stLouISTTrump-Paramount mediation is toxic for all involved
Dear Friend of Press Freedom,
It’s the 94th day that Rümeysa Öztürk is facing deportation by the United States government for writing an op-ed it didn’t like. More press freedom news below.
Paramount should abandon mediation with Trump. So should the mediator
Earlier this week, CBS News filed a strong brief outlining why President Donald Trump’s lawsuit over the editing of its 2024 interview with Kamala Harris is completely frivolous and an affront to the First Amendment.
But just days later, The Wall Street Journal reported that a mediator had proposed CBS owner Paramount Global settle the suit for $20 million. It’s been reported that Paramount — believing the Trump administration will block its merger with Skydance Media if it doesn’t settle – had previously offered $15 million, which Trump declined, demanding at least $25 million.
We wrote about why the unnamed mediator needs to consider their ethical obligations to not facilitate what may amount to an illegal bribe. Read more here.
Stop prosecuting journalist who exposed antisemitism
The Trump administration loves to position itself as an enemy of antisemitism. But it has continued its predecessor’s legally dubious prosecution of journalist Tim Burke, who found outtakes of a 2022 antisemitic rant by Ye, formerly Kanye West, that Fox News cut from a Tucker Carlson interview.
We’ve written before about why the government’s legal theories are nonsense, but there’s also the issue of why two presidential administrations thought it was a wise use of prosecutorial discretion to go after someone who clearly did a public good.
Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF) Advocacy Director Seth Stern, along with Bobby Block of the Florida First Amendment Foundation, urged the administration to drop the case in USA Today. Read more here.
Putting public records to use
Federal agencies are closing their Freedom of Information Act offices, disappearing information from their websites, no longer creating records, and possibly even inappropriately destroying them. At the local level, we’re seeing legislation introduced across various states that would make it easier for local governments to ignore requests they don’t like.
To discuss how the public can use public records requests to fight back against mounting secrecy, we hosted a webinar June 24 with Washington Post FOIA Director Nate Jones, MuckRock CEO Michael Morisy, investigative journalist and author Miranda Spivack, and FPF’s Daniel Ellsberg Chair on Government Secrecy Lauren Harper. Watch it here.
What’s going on in Greene County?
Earlier this month, FPF and the Society of Professional Journalists led a letter to Steve Catalano, chair of the Greene County Board of Supervisors, objecting to a policy that reportedly prohibited county employees from speaking to the press and required them to label anything they provide to the press as “opinion.”
In response, the county claimed that the policy does not exist, despite several county employees reportedly telling local newspaper The Daily Progress that they could not speak to the media about public records requests they’d denied due to the policy.
To resolve any confusion among reporters and county employees under the impression that there’s a gag order, we posted the exchange on our website. Read more here.
What we’re reading
‘They’re not breathing’: Inside the chaos of ICE detention center 911 calls (Wired). This important story is available to read for free, thanks to Wired’s partnership with FPF to unpaywall FOIA-based reporting. Other outlets should follow suit.
DeKalb solicitor-general dismisses charges against journalist Mario Guevara (Atlanta Civic Circle). Dropping charges is nice, but too little, too late after they handed the journalist (who has a legal work authorization) over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
‘Giving information to the enemy’: Israel’s ban on Al Jazeera extends to foreign broadcasters (The Dissenter). It was obvious from the outset that Israel’s Al Jazeera ban was a pretext for further censorship. The same goes for U.S. efforts to crack down on foreign media.
The Paramount risk in settling Trump’s lawsuit: ‘Bribery’? (The Wall Street Journal). The Journal’s editorial board writes that, instead of caving to Trump, Paramount should “win the legal case [and] vindicate its CBS journalists and the First Amendment.”
White House to limit intelligence sharing, skip Gabbard at Senate Iran briefing (The Washington Post). The public should know if the Trump administration is lying about its Iran strike. Leaks undermining the administration’s claims aren’t an excuse for secrecy — they are a reason to declassify the underlying records.
