About the Guest:
Timothy Richardson is the Program Director, Journalism and Disinformation. Timothy previously worked as an Editor at The Washington Post for thirteen years, where he served as the Breaking News Editor on the Metro Desk, placing him in the center of some of the nation’s highest-profile stories, including the protests that followed the killing of George Floyd and the Storming of the U.S. Capitol. Richardson oversaw accountability-driven reporting of the infrastructure law, the airline industry, transit systems, and the federal Department of Transportation. Richardson’s role at the Post was focused on launching and running day-to-day operations of the organization’s foray into hyperlocal news. He began his journey as the Digital Managing Editor of the Las Vegas Sun, then returned to The Post as the Metro Staff’s Digital Editor, strengthening its digital-first strategy. His earlier roles included serving as Digital Editor for the Naples (Fla.) Daily News and the Topeka (Kan.) Capital-Journal, helping each legacy print publication to establish a digital presence and strategy. Richardson is a graduate of Kansas State University.
Episode Transcript:
CORY BARKER: On January 14th, federal agents showed up at the home of Hannah Natanson, a Washington Post journalist. But instead of providing information, they were there to collect it. They arrived with a search warrant, agency's phones and electronic devices as part of an investigation that, according to reporting, was aimed at identifying the journalist sources for press freedom advocates. The search crossed a line long treated as fundamental in American journalism; the idea that reporters should be able to protect the people who speak to them. The incident didn't happen in isolation. It came amid months of escalating pressure on news organizations that include political attacks, legal threats, ownership changes and growing concerns about the influence of powerful interests inside major media companies. For many journalists, it's starting to feel like the guardrails that once protected the press are eroding.
MATT JORDAN: To help us make sense of this moment, what it says about the current state of press freedom, we're talking with Tim Richardson. He's the program director for journalism and disinformation at PEN America, where he focuses on threats to press freedom and the spread of false information. Before that, Tim spent more than a decade at The Washington Post, including time as a breaking news editor during some of the country's most consequential events, from the protests following the killing of George Floyd to the storming of the US Capitol. We're going to talk with him about The Washington Post journalist, read the broader political climate for journalists and what it means when the institutions meant to protect the free press start to change. Cory wasn't able to take part in this conversation, so I'll be talking to Tim one-on-one. Tim Richardson, welcome to News Over Noise.
TIM RICHARDSON: Thank you for having me.
MATT JORDAN: So, tell me a little bit about or tell us a little bit about PEN America. You know, its history and what it does.
TIM RICHARDSON: Sure. So, PEN America is a 103-year-old nonpartisan nonprofit. And we're focused at the intersection of literature and human rights to support free expression. And I kind of think of it as there's kind of two halves to the organization, really. One really focuses heavily on, you know, authors literary works. The other focuses heavily, and this is where my area is, on free expression. So, specifically, you know, I work on journalism and disinformation. We have teams that work on fighting book bans. We have teams that work toward advocating for higher education and other instances of free expression. But those are really the two kind of main kind of kind of the two main buckets of work, really within the organization.
MATT JORDAN: What was happening 102 years ago to… what was the impetus for the starting of PEN America?
TIM RICHARDSON: That is a great question. I will say PEN America is one of many, many PENs all across the world. So, while PEN America is the largest, it is certainly not the only PEN. They are, you know, there are organizations across the world. And so, we are really just one of many in that regard.
MATT JORDAN: Well, you know, the timing is about is correct in a way, insofar as for about a century, I guess that would have been after the around the time of the founding of PEN America, and then and for about a century, America was doing really well with press freedom. We were kind of continuing to be this kind of beacon on a hill. Other democracies would look at us we were compared with and then things started to slide a little bit. And so, over the last bit of time here, the, the Reporters Without Borders has an index of world press freedom. And the United States for the last decade or so has been, sliding. I think in the last count, in the 2005 press index, press Freedom index, we went from 55 to 57. And again, there are variety of reasons for that. But what has been happening into the press in America?
