Donald Trump is apparently not overly concerned about civil liberties, but neither was Barack Obama. In fact, Obama set many of the precedents to which Trump can avail himself, if he’s so inclined. From James Risen at nytimes.com:
WASHINGTON — If Donald J. Trump decides as president to throw a whistle-blower in jail for trying to talk to a reporter, or gets the F.B.I. to spy on a journalist, he will have one man to thank for bequeathing him such expansive power: Barack Obama.
Mr. Trump made his animus toward the news media clear during the presidential campaign, often expressing his disgust with coverage through Twitter or in diatribes at rallies. So if his campaign is any guide, Mr. Trump seems likely to enthusiastically embrace the aggressive crackdown on journalists and whistle-blowers that is an important yet little understood component of Mr. Obama’s presidential legacy.
Criticism of Mr. Obama’s stance on press freedom, government transparency and secrecy is hotly disputed by the White House, but many journalism groups say the record is clear. Over the past eight years, the administration has prosecuted nine cases involving whistle-blowers and leakers, compared with only three by all previous administrations combined. It has repeatedly used the Espionage Act, a relic of World War I-era red-baiting, not to prosecute spies but to go after government officials who talked to journalists.
Under Mr. Obama, the Justice Department and the F.B.I. have spied on reporters by monitoring their phone records, labeled one journalist an unindicted co-conspirator in a criminal case for simply doing reporting and issued subpoenas to other reporters to try to force them to reveal their sources and testify in criminal cases.
To continue reading: If Donald Trump Targets Journalists, Thank Obama
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Press freedom advocates already fear that under Senator Jeff Sessions, Mr. Trump’s choice to be attorney general, the Justice Department will pursue journalists and their sources at least as aggressively as Mr. Obama did. If Mr. Sessions does that, Ms. Dalglish said, “Obama handed him a road map.”
Neither Trump nor Sessions have ever been staunch defenders of the First Amendment, and Trump has it in for the mainstream media. Mr. Obama posed as a defender of the First Amendment, but his actions undercut his pose. He indeed leaves Trump a “road map” for press suppression, and I wouldn’t trust Trump or some other politician in the future not to use it. That’s the problem with governments curtailing civil liberties–once the precedent has been set, it’s seldom reversed and is more often expanded upon.
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