The economic destruction wrought by the novel coronavirus and ensuing societal shutdown has left few industries unscathed. Yet with digital readership skyrocketing, one would think journalism, of all industries, would be experiencing a boom time and be able to adjust to remote work more easily than most. But amid some high-profile layoffs and declining advertising revenue, many journalists are clamoring for the government cash cow to swoop in and cut them a taxpayer-financed check — and they’re doing so in almost apocalyptic terms.
“Life-saving news needs a stimulus,” reads the press release from the union Newsguild. “The Pandemic Is Crushing The Journalism Industry. The Government Could Save It,” glares the headline on HuffPost.
These calls are now echoing from the top levels of our government, with more than a dozen Democratic senators writing a letter calling on Senate leadership to pass a bailout for journalists. This is a mainstream movement: Signatories included high-profile Democrats such as Sen. Amy Klobuchar and Sen. Tim Kaine.
It’s a terrible idea. No economic downturn or number of layoffs will ever be worth sacrificing the press’s independence.
“I find it difficult to imagine Congress passing any kind of legislation that actually gives money to the news industry that does not somehow come with a lot of weird, terrible strings [attached],” said co-founder of the Save Journalism Project, John Stanton.
Exactly.
It’s easy to see why Stanton has this concern. After all, Congress has included “strings” in all the coronavirus bailouts to date — from airlines to small businesses, all bailout beneficiaries have had to comply with government dictates if they wanted the funding. This isn’t the end of the world if it simply means keeping inefficient flight schedules in place. But in journalism, it could have disastrous results.
A free press is supposed to hold government officials and policymakers accountable. It cannot reliably do so if journalists and outlets are dependent for their salaries on the officials they’re supposed to be scrutinizing.
Some insist that you could have government funding but simply have ideologically neutral qualifications. This well-intentioned argument is hopelessly naive.
Other actors here are far less benign. The union Newsguild, for instance, openly admits they want to attach “diversity” mandates to the money, and only give government funds to media outlets “free of partisan influence.” It’s easy to see how such criteria will be twisted to meet someone’s agenda. Just consider how hyperpartisan most prominent politicians are in their evaluation of the press. For President Trump, critical liberal outlets such as CNN and the New York Times are “fake news” and the “enemy of the people.” And on the Democratic side, former President Obama just this week referred to Fox News and conservative media as a “propaganda network.”
Only a fool would trust either Republican or Democratic politicians to hold the purse strings of the journalism industry. If you want a free and independent press, then you want to keep government money out of the picture.