TIM RICHARDSON: So, this has been a long slide, I think, for, you know, a lot of reasons, many of them good. We focused a lot on some of the assaults against the First Amendment, the assault, assaults against the free press that have happened in recent years and maybe over the past 12 months. But assaults on a free press have not just happened, you know, just, over the past year or so, it's a lot of things have happened. And, you know, part of that is, I think the discrediting of, of the news media has been a huge part of that. We've seen that happening for years. Certainly, when Trump took office, during his first term, there was, a significant amount of rhetoric that was targeted at reporters and credible information. We've seen that, continue now. But I do think that in some cases, in some ways that has been effective. I mean, it just that's I think the reality we see, the trust in the news media is now at a historic low. I believe it was pegged at something like 28%, a few months ago. I think that a lot of that also has to do with the fractured media environment. Everyone is kind of, you know, choosing your own adventure. There is confirmation bias of people seeking out information, where they know their ideology and their viewpoints will not be challenged. And in some of those instances, there is, continued discrediting of, you know, you can call it the mainstream media, the legacy media. I like to say, you know, the kind of credible reporters, credible outlets. But there is that demonization and a lot of critical content, focused on, outlets that are providing credible information. And that has just kind of whittled down the trust in the news media over the years. And I think a lot of that is why we are where we are in this moment.
MATT JORDAN: Yeah, a lot of the start of the attack of the on the press, you know, starts around, around the late 60s, you know, with the kind of, attack on the bias of journalists. Right? That was that became a strategy other than, well, other than degrading the trust of the public. What is some of the outcome of divisive rhetoric, like calling reporters enemy of the people and stuff like that?
TIM RICHARDSON: Yeah, I mean, we've seen right. Reporters, you know, certainly enemy of the people was something that came out a few years ago. But I think what we saw… we've moved from a lot of the rhetoric that we saw, you know, in the first Trump administration to more recently over these past, 12, 13 months, a lot of action. And I think that is really what makes this moment different. And it is not just the White House. It is much of the entire administration that has implemented policies, regulation, you know, from the standpoint of the FCC to really harm a free press. And, you know, I mean, you mentioned some of the insults we've seen. The president called reporters piggy, terrible, making critical comments about their appearance, certainly their intelligence. And it's definitely worth noting that the vast majority of these insults have targeted female reporters as well. And, you know, we do continue to see those insults, creep up, along with a lot of the other, you know, it's not just rhetoric, but it's action. And it’s lawsuits. And I'm sure we'll talk a lot about a lot more about some of those things that we're seeing. But there are certainly has been a very intense escalation in a lot of these actions, and rhetoric, but also, you know, actions and lawsuits and those sorts of things that have happened over the last several months,
MATT JORDAN: Given the scope of the many patterns around the world, you know, free press associations around the world, how much of this is stuff that others have seen around the world? And what does it usually portend to?
TIM RICHARDSON: I think that's a great question, because a lot of our work in the press freedom space focused overseas, for, you know, several years ago, we weren't doing a lot of press freedom work in the United States in the way that we are now, because there wasn't really the same need for it. You know, the press is, I think, was more respected. Certainly, the threats to a free press were a fraction of what they were now. But that has changed. A lot of organizations, PEN America included, have focused, significantly, their work on defending a free press in the United States because it is under attack in ways that we've never seen in modern history. So, you know, some of those resources that have been used, and not just PEN, but many organizations, you know, press freedom organizations, have shifted resources back here to try to advocate for a free press, here in the US. And because it just wasn't something that was necessarily needed in the past.
MATT JORDAN: So, let's get into some of the details of that. You said a second ago that what we're seeing in the last, you know, 12 months or so and maybe some of this kind of started in the first Trump administration is of a different type of coercion. And we had little bit of coercion. We might have had some access, you know, kind of denying people access before. But what has changed that has been surprising to you?
