Category: Access & Censorship

When Trump took the stage Wednesday at his “Save America” rally, he started his speech with a rant against the media, calling it “the biggest problem we have as far as I’m concerned — single biggest problem” and falsely claiming “fake news” had stolen the election. Hours later, some of his supporters had taken his message to heart and went after the media members who they saw as responsible for Trump’s loss in the 2020 election.

News organizations should soon expect to hear from federal law enforcement agencies. National Press Photographers Association General Counsel Mickey Osterreicher says he expects that they will ask or demand that news organizations and individual journalists who documented the siege of the U.S. Capitol turn over their unpublished images and videos.

As Trump supporters rampaged on Wednesday, incited by the president’s false claims of a stolen election, they hit on a secondary target: journalists.

The controversial Article 24 in the new Global Security Bill pushed by French President Emmanuel Macron’s government and police unions would make it illegal to publish images of police officers with the intent to cause them harm. Offenders would face up to a year in jail and a fine of €45,000 (~$53,000).

While the daytime rally included several skirmishes, the number of violent incidents escalated significantly after sunset. There is ample evidence of violence from pro-Trump demonstrators. One assaulted freelance journalist Talia Jane, while a Proud Boy was filmed punching a French photographer in the face. At one point, a large group of Proud Boys and Trump supporters charged at counter-protesters en masse. To be clear, there was also evidence of assaults by left-wing demonstrators, as later highlighted by Trump. But the President’s framing of events erased the violence of his own supporters and painted a misleading, one-sided account.

One of photography’s most important problems is the power imbalance between someone operating a camera and someone finding her or himself in front of it. Unless there is an actual collaboration going on, it is the photographer whose decisions result in what the subject looks like in the picture(s). I used “actual” in front of “collaboration” on purpose: unlike many other people, I do not think that having some chit chat with a subject makes for a collaboration. A collaboration would be a joint making of the picture, in which photographer and subject talk about how the subject wants to be portrayed, what the photographers sees in her or him, etc.

A Seattle judge ruled Friday five news outlets must turn over unreleased photos and videos from a late May protest to local law enforcement. The Seattle Police Department believes the raw footage would help solve an ongoing arson and theft investigation, but First Amendment lawyers believe the ruling is troubling.

“Let’s revoke the NYPD’s ability to issue press credentials entirely. They’ve repeatedly proven that they are unwilling and unable to oversee a legitimate process,” Scott Stringer, the city’s comptroller, tweeted. Keith Powers, a City Council member, tweeted that he was considering legislation that would move credentialing to a new agency.