[Congressional Record Volume 163, Number 45 (Wednesday, March 15, 2017)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1819-S1820]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                          Freedom of the Press

  Mr. UDALL. Mr. President, this week is Sunshine Week, a week when we 
applaud open government and when we celebrate the institutions that 
hold government accountable. Throughout our Nation's history, one of 
the most important has been the press, the free press. Donald Trump, as 
candidate and President, has repeatedly attacked the press. He has 
called it the ``enemy of the people,'' he has labeled the national 
media outlets as ``fake news,'' and he has criticized respected 
reporters who have reported for years.
  He has singled out mainstream newspapers like the New York Times, 
Politico, and the Los Angeles Times, and television outlets like ABC, 
NBC, CBS, CNN. That is how this President operates. He acts like a 
bully, and not just with the media. He attacks the courts when article 
III judges disagree with him, and when they find he is breaking the 
law. He attacks sitting judges for deciding against him, even those 
appointed by Republican Presidents.
  Without basis, he attacks our intelligence agencies, and he even 
demeans career public servants who risk their lives to keep our Nation 
safe. The President's goal is obvious, to undermine the institutions in 
our country who threaten him, who criticize him. Authoritarians have 
used this strategy for centuries and continue to do so today in 
countries where democracy is weak or nonexistent and where autocracy or 
kleptocracy is strong.
  But this is the United States. We are an example to the world of 
democratic principles and action. The President's repeated attacks on 
our democratic institutions need to stop and they need to stop now. A 
free and robust press is critical for democracy to work, period, end of 
story. Our Nation's history of a free press dates back to our founding. 
Free press in the colonial United States developed in reaction to 
severe restrictions on free speech in England.
  During the latter half of the 17th century, all books and articles 
were required to be licensed by the government to be published. Then, 
``seditious libel''--bringing ``hatred or contempt'' upon the Crown or 
the Parliament by written word--was a criminal offense. So to speak 
against the Crown was a criminal offense. Truth was not a defense.
  No publication could criticize the Crown or the government, even if 
it was accurate. The first newspapers in the Colonies operated under 
licenses from the colonial Governor. But by 1721, James Franklin, 
Benjamin Franklin's older brother, was publishing one of the first 
colonial independent newspapers, the New England Courant, in Boston.
  Ben Franklin was his apprentice, typesetter, and sometimes 
contributed under pen names. Several years later, Ben Franklin began 
publishing his own independent newspaper, the Pennsylvania Gazette. His 
newspaper became the most popular in the Colonies and was published 
until 1800.
  By 1735, the tenets of seditious libel were coming undone. John Peter 
Zenger, the publisher of the New York Weekly Journal, ran articles 
harshly critical of the colonial government. Zenger was arrested and 
tried for libel. While he admitted he published the articles, his 
lawyer argued truth was a defense. The press, the lawyer argued, has 
``a liberty both of exposing and opposing tyrannical power by speaking 
and writing the truth.''
  The judge, however, instructed the jury as to the law at the time, 
that Zenger must be found guilty if he published the articles, whether 
truthful or not, but after 10 minutes of deliberation, the jury 
acquitted Zenger. These were some of the beginnings of a free press in 
our Nation.
  The first rights in the Bill of Rights are freedom of religion, the 
press, speech, petition, and assembly. The press, as an institution, is 
expressly protected by the Constitution. In 1789, the drafters of the 
Bill of Rights understood that a free press was essential to the growth 
and success of our new democracy. They understood that debate, 
disagreement, the free flow of ideas, make an informed public, that the 
press helps educate voters.
  They understood all too well that government power needed to be 
checked and that the press holds the powerful in check by investigating 
and exposing arbitrary conduct, abuse, and corruption. A democracy 
cannot exist without a free press. It is as simple as that, but our 
President does not seem to understand this or he does not care. 
According to him, the press is ``dishonest,'' ``not good people,'' 
``sleazy,'' and, ``among the worst human beings.'' Those are all quotes 
by our President.
  Established press organizations are the ``fake news,'' and a few 
weeks ago he declared the press ``an enemy of the people.'' We have not 
heard attacks like this since Watergate, and even then, it wasn't so 
much so fast. The President's subordinates are now given license to 
accuse and to limit press access.
  Chief Strategist Steve Bannon said the press should ``keep its mouth 
shut and just listen for a while.'' This quote from Mr. Bannon has 
extra significance today because he is no longer the head of a 
rightwing media company. In a controversial move, President Trump 
issued an Executive order to add him to the National Security Council's 
Principal's Committee.
  Today, we are going to vote on the nomination of General McMaster to 
retain his three-star general status while serving as the head of the 
National Security Council. I do not believe a political extremist like 
Mr. Bannon should serve on the Council. At a minimum, General McMaster 
should direct Mr. Bannon to stop attacking the free press while serving 
on the Council.
  Senior adviser Kellyanne Conway called for media organizations to 
fire reporters who criticized Candidate Trump. Press Secretary Shawn 
Spicer barred the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times, BuzzFeed, 
and Politico from a press conference, and the Secretary of State will 
now travel without the press corps, disregarding a decades-old 
practice.
  Now, don't get me wrong. The press does not always get it right. They 
make mistakes. News organizations have their biases. Mistakes should be 
corrected and bias should be tempered by using accepted journalistic 
methods and professional judgment and following journalism's ethics 
code.
  Mistakes and the exercise of professional judgment are not the same 
thing as reporting ``fake news.'' The President's Republican colleagues 
have been too silent in the face of attacks. Few in Congress have stood 
up against the President's hostility to the press. Government officials 
are afraid to disagree. Just last week, at a Senate Commerce Committee 
hearing, I asked the FCC Chair, Mr. Pai, a yes or no question, does he 
agree with the President that the press is the enemy of the people.
  He did not engage. He would not answer. He let stand the President's 
remarks. The President's characterization of the press as the enemy is 
reminiscent of President Nixon, when Nixon said: ``Never forget. The 
press is the enemy. The press is the enemy. The press is the enemy,'' 
as recorded on his secret tapes.
  The press was Nixon's enemy because the press exposed his criminal 
conduct which led to his resignation. The press is Trump's enemy 
because the press exposes his and his associates' ties to

