Summary

Donald Trump, the president-elect and convicted felon, has escalated his legal attacks on media outlets critical of him, sparking fears for press freedom under his second term.

His lawyer recently demanded $10 billion in damages from The New York Times and Penguin Random House over alleged “defamatory” content.

Similar lawsuits target the Daily Beast, CBS News, and others, accusing them of “malicious” reporting and election interference.

Media groups and watchdogs, including the Committee to Protect Journalists and Reporters Without Borders, warn these actions threaten press freedom and the public’s right to information.

  • Sgt_choke_n_stroke@lemmy.world
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    9 days ago

    This is on par with “the capitalist will sell you the rope to hang himself.”

    Media should of been asking “what does deporting millions of illegals looks like logistically.” But they softballed him for the ratings and scandalous stories.

    They brought this onto themselves.

    • nomous@lemmy.world
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      9 days ago

      They absolutely coddled and voiced all his insane rantings while never refuting any of them.

      I hope their 30 pieces of silver are heavy in their pockets as the rope is put around their necks.

      • Rubanski@lemm.ee
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        9 days ago

        Did you wrote that last sentence yourself ? I might steal it, great writing

        • nomous@lemmy.world
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          9 days ago

          I think so but it’s probably paraphrased from something I heard once upon a time, feel free to use it.

  • SlippiHUD@lemmy.world
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    9 days ago

    So glad the media hedged its bets and still lost and is taking the rest of us with them

  • Gerudo@lemm.ee
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    9 days ago

    Doesn’t suing for damages mean you have to prove damages? The fucker just got reelected president, what damages did he succumb to?

    • this_1_is_mine@lemmy.world
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      9 days ago

      Trump is a shit throwing champ. His shit is so noxious it sticks to and destroys almost anything it touches. Even if you make it away without being completely Broken down it sticks with you like the stank of the Bog of the Eternal Stench!!!

      He’s throwing shit cause now he can start throwing shit again at the media being shills and hurting everything to ruin trust in the words spoken and ideas passed … since now the platform is no longer helpful in his victory.

    • Alwaysnownevernotme@lemmy.world
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      9 days ago

      It would if our legal system wasn’t a sham. Unfortunately basically every “rule” it has is snapped off at the base from the lightest breath of a wealthy Pearson.

  • Magister@lemmy.world
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    9 days ago

    It’s special, from the outside (I’m not American) to see the USA will go in full blast dictatorship in 2 months. If we believe Trump will do what he said, basically there will be no more future election, no department of education, no FBI, no press freedom, no veteran healthcare, etc and also Hillary, the Biden, Obama, etc will be in jail yada yada.

    Will see from the outside, with a popcorn bucket, the shitshow.

    From the outside, a lot of people are also saying that USA deserved it because they voted for it, like brexit for instance.

    Sorry for you guys ☹️

      • anon6789@lemmy.world
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        9 days ago

        I’ve been thinking about how Ukraine has been able to hold out against Russia for so long, but the US just surrendered to them without a fight. Never thought I’d see the day. But at least our pending top intelligence person already has contacts inside the Kremlin… SMH

      • Pelicanen@midwest.social
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        9 days ago

        They’ll pay the upfront cost, after the big countries follow the US in tearing up climate goals we’ll all be in a river of shit.

        This is not to dismiss what they’re going to suffer through, there are going to be horrifying crimes of humanity committed against them that won’t happen to most of the rest of us, I just want to clarify that there is nowhere to go to avoid being impacted by this.

    • taiyang@lemmy.world
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      9 days ago

      Well, twenty something percent of citizens voted for him but yes. I don’t think it’ll be quite as bad as he said since there guard rails, but we apparent voted for a full Congress for him too and hoping “sane” Republicans will save us is a fools errend.

      But if 2016 is any indication, it’s probably not as bad as brexit, lol. I think we need to leave NATO or something to be that bad. (But, Brits didn’t deserve that, either, nor their crappy Tory leadership. They have my sympathy, as anyone conned by evil people should).

      • gramie@lemmy.ca
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        9 days ago

        There were guardrails, but most of them are just litter on the side of the road now. The supreme Court has essentially justified any action he takes, Congress will not dare to oppose anything he wants, and he is appointing toadies and lickspittles to the highest offices of the land. Oh, and he is reclassifying all the major bureaucrats as political appointees so they can be fired at will.

