Media watchers blame the hostility toward reporters on Trump
The case of a Montana congressional candidate accused of bodyslamming a reporter is being blamed by some media watchers on a wave of hostility toward journalists President Donald Trump helped generate.
“It definitely started before Trump, but he definitely exacerbated it,” said Kelly McBride, a vice president at the Poynter Institute, a media think tank and training center in St. Petersburg, Fla.
For months, Trump, first as a candidate, now as president, has attacked the media, calling it dishonest, branding it the “enemy of the people” and accusing it of putting out “fake news.”
During the White House campaign, reporters at Trump rallies were often confined to a penned-in area, vilified by the candidate and subjected to such insults and threats from his supporters that some members of the media feared for their safety. At one rally, a man was photographed in a shirt that read, “Rope. Tree. Journalist. Some Assembly Required.”
The air of menace was heightened by Trump’s talk of wanting to punch or rough up hecklers in the crowd.
Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski was arrested during the campaign on battery charges for grabbing a female reporter. A Florida prosecutor later dropped the charge.
On Wednesday, Greg Gianforte, the Republican candidate for a House seat in a special election Thursday, was charged in Montana with misdemeanor assault for allegedly grabbing Guardian reporter Ben Jacobs by the neck and slamming him to the ground after Jacobs asked him about the GOP health care bill. Gianforte could be fined up to $500 or get six months in jail if convicted.
Gianforte, who has tried to align himself with Trump, said the reporter was being aggressive and grabbed him by the wrist. Jacobs said he never touched Gianforte. And a Fox News reporter who witnessed the incident said Jacobs was not physically aggressive.
“The attack in Montana is only the crudest and most visible expression of the rising hostility toward the media,” Jonathan Turley, a constitutional law expert at George Washington University, wrote in an email.
Among other recent incidents reported in May:
› The editor of Alaska’s largest newspaper said a state senator slapped one of his reporters when the reporter sought the lawmaker’s opinion on a recently published article.
› A Washington-based reporter from CQ Roll Call said he was pinned against the wall by security guards and forced to leave the Federal Communications Commission headquarters after he tried to question an FCC commissioner after a news conference.
› A West Virginia journalist was arrested after yelling questions about the opioid epidemic at U.S. Health Secretary Tom Price.