Veteran media reporter Brian Stelter said that those leading news organizations are preparing for ways that a second Trump administration could leverage “government interference” to “punish the media.”
Speaking to CNN’s Abby Phillip on Tuesday night the pair discussed comments made by MSNBC host Rachel Maddow to Oliver Darcy for the Reliable Sources newsletter that she was worried former President Donald Trump “plans to build camps” to hold migrants and political enemies, including critics like her, should he return to the White House.
Stelter said that Maddow’s comments had been “nuanced and thoughtful” but acknowledged the remarks were “speculative non-fiction.” He said: “We use the words that Trump and his allies have said, and we use them to talk about the future. Jail, of course, is an extreme part of the spectrum. Imprisonment is an extreme part.”
Widening the conversation to other conceivable ways that a potential Trump administration could persecute media organisations, Stelter continued: “But think about IRS audits. Think about government pressure on media companies. Think about other forms of government interference. There are a lot of pressure points and frankly, Rachel Maddow is not the only member of the media thinking about this.
“I’ve talked to the heads of news organizations, CEOs, and media companies that are thinking this through, not in dramatic fashion, not because they’re afraid of going to jail, but because they want to know what could Trump do to use his power in the second term to punish the media,” he added.
As Phillip pondered whether that would impact voters’ intentions, Stelter added: “I’m glad that she’s bringing it up because we need to think through these issues even though it can sound a little bit out there talking about it.”
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Correction: A previous version of this story referred to Stelter as a correspondent with CNN. He is a former CNN correspondent.
