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“Incidents take place.” A mere phrase. That’s all it took for Donald Trump to brush off what is arguably the most infamous murder of a reporter of the past ten years – and in so doing plumbed a new low in his disregard toward the press, for journalism – and for the truth.

Background Details

The American leader’s dismissive attitude of the killing of well-known reporter the Washington Post columnist came during a media briefing with the Saudi leader, Mohammed bin Salman – a man whom the CIA found in a 2021 report had orchestrated the kidnap and killing of the Washington Post columnist in 2018. (The crown prince has denied involvement.)

The US intelligence services were not the only ones to determine the homicide – which occurred in the Saudi diplomatic building in Turkey and in which the 59-year-old journalist was sedated and cut apart – was approved at the highest levels. An investigation led by former UN expert, the UN investigator, reached comparable findings.

Global Reactions

For a brief period, nations were unified in their condemnation of Saudi Arabia’s actions. The US imposed sanctions and visa bans in 2021 over the murder, although it refrained of sanctioning Prince Mohammed himself. Since then, the kingdom has been slowly rehabilitating itself – and the crown prince’s visit to the US capital seemed to be the final confirmation of that redemption.

Presidential Comments

Critics of the government had roundly condemned the meeting. But what was on display at the presidential residence was more alarming than could have been anticipated. Not only did the president fete Prince Mohammed but he effectively rewrote the facts – and then pointed fingers at the victim. The crown prince, he claimed when asked, knew nothing about the killing – in direct contradiction to what his nation’s intelligence services concluded four years ago. Moreover, Trump said: “A lot of people disliked that person that you’re talking about, whether you like him or didn’t like him, incidents occur.”

Established Conduct

This represents a fresh and shameful low for a president who has made little secret of his disdain for the truth – or for the press. Trump has smeared reporters (he called a news network, whose journalist asked the inquiry about the journalist at the Saudi press conference “false information”), scolded them in open settings (he called one a “rude name” this week for asking about his relationship with the convicted sex offender financier the convicted criminal), taken legal action against news outlets for large amounts of money in vexatious law suits, and called for media groups he disapproves of to lose their licenses.

He has pressured established media out of the White House press pool for declining to use terminology of his choosing, and he has gutted funding for essential public media at home and crucial free press internationally.

Broader Implications

All of that has fostered an atmosphere in which reporters are manifestly less safe in the US, but one in which their targeting – and indeed murder – becomes not just unimportant (“things happen”) but tolerated (“many individuals didn’t like that person”).

It is unsurprising that 2024 was the most lethal year on record for the press in the over three decades the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has been documenting this data: a ongoing neglect to bring to justice those responsible for journalist killings has created a environment without consequences in which journalists’ killers are actually able to get away with murder and so persist in these actions.

Nowhere is this more evident than in the Middle Eastern nation, which is accountable for the deaths of over two hundred journalists in the past two years.

Societal Impact

The impact on society is profound. Attacks on journalists are assaults on facts. They are attacks on facts. They are attacks on our entitlement to information and on our liberty to live freely and safely.

This week, CPJ meets for its annual International Press Freedom awards. My message at the event is the identical as my one for the president: such events may happen. But it is our responsibility to make sure they do not.