[[Page S1820]]

Russia, the President's myriad Trump organization conflicts of 
interest, his constant barrage of misrepresentations of fact.
  Nixon's Press Secretary called the Washington Post investigative 
reporting shoddy and shabby journalism. Like President Trump's 
accusation of fake news, that same Post reporting won the paper a 
Pulitzer Prize.
  Watergate was a break-in of the Democratic National Committee during 
the Presidential campaign. Nixon ordered his Chief of Staff to have the 
CIA block the FBI's investigation into the source of the funding for 
the Watergate burglary. During this last Presidential election, we had 
a cyber break-in of the DNC. Even after 17 U.S. intelligence agencies 
concluded Russia hacked the DNC to sway the election, Candidate Trump 
refused to accept their analysis.
  The President's Chief of Staff pressured the FBI to publicly deny 
that Trump associates had contact with the Russians, while his Chief 
Counsel reportedly breached the firewall seeking information from the 
FBI about an investigation into the President and his associates. Since 
the press began to look hard at the ties between President Trump and 
the Trump organization, his associates and Russia, the President has 
not let up on his criticism. Just last week, the President threatened 
by tweet as follows:

       It is amazing how rude much of the media is to my very hard 
     working representatives. Be nice, you will do much better!

  The job of the press is not to be nice. It is to gather the facts and 
report them. Now that the President of the United States has called the 
reputable U.S. news organizations fake news, others are doing the same. 
Russia's Foreign Ministry spokesman recently accused a CNN reporter of 
spreading ``fake news'' because the reporter asked about accusations 
from U.S. officials that the Russian Ambassador is a spy.
  This is a dangerous path. Putin has throttled an independent press in 
the Russian Federation, imposing restriction after restriction on the 
news media. Reporters have been harassed, threatened, and jailed. The 
numbers of truly independent media organizations in Russia have been 
reduced to a very few, and they have been replaced by state-owned, 
state-run news media, like RT, formerly known as Russia Today, a 
propaganda bullhorn for Putin, according to Secretary John Kerry.

  The President admires Putin as a--and I will quote the President 
here--``strong leader.'' Putin has used his strength to silence an 
independent press. We do not want our press silenced.
  Justice Brandeis, in a famous defense of free speech in a 1927 First 
Amendment case, said: ``[T]hose who won our independence by revolution 
were not cowards. They did not fear political liberty.''
  Does President Trump fear political liberty?
  The irony of the President's accusations of ``fake news'' is that he 
himself has spread misinformation and fanned the flames of internet-
driven lies, from questioning President Obama's citizenship, to his 
frivolous claim that millions of people committed voter fraud and that 
he really won the popular vote--that is the President's claim, that he 
really won the popular vote--to President Trump's unsubstantiated 
accusation that President Obama wiretapped Trump Tower.
  We have entered into an era in U.S. politics never seen before in my 
lifetime. We cannot allow this to be sanitized or explained away. The 
phrase ``alternative facts'' has become a national joke because it 
sounds like something from George Orwell's ``1984.''
  It is not acceptable for a President to falsify, misrepresent, or 
flatout lie. The President's party in Congress should not allow this. 
They should not look the other way and continue to profess that the 
emperor's clothes are grand.
  Reacting to Mr. Trump's attacks on the press, President George W. 
Bush responded:

       I consider the media to be indispensable to democracy. We 
     need an independent media to hold people accountable. Power 
     can be very addictive and corrosive . . . and it's important 
     for the media to hold to account people who abuse their 
     power--whether it be here or elsewhere.

  That was President George W. Bush's recent comment.
  President Bush's prescription for democracy in 2017 is the same as 
the drafters of the First Amendment in 1789: A free and independent and 
robust media is essential to democracy, and any broad-based attack on 
the press is an attack directly on our democracy.
  There is one thing President Trump must understand: The press won't 
go away. They won't stop reporting on the actions he takes and on the 
decisions he makes. He can spend the next 4 years attacking the press, 
but they will still be there--just as they were after Nixon resigned.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. SULLIVAN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. Ernst). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.