Jonathan Peters

What does the law say about hate speech online? The First Amendment provides broad protection to speech that demeans a person or group on the basis of race, ethnicity, gender, religion, age, disability, or similar grounds.

The 2016 Presidential election, which upended voters, journalists, politicians, and special-interest groups, was remarkable for a number of reasons—not least Trump’s unconcealed contempt for the press, whose role was challenged again and again on the campaign trail.

The New York Times went further in a December 13 story detailing Russian efforts to disrupt the 2016 presidential election, describing “every major publication, including The Times,” as “a de facto instrument of Russian intelligence.” Running more than 7,000 words, the story broke down how, in 2015, hackers linked to the Russian government compromised at least one Democratic National Committee computer system; how those hackers later accessed the DNC’s main network and targeted people outside the DNC, most famously Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta; and how “by last summer . . . Democrats watched in helpless fury as their private emails and confidential documents appeared online day after day—procured by Russian intelligence agents, posted on WikiLeaks and other websites, then eagerly reported on by the American media.”

First, could President Trump “open up our libel laws”? No. States create nearly all libel laws, and they’re subject to First Amendment limits. Trump couldn’t require states to change their laws, any more than he could require the Supreme Court to change its First Amendment jurisprudence, or require Congress to rewrite the First Amendment. This is a matter of eighth-grade civics.

Second, could President Trump change the Freedom of Information Act? Kind of. He alone couldn’t amend the law, but he could affect its implementation. For example, on his first full day in office, President Barack Obama signed one executive order and two presidential memoranda heralding a “new era of openness” that would, among other things, re-establish a presumption of disclosure for records requested under the FOIA—and reverse President George W. Bush’s changes to the Presidential Records Act, to hold his own records “to a new standard of openness.”

Third, could President Trump crack down on public affairs reporting? Yes, most likely in the area of national security—if his Department of Justice prosecuted journalists under, say, the Espionage Act, something that has occurred once before, or if his DOJ tried to obtain an injunction against publication, or prosecuted leakers and subpoenaed journalists to supply information. Another route would be to issue an executive order modifying how classified information must be handled, or allowing information to be classified for longer periods.

Fourth, what if President Trump simply didn’t like the press, as he’s been saying on the campaign trail? What impact could that have? It could mean Trump would be less accessible to journalists or wouldn’t invite them to certain functions or press conferences.

[Commentary] Police departments around the country increasingly are using sophisticated technology to surveil American citizens by monitoring cellphone data, in many cases carefully hiding those activities from the public and the press.

The American Civil Liberties Union, along with The Associated Press and USA Today, have all done important work recently to shine a light in the surveillance shadows. Local news outlets, including some here in Florida, have also done valuable reporting on the use of the technology, which offers investigative benefits but also raises constitutional concerns. It’s vital that a close look at these surveillance practices continues.

Local journalists in particular have an opportunity to serve their readers by building on the work that’s been done -- work that has raised serious questions about an area of high public interest, and already has had demonstrated impact.

But it’s vital, too, to understand the government secrecy that has surrounded these techniques --and how the relationships between local police and state and federal agencies, which sometimes supply the equipment, challenge public records laws. It’s going to take a multipronged media attack to get around that secrecy and learn more about what law enforcement agencies at all levels are doing.

A Harvard study “Who Gets a Press Pass? Media Credentialing Practices in the United States,” released by the Berkman Center for Internet & Society and the Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy is the first of its kind to perform a quantitative analysis of credentialing in the US, the study captures the experience of journalists nationwide in their efforts, from 2008 to 2013, to obtain credentials from various organizations.

It also highlights the need to reform credentialing systems so they reflect the reality of the current news ecosystem -- and protect the ability of all journalists to bring news to the public. The overarching goal, according to the study, was to identify patterns in credentialing practices that would lead to “better structure and predictability in the credentialing process,” recognizing that the US journalism industry is “more diverse than ever before, with a wide array of independent newsgatherers complementing the work of institutional news organizations.”

The survey asked the respondents about their efforts to obtain credentials from 17 types of federal, state, local, and private organizations, including state legislatures, municipal governments, and county law enforcement agencies. Out of the 676 respondents who said they had applied for a credential from one or more organizations, a full 21 percent -- one out of every five -- said they were denied at least once.

As the study concludes, the results suggest that credentialing organizations give preference to formal employment relationships over other types of arrangements. The last 10 years have seen major swings in media-consumption patterns, and innovations in technology have created new means for people to commit acts of journalism -- all complicating efforts to define a journalist for credentialing, shield law, Freedom of Information fee waiver, and other purposes.