TIM RICHARDSON: So, there really has been an onslaught of actions targeting a free press. But I think you have to take it, you know, there's a bigger picture here. And that is the really, you know, kind of the targeting of credible information that would allow the administration to insert its narrative and try to dominate that narrative. If you can clamp down on the, on the, you know, credible information that's coming from outlets and journalists whose entire mission is to hold power to account, and you can insert your own narrative that, you know, that gives you more, more power to further your narrative. So, you know, look at the very first weeks in office when the White House, banished the Associated Press from the press pool over content, really, because the Associated Press refused to call the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America. That is a case that still winding its way through court. We've seen the Pentagon boot out the press corps, you know, outlets that have for decades held, the Pentagon and its leadership to account for its decisions. They were gone because they, you know, they, had to leave essentially because they refused to sign, an agreement with the Pentagon that, in essence, would not have allowed them to do journalism within the walls of the Pentagon. So, the Pentagon is still being held to account by credible reporters, but they're doing it from home, or they're doing it in their newsroom, as opposed to within the Pentagon itself. We've seen the president personally file lawsuits against media organizations over content that he doesn't like. We've seen the defunding of the U.S. agency for Global Media, which Voice of America is the outlet that's maybe what most well-known within that. But there are others, Voice of America and others are Radio Free Europe, Radio Free Asia. We've seen the defunding of public media, you know, NPR, PBS losing their federal funding. That's a move, of course, that Congress approved but at the request of the president. So, there is a very long line of attacks against the media that we have seen from the beginning of the administration through now. And, of course, more recently, we had the FBI raid against Washington Post reporter Hannah Natanson House, which was just unprecedented, we've had two arrests of journalists, Don Lemon and Georgia Fort. So those are, you know, there really has been a very significant escalation. And one of the things that's surprising to me is how I think there is a I think there's a lack of understanding or a lack of awareness. I, you know, from the public as to what exactly is happening from a press freedom standpoint. There was a study that was done earlier in the administration and Trump 2.0, looking at awareness, public awareness of the threats to a free press. And it is, you know, that the percentage of Americans who are aware of what is happening is roughly half, what it was during Trump's first term. That was a study that was done several months ago. It is quite possible that that awareness has increased. I haven't seen any, you know, updated surveys in that regard, but that is something that I have personally found alarming is just that lack of awareness there.
MATT JORDAN: You know, it's very surprising to me that there is a lack of awareness. Recently we saw, journalist basically being attacked on almost on screen, you know, in terms of because the video was available, we had in Minneapolis, we had six journalists who were attacked by ICE agents, John Abernathy, a photographer for Getty, Whitney Wild for CNN. Jalyssa Dugrot from MintPress News. JT Cestkowski from Status Coup, Jon Farina from Status Coup, KingDemetrius Pendleton from Listen Media. These are people that were attacked basically on screen. And yet the public still is sleeping on this. It seems, odd.
TIM RICHARDSON: Yeah. You know, we've seen these assaults against reporters happening in several places now, of course we saw them, you know, what's happened in Minneapolis in these last few weeks has been awful. And yet it follows what we saw earlier in Chicago, which, you know, follows earlier. You know, what we saw earlier in Los Angeles, we've seen this take place in New York. And so, this has happened all across the country. And we've seen journalists assaulted at the hands of ICE agents. And I think what is also, we also have to remember that some of the governments narratives that have come out of some of these events, and I'm specifically thinking about the shootings of Renée Good and Alex Peretti, how, you know, those are narratives where we're frankly not correct. I mean, there were there were false narratives, from the government. It was disinformation being peddled by the government. And I think that is another, it's forcing journalists to continue to do work reporting on these kinds of difficult stories at the same time, when there's an entire economic crisis around journalism, there are fewer reporters. And, of course, you know, as you mentioned, they're being attacked on American streets. And there is still a ton of fantastic journalism that is out there, incredible reporters, incredible outlets that are doing their best to hold, you know, the government to account, whether it's ICE, you know, lead other, other, federal officials within Minnesota here in Washington. So, I think people need to be careful and cautious about where they're getting their information, because if you're getting your information from the right places, you are getting credible information that is telling you exactly what is happening on the ground. Unfortunately, there are others who, for weather, political reasons or other financial reasons because, you know, maybe that knowing the way that social media algorithms work or they're feeding people lies, frankly, in some cases, or spin, if you want to put it a little bit more diplomatically, but in many cases it is straight up disinformation. So, it just matters where people are getting their information. There is still a ton of great work that is happening on the ground.
