🔗 Share this article

“Incidents take place.” Just two words. That was enough for Donald Trump to effectively dismiss what is probably the most infamous murder of a reporter of the last decade – and in so doing plumbed a new low in his contempt for journalists, for journalism – and for the facts.

Background Details

The American leader’s dismissal of the murder of well-known reporter the Washington Post columnist came during a media briefing with the Saudi leader, Mohammed bin Salman – a man whom the US intelligence concluded in a recent assessment had ordered the kidnap and killing of the Washington Post columnist in that year. (Prince Mohammed has rejected accusations.)

The US intelligence services were not the only ones to determine the murder – which took place in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul and in which the late Khashoggi was sedated and cut apart – was signed off at the top echelons. An inquiry led by former UN expert, Agnès Callamard, reached similar conclusions.

International Response

For a short time, governments were unified in their criticism of the kingdom’s conduct. The US enacted sanctions and visa bans in 2021 over the murder, although it stopped short of sanctioning the crown prince himself. Since then, the kingdom has been slowly rehabilitating itself – and the crown prince’s visit to Washington seemed to be the ultimate sign of that redemption.

Presidential Comments

Opponents of the regime had strongly criticized the meeting. But what was on display at the White House was more alarming than could have been imagined. Not only did Trump honor the Saudi leader but he effectively rewrote history – and then pointed fingers at the victim. Prince Mohammed, Trump asserted when asked, knew nothing about the murder – in clear opposition to what his country’s own intelligence services determined previously. Moreover, Trump said: “Many individuals disliked that gentleman that you’re talking about, whether you like him or didn’t like him, incidents occur.”

Pattern of Behavior

This represents a new and abject low for a leader who has made little secret of his contempt for the truth – or for the media. He has smeared journalists (he called a news network, whose journalist asked the question about the journalist at the Saudi press conference “false information”), scolded them in public (he called one a “rude name” this week for asking about his connection with the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein), sued media organizations for large amounts of money in frivolous cases, and called for media groups he disapproves of to lose their licenses.

He has forced established media out of the official briefing group for declining to use language of his choosing, and he has gutted financial support for essential public media at domestically and vital independent media abroad.

Wider Consequences

All of that has created an atmosphere in which reporters are clearly more vulnerable in the United States, but one in which their victimization – and indeed murder – becomes not just unimportant (“incidents occur”) but tolerated (“many individuals didn’t like that person”).

It is unsurprising that that year was the most lethal year on file for the press in the more than 30 years the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has been documenting this data: a ongoing neglect to hold those responsible for reporter murders has created a environment without consequences in which journalists’ killers are literally able to escape punishment and so persist in these actions.

Nowhere is this clearer than in Israel, which is responsible for the deaths of over two hundred media workers in the recent period.

Societal Impact

The impact on society is deep. Attacks on journalists are assaults on facts. They are attacks on facts. They are violations of our entitlement to information and on our liberty to exist without fear and safely.

On Thursday, CPJ gathers for its annual International Press Freedom awards. My message at the event is the identical as my message for Trump: these things may occur. But it is our responsibility to make sure they do not.