        It really is as bad as it seems.

        • taiyang@lemmy.world
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          9 days ago

          We’ll see. The guy practically steals political capital so it is unpredictable; traditional candidates usually have to cut deals with folks in house and Senate when a policy would cost that person votes, but he doesn’t play by that because he can just make shit up. Gaetz will be a good test to see if he’s still able to force bad choices on people.

          The only upside is he’s also an idiot who doesn’t trust people around him. 2016-2020 was bad, but man it could have been a lot worse if he wasn’t inept.

          • HeyThisIsntTheYMCA@lemmy.world
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            8 days ago

            I’m hoping he announced the gaetz nomination to get him to resign, and it’s going to nominate someone else for reals (all over some perceived slight). I have nothing to base this off of, other than it would be funny.

      • superkret@feddit.org
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        9 days ago

        over 70% of all eligible voters didn’t vote against him.
        That’s a democratic mandate.

        • taiyang@lemmy.world
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          9 days ago

          Half of voters, and still 47% voted Harris last I checked. And turnout was especially bad, too, hence it technically only being a fraction of Americans. That’s not to say it’s not terrible, but even when Trump didn’t get a majority last two times it was alarmingly high.

          But my expertise is in education, I can say definitively that Americans fail at civics and we haven’t done much to fix that in close to half a century. But failing civics doesn’t mean you deserve persecution or deportation or skyrocketing costs or nuclear death-- especially when people can legally lie to you to sway your vote. Systems fucked, but I wouldn’t place the blame on that slight majority of subset of the population.

          • MegaUltraChicken@lemmy.world
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            9 days ago

            we haven’t done much to fix that in close to half a century

            On the contrary, Republicans have fought tooth and nail to destroy public education and keep people as dumb as possible. This is their desired result.

            • taiyang@lemmy.world
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              9 days ago

              Yes, I know. Well actually, technically No Child Left Behind was a bipartisan attempt to improve education under Bush but was designed by people with conservative values (hence being a shit show designed to improve public education by punishing it).

              But yes, on average, they’ve mostly pushed privatization of education and in more recent years, homeschooling for religious values. Dumbing down of society is probably a welcome side effect of stealing money from kids to fund tax breaks for the rich, though.

          • P1nkman@lemmy.world
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            9 days ago

            I might be mistaken, but in Norway, if you do not vote, the missing vote will go to the party with the most votes in your region, so technically, not voting is voting for the most popular party.

    • teawrecks@sopuli.xyz
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      9 days ago

      Sucks for the US, but also for all the other countries dependent on the US for passive protection. Russia and China are going to do whatever they want now. North Korea might even get a chance to see some action. Historically, the US has made an effort to keep an eye on our enemies from the borders of our allies. Trump legitimately believes the only enemies that exist are within our borders.

  • JovialMicrobial@lemm.ee
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    9 days ago

    This screams “I’m so insecure that I must silence any and all criticisms.”

    What a pathetic human being.

  • Asafum@feddit.nl
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    9 days ago

    And will anyone sue Fox other than some private business?

    Nope. Democrats will just sit back and let Fox, Newsmax, OANN and the like all go and call them communist scum that want to kill babies and destroy everything.

    It’s so aggravating.

    • Kecessa@sh.itjust.works
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      9 days ago

      That’s what I was going to say, why don’t the Democrats ever reply in kind? Because clearly going high never worked!

  • seaQueue@lemmy.world
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    9 days ago

    Ah, right. Quoting the candidate and discussing his behavior is election interference now 🤦‍♂️

  • Absaroka@lemmy.world
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    9 days ago

    Aside from democracy and society as a whole, the biggest loser in this last campaign was traditional media. I don’t think any outlets came out ahead and confidence for many in publications like the NY Times, Washington Post, LA Times, CNN, MSNBC, and others is at rock bottom.

  • Mnemnosyne@sh.itjust.works
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    9 days ago

    I really hope the media loses these hard, honestly. At this point I don’t even mind if Trump benefits some, I just want to see the media that sanewashed Trump and pretended there was anything reasonable about him returning as a presidential candidate get what they deserve.