MATT JORDAN: If you’re just joining us, this is News Over Noise. I’m Matt Jordan. I’m talking with Tim Richardson from PEN America about the threats facing press freedom in the United States. What's happened in the ownership space over the last quarter century that has made press freedom more problematic?
TIM RICHARDSON: Yeah, we certainly have seen a, a lot of consolidation. We've seen, you know, lots of the large newspaper companies, for example. And I think sometimes we maybe falsely use newspaper as a proxy for, for credible information, which I think is a mistake. But there are lots of other great sources of information beyond newspapers that said, you know, we've seen thousands of newspapers closed their doors, we've seen ownership consolidate. We've seen in some cases, billionaire tech owners. The Washington Post, my former employer, comes to mine own, you know, purchase, these assets in some cases, have done a great job. This is not to say that they've all done poorly, because that's not the case, but certainly in the case of Jeff Bezos, just the news that we've seen over the past few days with layoffs, the pulling of a presidential endorsement, the change in the direction of the editorial page. But this also isn't an issue related to newspapers. We've seen it in broadcast, where now there are just a small handful of players that own a large percentage of the affiliate stations across the country. So, we have seen, a significant you know, even if you look at newspapers, for example, you've seen in many, many cases these kind of venture capitalist companies come in and sell the place for parts and in some ways, and reduce the number of, reporters that they have. So, yeah, it is a tough industry. The economics are very challenging right now. There have been some success stories, particularly in the kind of the nonprofit newsroom space. But, yeah.
MATT JORDAN: Yeah. And in that and the kind of leverage being used to for even those which aren't ideologically aligned with the current administration, they're getting a lot of leverage put in their in their way. Again, if you go back to your former employer, The Washington Post, I think it was the must have been for Super Bowls ago when they put out the Democracy Dies and Darkness commercial. Right? And they staked the claim against this type of thing. What happened in Trump two, regime that made, Washington Post do such an about face?
TIM RICHARDSON: Yeah. It's just been so demoralizing and disheartening to see what's happened. And I just, I have so much respect for my former colleagues who, no longer have jobs and certainly those who are still within the newsroom but are but have seen, you know, our kind of working in a space with so many fewer people. Now, I think that the Jeff Bezos that owned The Washington Post for the first many, many years, he bought it in 2013, I believe, was not the Jeff Bezos, frankly, that we see today. He was a great he was a fantastic owner. He was hands off, you know, never once did he insert his, you know, his will or his opinion into the news pages at all. And I don't believe, you know, I don't work on the opinion side, but I wasn't aware of anything happening there as well. So, he was a great owner. Put you know, a ton of resources into the product, expanded the newsroom significantly. And then, you know, now we see him at the side of the president, a president who, you know, criticizes and harms, free press at every turn whenever he can. And I think that just Bezos has it. I think he probably has more interest in the company, which is the, you know, the source of his wealth, of course, Amazon and also his passion is Blue Origin, you know, the space company that he owns. And just a few days ago, you know, Pete Hegseth, who kicked out The Washington Post and many other credible news or outlets visited Jeff Bezos and Florida, I believe. And Bezos was singing his praise, talking about how great it was that he was there and that just the side by side of seeing that happening as reporters are being booted from the Pentagon, and, you know, the post is losing a third, probably more than one third of its staff, of course, that coming after a couple of other rounds of buyouts in recent years has just been really, sad to see. And, you know, it's harmful for the post, but, you know, it's harmful for the entire industry that holds power to account. And, you know, it just shows how journalism is struggling. And it's just it's awful news for democracy as a whole, really.
MATT JORDAN: So, you were implying with Bezos and, you know, again, if this wasn't what you're implying, I apologize, that there because he has other business in front of the administration that gives them a certain amount of leverage to force him to bring his, you know, reporters to heel, essentially. Right?
