Legendary Newspaper Leader Warns Trump’s Team is ‘Salivating For The Opportunity to Prosecute Journalists’

Legendary former Boston Globe editor Marty Baron joined CNN’s Christiane Amanpour this week to discuss President-elect Donald Trump’s attack on the media and ABC News settling a defamation suit with Trump for some $15 million.

“So lay out how you think the next administration can come after us. I mean, it is us in the big sense. What tools can they use?” Amanpour asked.

“Sure. Well, they have a lot of tools in their toolbox, and I think they will use every single one of them. That’s already evident from the measures that they are promising to take. I think they are salivating for the opportunity to prosecute journalists for leaks of supposed national security information,” Baron replied, adding:

I think that they’ve already threatened to revoke the licenses for stations affiliated with the over some of the major networks. They are already, as you mentioned, are likely to sue a lot of a lot of media outlets for supposed defamation and other supposed it offenses. I suspect a lot of the wealthy allies of Donald Trump will underwrite those lawsuits.

I suspect that they will deny information to major media outlets routinely. I suspect that they will threaten advertisers from major media outlets as well. So they will do everything to undermine public confidence in the press, to further undermine public confidence in the press, and undermine its economic sustainability.

“And probably to intimidate the press by this relentless pursuit. Look, Kash Patel, who is the nominee of Trump for the FBI, said famously, ‘We’re going to come after you,’ about the press. And just recently, Donald Trump himself about suing these organizations that we’ve just mentioned said the following. And I’m going to play what he just said from Mar-a-Lago yesterday,” Amanpour continued before playing a clip of Trump saying:

And I feel I have to do this. I shouldn’t really be the one to do it. It should have been Justice Department or somebody else. But I have to do it cost a lot of money to do it. But we have to straighten out the press. Our press is very corrupt.

“You know, that’s a horrible thing to hear, frankly, that our press is very corrupt. Do you think that lands with people and despite all the tools and mechanisms you’ve just enumerated? Do you think it will be successful?” Amanpour asked.

“Well, certainly there’s a large segment of the American public who do not have confidence in the mainstream press. And I understand that there’s been a decline in confidence in all institutions in our country, from the presidency to the Congress to banks, to major businesses, the medical community, religious institutions, pretty much everybody. And the press is certainly in there and has suffered a lot,” responded Baron, who won a Pulitzer for his paper’s investigation into abuse in the Catholic Church. He added:

I think the intent here is, as you say, to intimidate the press. I think that but more than that, I think he has suggested by his comments just yesterday that he would like to use the power of government against the press and to judge by the nominations that he has said he will make. He will use the power of government against the press. I suspect he will embark on an investigation. The Justice Department will embark on investigations. He will seek to revoke or potentially revoke the licenses of stations affiliated with the major networks.

I think he will engage in a lot of measures that will burden the press. And the intention is not necessarily to win these cases. It’s to inflict to impose these heavy burdens the cost of defending yourself against lawsuits, against investigations, all of that. Those costs are enormous. He talks about the cost of bringing a lawsuit. The cost for defending that lawsuit is enormous as well. And a lot of media institutions simply can’t afford that.

“That’s absolutely true. And I wonder whether you think that it’s also going to lead to a sort of a mass self-censorship because presumably is going to have a massively chilling effect. Look at what elections lawyer Marc Elias posted after the ABC settlement for $15 million and an apology by ABC and George Stephanopoulos said, ‘Knee bent, ring kissed, another legacy news outlet, chooses obedience.’ And just to be clear, Stephanopoulos had said in an interview that Trump was found, quote, liable for rape in the E. Jean Carroll case. In fact, he was found liable for sexual abuse. Do you think, Marc Elias, the election lawyer’s characterization is accurate?” Amanpour followed up.

“Well, I think a trend is in the right direction. I don’t know that I would use language quite that strong, but I think it’s clear that I mean, in the case of ABC News, you know, the judge said in that case that it’s true that under New York law that was not considered to be rape and ABC News did make a mistake and the way that they characterized it. But he said that in common parlance, it would be considered rape. So that there was a strong defense that ABC News had and it caved. And it probably caved for a variety of reasons. I would have to speculate here, of course, but probably because Disney, its parent company, has other commercial interests that it has in mind and also because it doesn’t want its network to be in a position of conflict with the president of the United States just as he takes office. But we’ve seen those kinds of that other news organizations as well,” Baron concluded.

Watch the clip above via CNN.