature of the government-media relationship is ingrained in the practice of journalism.
Ironically, the back and forth, tug-of-war, cat and mouse interaction between the government and media is an inherent aspect of a functionally effective free press in a democratic society.
But under Trump, the adversarial nature of government-media relations was abusive and self-defeating to providing accurate and timely information to the public.
“The press should be not only a collective propagandist and collective agitator, but also a collective organizer of the masses” — Vladimir Lenin, Russian revolutionary.
The free press is a cornerstone of democracy
The problem for the media and public has always been that Trump lives in a parallel universe of propaganda, one in which lies substitute for truth.
But make no mistake, this is not an innocent oversight. Rather, it’s a well calculated communication strategy to confuse the public until it doesn’t know what to believe anymore. It’s a clear plan to deflect, distract and dismantle the truth.
Lest Trump forget, a free and independent press is a critical cornerstone of democracy.
It connotes that government officials have an inherent responsibility to tell the truth and engage in constructive dialogue with the news media so citizens can obtain the facts, not fiction.
Trump’s troubling relationship with the truth is eerily reminiscent of the Big Lie Theory perpetuated by Joseph Goebbels, the German propagandist for the Nazi Party of Adolf Hitler.
The Big Lie Theory, which Trump has championed, is based on the premise that the bigger and more pervasive the lie, the more the public perceives it as truth.
That’s exactly what Trump has done by insisting for years, without evidence, that the 2020 election was “rigged” because he lost — along with a host of other crazy conspiracy theories since then.
Interestingly, Trump’s former chief of staff, General John F. Kelly (retired), told The New York Times that Trump praised Hitler in private conversations. This followed similar reporting by The Atlantic.
“Think of the press as a great keyboard on which the government can play” — Joseph Goebbels, chief Nazi propagandist.
“Enemy of the People”
Next time you witness Trump castigating the free and independent press as “the enemy of the people” or “fake news” ask yourself these questions:
- Is this what American democracy and freedom of the press looks like?
- Is this the example the USA wants to showcase to the advanced industrialized world, Third World countries and banana republics alike?
Before answering, consider some other so-called “strong men” who intentionally abused the term “enemy of the people” (or something similar) to mislead the masses by maligning the media or other segments of society:
- China’s former communist leader Mao Zedong said, “Members of society are divided into two major categories: the people and the class enemy.”
- Soviet dictator Vladimir Lenin said in 1917: “All leaders of the Constitutional Democratic Party, a party filled with enemies of the people, are hereby to be considered outlaws, and are to be arrested immediately and brought before the revolutionary court.”
- Nikita Khrushchev said in a 1956 speech to the Soviet Communist Party: “The formula enemy of the people was specifically introduced for the purpose of physically annihilating such individuals.”
- Hugo Chavez, the autocrat and disgraced former ruler of Venezuela, once called the media “enemies of the homeland.”
- Former military rulers of Myanmar (Burma) referred to the media as an “enemy of the state.”
- Richard Nixon, the disgraced U.S. president, said in a taped phone conversation with a top military leader: “The press is your enemy…Enemies. Understand that? Because they’re trying to stick the knife right in our groin.”
“Ideas are more powerful than guns. We would not let our enemies have guns. Why would we let them have ideas?” — Joseph Stalin, 20th century Soviet dictator.
The takeaway: the free press is at stake
It should be clear to all that Trump wants to trample on the fundamental freedoms which form the pillar of democracy.
That could begin with the elimination of the free and independent press protected by the Constitution.
Trump’s hostile rhetoric toward journalists has historically been used by dictators and despots who aim to silence or shut down the media. That’s straight out of the “dictator’s playbook” — as experts on authoritarianism have warned.
Trump’s draconian discourse against the institution of journalism is the antithesis of how government functions in the world’s greatest democracy.
Any U.S. president who perpetually attacks a free and independent press in such a vicious manner is himself an enemy of the norms and moral values which form the fabric of American society.
In addition to being dangerous to democratic governance, it’s pathetic that Trump has such a fragile ego and insecurity complex. He simply can’t withstand any scrutiny or criticism whatsoever.
That’s why Trump lashes out at the media like a whining child who can’t get his way.
The potential death of a free press under another Trump presidency should be highly alarming to all citizens, regardless of their political and ideological differences.
There’s a real possibility that government-run media may become the new normal as journalism is outlawed during a second Trump term in the White House.
Voters should take this into account when casting their ballots for the president.
Photo credit – Wikimedia Commons
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