TIM RICHARDSON: Oh, I wouldn't say, you know, I don't think that, you know, Bezos is not he certainly made his opinions known within the editorial pages. And you on the opinion side, shifting the focus to, you know, personal liberties and a kind of a more, administration friendly tone and content. So, there's no question about that. I mean, he is he's come out to say that the news pages are still, you know, the news reporters are still doing fantastic work. And so, I don't think that you can read into this, that these changes were made and these reductions were made to reduce, necessarily the amount of criticism against the administration. Because if you look at the reporters who, you know, remain those covering national politics, those covering the White House were kind of disproportionately not affected by the by these decisions. And we still see a ton of great journalism coming out of that newsroom focused on the White House and the administration. So that is still happening. There's a lot of great work that is still happening. But I do think that we've seen that the owner has, you know, kind of shifted his focus, I guess, away from journalism, where he was so supportive for many, many years to his passion of Blue Origin and of course, Amazon and wanting to support those two entities.
MATT JORDAN: Yeah, Amazon, which did have a, a case against it at the, at the Federal Trade Commission for antitrust, that, you know, there have been a series of things that, would make one think about that; the firing of Ann Telnaes as the Pulitzer Prize winning cartoonist, who did a cartoon, showing Bezos paying tribute at the feet of Trump and was promptly let go. Soon thereafter. So, but I guess what I'm getting at is this is, I guess there's subtler forms of coercion than just, you know, stopping the press. And you see that, with what they're doing at a number of places, even regime-friendly papers like The Wall Street Journal. Right. They had… the Trump administration put a slap suit against them. Or maybe it was Trump's, individual lawyer put a slap suit against him. It's become so difficult to tell the difference between the two of them. They threatened to sue them for, writing stories about the Epstein affair. Right? And we see this, also, with ABC, we see it with CBS, where there were lawsuits that were basically had no standing on, facts where that coercion, that leverage was used against these outfits who might have been holding them accountable.
TIM RICHARDSON: Yeah. And I think, you know, one word intimidation. And it's not just the… in many cases, these lawsuits that are filed, I would say that the goal is not necessarily to win. I think Trump knows in many cases he might not come out victorious. Now he has come out with a couple of $16 million settlements. But I think the bigger picture here is intimidation of, you know, trying to ensure trying to influence editorial decisions when he can't actually, you know, doesn't actually have a say in those decisions now. And, you know, of course, he has fund removed funding from outlets where he can. But, you know, let's say, you know, other smaller newsrooms or even, you know, larger newsrooms have reporters who are trying to do the work of holding the administration to account. They're trying to intimidate reporters into making them think twice, really, about the stories that they try to pursue, make them kind of question whether this is the right move. If I, you know, if I report the wrong thing, could, the president come after me? Could he file a lawsuit? And, you know, The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal and other, you know, of the some of the largest media organizations in the country, they can withstand a lawsuit. They have they have lawyers on staff. They can handle this, and they will be perfectly fine. What is problematic is when smaller outlets or reporter freelance reporters who don't have the backing of a major institution behind them start to think twice about their reporting and what stories they are putting out there and publishing. That chilling effect is a lot of what is behind the actions of the administration. And I'm not, you know, this isn't just the lawsuits that have been filed. It really is a through line for all of the actions that we've seen, it's reducing credible information that's out there to try to try to control the narrative, but it's also trying to have an impact on all reporters across the entire industry to intimidate them and try to make them think twice about their coverage and what, you know, the stories that they're putting out there.
MATT JORDAN: How have they used the FCC to do some of this coercive work?
TIM RICHARDSON: First of all, you know, the FCC has opened investigations against every network, with the exception of Fox, of course, which is owned by a Trump ally, Rupert Murdoch, although Trump did sue Rupert Murdoch's Wall Street Journal, but from PBS, NPR, the other three networks have all faced investigations. Some of those investigations, you know, dovetailed the CBS and ABC dovetailed with the lawsuits that Trump had filed. So, we've seen the threatening of broadcast licenses. Of course, the Jimmy Kimmel with, with Brendan Carr, the FCC chairman, saying, “We can do this the easy way or the hard way.” You know, speaking on speaking on a right leaning podcasters network. So, we and then we even more recently, the equal time rule has come has made headlines with the FCC opening an investigation into The View. So, we have seen from a regulatory standpoint, and it really is this onslaught against credible information. And I think there's the sense that, you know, the Trump himself and Brendan Carr have, you know, they've got their thumb on the scale in a way that we just haven't seen before. I mean, the FCC is typically kind of this, you know, sleepy organization within the federal government or, you know, agency within the federal government that, you know, you hear about occasionally, but it kind of does its work in a nonpartisan, nonpolitical way and that just has not been the case over the last 12 months.
