It’s the kind of stuff that would make Deep Throat cringe and President Richard Nixon smile. Police and powerful people taking action to keep journalists from doing their jobs. Breaking down doors. Threatening arrest. Filing lawsuits demanding millions.
No, not in the age of Watergate. In California. Now.
Police in San Francisco go after a reporter’s records with a sledgehammer and guns drawn, despite a strong law prohibiting such actions. The state Attorney General threatens journalists with jail for possessing a document obtained under California’s Public Records Act.
A powerful congressman with ties to President Donald Trump sues his local newspaper for $150 million, alleging slander, because it reported on allegations contained in a lawsuit that mentioned the congressman’s name.
While tensions have been high in Washington between the press and politicians since Trump took office, the growing conflict in deeply Democratic California might seem out of character.
“Something’s amiss with press freedoms in the Golden State,” said David Snyder, who runs the First Amendment Coalition, an open-government advocacy group. He called the recent events “pretty close to breathtaking.” Local and state officials have “done things far more harmful than the Trump administration. They’ve really stepped over the line.”
