Three Democratic lawmakers reintroduced a Journalist Protection Act that intends to designate “certain attacks on those reporting the news” as a federal crime.
The bill was introduced by Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.), Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) and Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.).
It was originally introduced by Swalwell in February 2018 when the House was under Republican control. Democrats officially took back the House this January.
“The Journalist Protection Act makes it a federal crime to intentionally cause bodily injury to a journalist affecting interstate or foreign commerce in the course of reporting or in a manner designed to intimidate him or her from newsgathering for a media organization,” reads the Tuesday press release. “It represents a clear statement that assaults against people engaged in reporting is unacceptable, and helps ensure law enforcement is able to punish those who interfere with newsgathering.”
The lawmakers said they were introducing the bill as a response to President Trump’s “climate of extreme hostility” toward the media.
“Both before and since taking office, President Trump has blatantly stoked a climate of extreme hostility toward the press,” the release said. "He has called the press ‘the enemy of the American people,’ and described mainstream media outlets as ‘a stain on America.’
“Such antagonistic rhetoric encourages others to think, regardless of their views, that violence against journalists is more acceptable.”
Trump has often referred to the media as “the enemy of the people” while regularly evoking the phase “fake news.”
"I really wish I didn’t have to introduce this, but we have seen rhetoric from the president declaring the media as the ‘enemy of the state,’ " Swalwell said last year when he first introduced the bill.
That is a product of “Post Modernism’s” failed philosophy of Derrida’s “Deconstruction”! But make no mistake, this is just a power grab to control the Democratic narrative by use of propaganda without being challenged on the basis of truth. In other words Democrats want the power to make any shit up and package as truth. This is a communist method of silencing the masses! It’s probably why the CHICOM’s have an enormous wing just dedicated to propaganda for this very purpose and for the most part it has worked for them, and so no surprise that this is the Democrats way of attempting to do the same thing! Nevertheless, I can’t see how the American people from left or right will tolerate this passage of such a bill!
This bill is nothing more than the liberals creation of another victim class and their proposal to save it. I am sure that the FAKE NEWS media will give accolades to the liberals for this fake protection racket.
Fake journalists may mimic the Jussie Smollett saga and orchestrate non-lethal attacks on themselves…and blame Trump supporters for them.
Perhaps, but I think there is a much larger sinister agenda at play here that hints at taking control of the national narrative. I don’t think it stops at media, but the internet as well. Once they take control of that, then this power grab makes more sense in the bigger picture of things to come!
I think that agenda has already been established. Liberals already control most of the media as the media outlets are replete with liberal owners and journalists with a liberal bent.
The internet as well is biased liberal as evidenced by Twitter, Facebook, Google and their offspring.
Liberals won’t be satisfied until we have our own version of Pravda…with no real competitors. The MSM outlets already parrot each other. I’m not sure which is the lead off outlet, if there is one.
First of all, the government has no business saying who is and who isn’t a journalist. Secondly, no class of citizen should be singled out for special protection. Equal protection under the law, not special protection for some.
Democrats should just cut to the chase and pass a law saying everyone but straight white Christian males gets special protection. Would save a lot of paper and time.