MATT JORDAN: You talked earlier about how the administration had defunded and dismantled the global media. US Global Media Agency, the US agency for Global Media is what it's called. And they oversee the allocation of funds to us public broadcasters like Voice of America, Radio Free Europe, Radio Liberty, the Middle East Broadcast Network, Radio and Television [inaudible], Radio Free Asia, what is the impact of all of it in a global sense? What's the impact of these particular, outlets being, silenced or, you know, muted, at least by the administration?
TIM RICHARDSON: So, this has those outlets have been a crucial form of soft power for the United States. You know, for some 80-plus years. And the they have just, you know, systematically been dismantled. Now, it does look like some funding has been restored for them, which is great news. But yes, you know, the staff were dismantled. You know, they were they were booted from the airwaves in these countries that are very fragile, where the United States has long been able to provide credible information under authoritarian regimes. The United States has been you know, we've been the source of information for people who had no other source of credible information. And that almost disappeared entirely. And at the same time, it opens the doors for these authoritarian leaders to be able to, you know, it kind of gives them a green light, right? If they're seeing the United States president crack down on the media in this way, what's to stop them from doing even more than they've done? Or you know, it allows them an entry point to crack down further, and you know, crackdown on dissent. And, you know, I think we've seen more and more of that. And we've seen the doors open for other countries, whether it be Russia, whether it be China, whether it be Iran, to fill that void and bring their own narrative to the situation. So, I think there are lots of dangerous aspects, to what we've seen. And I do hope that, you know, there's bipartisan support for bringing this back. And I hope that we see those outlets back up and running and bringing credible information and kind of restoring the soft power that we've had for so many decades.
MATT JORDAN: I hope so, too. Just as, as our listeners kind of, think about what they might be able to do, what should they be aware of? What should they be on the lookout for, and what might they do to help reverse some of these kind of some of the backsliding that we're seeing?
TIM RICHARDSON: I would say, first and foremost, look at where you're getting your information and make sure you're getting credible information and support journalists, support outlets and experts who are doing, the hard work of bringing credible information to the public and don't amplify falsehoods. I think that's another crucial thing. If you come across something on social media, you think it not… might not be accurate. Check to make sure, see if other, you know, credible, sources are reporting that see if you can get other metadata, dates, those sorts of things before you hit send or post, just to make sure you're not amplifying it. Because when you publish something, when you, when you when you post something on social media, you are giving it air. You're amplifying it. And in this very polluted media ecosystem that we are in, everyone has a role in that of policing what you at least can put on your own timeline. So, I would just urge extreme caution for amplifying anything but really support journalism. Donate, you know, to, to nonprofits and others who are doing this hard work because it is such a crucial, moment in history and journalism is under threat from so many different ways, on so many different levels. And so, I think anything that we can do to, support those who are doing that hard work, will go a long way.
MATT JORDAN: Great. Tim Richardson, thank you so much for being with us and sharing some of your wisdom.
TIM RICHARDSON: Thank you so much for having me.
MATT JORDAN: That's it for this episode of News Over Noise. Our guest was Tim Richardson, program director for journalism and disinformation at PEN America. To learn more, visit news-over-noise-dot-org. I'm Matt Jordan.
CORY BARKER: And I'm Cory Barker.
MATT JORDAN: Until next time, stay well and well informed. News Over Noise is produced by the Penn State Donald P. Bellisario College of Communications and WPSU. This program has been funded by the office of the Executive Vice President and Provost at Penn State and is part of the Penn State News Literacy Initiative.
[END OF TRANSCRIPT]
Episode Credits:
Producer: Lindsey Whissel Fenton
Audio Engineers: Mickey Klein, Scott Gros, Clint Yoder
News Over Noise is a co-production of WPSU and Penn State’s Bellisario College of Communications. This program has been funded by the office of the Executive Vice President and Provost at Penn State and is part of the Penn State News Literacy Initiative.
