Freedom of the press in the United States. The country is in the 57th place in the classification of press freedom established every year by the reporters of the NGO Sin Frontières (RSF) and was released this Friday, May 2 for its 2025 edition.
The country is falling 2 places compared to last year and reached its lowest level since RSF has made this classification. In comparison, France is classified this year 25 (-4 places).
Weyton Cleimers, director of the US RSF Office.
In 2024, the United States had fallen from 45 to 55, RSF already pointed out “a context of growing distrust with respect to the media, promoted in particular by the open hostility of political leaders” as the presidential elections last November.
White House influencers
The entrance to the office this year as Donald Trump, who describes traditional media as “false news”, has only aggravated the trend.
“Political attacks, particularly from President Trump, have reached a critical level for press freedom in a country where many Americans consider it acquired due to the first amendment to the Constitution,” said Clayton Weimers.
In February, the White House limited its access to Associated Press (AP), because the prestigious American news agency continues to use the term Gulf of Mexico and no, as required by Trumpian vocabulary, that of “Gulf of America”.
The presidency, on the other hand, invited the “new media” to the heart of power: influential pro-trump people who now have the right to their own information about the press.
“There is no damage for the White House to open its press conferences to more diverse voices, but this is not what is happening. What is happening is that they bring commentators about the radical right that do not do journalism,” says Clayton Weimers.
“The trend is to punish the media that ask difficult questions and that they refuse to follow their line and reward those who only comply with what the presidency says,” summarizes the director of the United States.
Donald Trump also launched legal attacks against the private channel of CBS (Paramount Group) and BLUB ABC (Disney Group), which paid $ 15 million under the threat of a defamation trial.
“These are large groups that have great interests beyond the media and that are more likely to bend against Donald Trump because the media are not their most profitable sector,” says Clayton Weimers.
“Desert information”
But Donald Trump’s assaults on journalists are not the only reason for the degradation of the United States by RSF. The NGO also indicates a climate of “economic recession” that weighs in the press, especially local.
Due to the decrease in paper advertising and competition in online information and social networks, “it is estimated that two local newspapers close every week in the United States,” said Clayton Weimers.
“The disappearance of local titles behind the big information of the deserts,” deplores Clayton Weimers, who sees “a danger to democracy.”
The Trump administration also threatens the financing of public radio and the PBS and PBS radio, and wants to silence the United States “voices” abroad, such as Voice of America, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty or Radio Free Asia.
Source: BFM TV
