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IF THE TRUTH IS A CRIME, THEN WE ARE ALL CRIMINALS, BECAUSE SILENCE
IS WHAT TYRANNY DEPENDS ON  
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Thom Hartmann
July 8, 2025
Hartmann Report
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_ Now that Trump has threatened to prosecute CNN, what happens next
will define the role of the press and the soul of this nation… _

,

 

History rarely announces itself. It creeps in quietly, cloaked in the
language of “law and order,” “national security,” and
“patriotism.” But every now and then, it screams.

LAST WEEK, IT SCREAMED.

Donald Trump, now seated once again behind the Resolute Desk, and his
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, have openly threatened CNN
[[link removed]] with
criminal prosecution for reporting on the existence and use of an app
— ICEBlock — that alerts undocumented immigrants about nearby
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations.

This app, which is publicly available, and the reporting around it —
likewise rooted in public records — is suddenly being framed as a
“national security threat.”

Let’s be crystal clear about what’s happening: the President of
the United States and his administration are threatening to jail
journalists for doing their jobs.

THIS ISN’T JUST AN AUTHORITARIAN FLIRTATION. IT’S A SHOT ACROSS
THE BOW OF AMERICAN DEMOCRACY. AND IT SHOULD CHILL EVERY CITIZEN WHO
STILL BELIEVES IN THE SACRED PROTECTIONS OF THE FIRST AMENDMENT AND
THE ROLE OF A FREE PRESS IN OUR CONSTITUTIONAL REPUBLIC.

There’s a reason the Founders placed freedom of the press in the
very First Amendment. They understood that tyranny doesn’t announce
itself with tanks in the streets (although Trump has brought us that,
too, in DC and Los Angeles): it _begins_ when dissent is silenced
and truth becomes optional. When the government gains the power to
determine what is and isn’t “acceptable” journalism or citizen
monitoring of government actions, democracy doesn’t just wobble. It
collapses.

WE’VE SEEN THIS MOVIE BEFORE.

In the 1970s, Richard Nixon compiled an “enemies list,”
weaponizing the IRS and FBI against journalists and political
opponents. But even Nixon — infamous as he was — never dared
prosecute a major news network for reporting publicly available facts
or proudly announces criminal investigations of individuals monitoring
the police.

In 1917, Woodrow Wilson signed the Espionage Act into law, a piece of
legislation later used to imprison dissenters and suppress anti-war
journalists during World War I. Bernie Sanders’ hero, democratic
socialist Eugene Debs
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was thrown into prison for protesting our involvement in World War I
and ran for president in 1920 from his prison cell.

In 1950s McCarthyist America, journalists who didn’t toe the
anti-communist line were blacklisted, surveilled, and driven from
their careers.

HISTORIANS — AND EVEN HIGH SCHOOL HISTORY CLASSES — CORRECTLY
IDENTIFY WILSON’S AND MCCARTHY’S EXCESSES AS A TERRIBLE MOMENTS IN
OUR PAST, MOMENTS THAT SHOULD NEVER, EVER BE REPEATED.

But now, in 2025, we are revisiting that time but with a new beast
entirely: a populist authoritarian with open contempt for
constitutional constraints, emboldened by a cult of personality, and
empowered by six corrupt Republicans on a Supreme Court that has told
him he can openly commit crimes without fear of prosecution.

COMPOUNDING THIS CRISIS OF DEMOCRACY IS A BILLIONAIRE-OWNED RIGHT-WING
MEDIA ECOSYSTEM THAT NO LONGER EVEN PRETENDS TO TELL THE TRUTH.

Donald Trump is not unique in history, but the confluence of power,
propaganda, and post-truth politics he embodies is dangerously
unprecedented in America.

THE MOST TERRIFYING PART OF THIS EPISODE IS NOT THAT TRUMP IS
THREATENING CNN. IT’S THAT EVERY OTHER NEWSROOM IN AMERICA IS NOW
TAKING NOTICE AND SOME ARE _IMMEDIATELY_ BENDING THE KNEE.

FOR EXAMPLE, CBS’S NEW PRESIDENT, DAVID ELLISON
[[link removed]] (SON
OF BILLIONAIRE “MAGA LARRY” ELLISON) REPORTEDLY JUST GAVE GIVE
$15 MILLION
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TRUMP AND PROMISED, ACCORDING TO TRUMP HIMSELF, ANOTHER
[[link removed]] $15
MILLION IN NATIONWIDE “FREE ADVERTISING” FOR HIS HATEFUL MAGA
MESSAGE.

When a president targets a media outlet for reporting on a publicly
available app or quoting anonymous officials, the effect isn’t just
on that outlet. It reverberates throughout every editorial board,
every reporter’s notebook, every newsroom budget meeting.

THEY ASK THEMSELVES: _SHOULD WE COVER THIS STORY? WILL WE GET SUED?
WILL OUR REPORTERS GET SUBPOENAED? IS IT WORTH THE COST, RISK, OR EVEN
THE HASSLE?_

This is the “chilling effect” in action. And it
is _exactly_ what authoritarians want and dictators get.

THEY DON’T NEED TO JAIL EVERY JOURNALIST OR EVEN EVERY PROTESTOR OR
OPPOSITION POLITICIAN; THERE ARE ONLY AROUND 1,500 
[[link removed]]POLITICAL
PRISONERS IN RUSSIA, A COUNTRY WITH A POPULATION OF 143 MILLION.
THAT’S ALL PUTIN NEEDED TO COW THE PRESS AND THE POLITICAL
OPPOSITION — AND THE PEOPLE IN THE STREETS — INTO SILENCE.

Ask journalists and activists in Mexico, where threats and violence
have silenced entire newspapers. Or in Russia, where one law
criminalized the reporting of the word “war” to describe the
Ukraine invasion and the entire nation’s press immediately bent the
knee. Or in Hungary, where Viktor Orbán turned independent press
outlets into government mouthpieces. It always starts the same way:
with “exceptions,” “investigations,” “national security,”
and “fake news.”

SOUND FAMILIAR?

Let’s talk about what CNN actually reported. The so-called
“ICEBlock” app was not a secret Pentagon tool. It’s publicly
downloadable. It informs undocumented immigrants — many of whom have
lived and worked here for decades — about where ICE raids might be
happening. You know, the same way Waze tells drivers where police
speed traps are.

CNN and The New York Times also reported
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internal U.S. government discussions about military options in Iran,
again, based on information already circulating through D.C. and
partially leaked by officials themselves. It was nothing that
would’ve shocked the Ayatollah.

BUT TRUMP SAW A HEADLINE HE DIDN’T LIKE, AND NOEM SAW A POLITICAL
OPPORTUNITY TO PLAY TOUGH COP ON IMMIGRATION. SO NOW, INSTEAD OF
DEBATING IMMIGRATION POLICY OR MIDDLE EAST STRATEGY, WE’RE TALKING
ABOUT JAILING JOURNALISTS AND SUING NEWS OUTLETS.

LET ME REPEAT THAT: _JAILING_ JOURNALISTS. NOT PRESSURING THEM. NOT
CRITICIZING THEM. _PROSECUTING_ THEM.

Here’s the thing. All Trump needs is a few ambitious prosecutors, a
distracted electorate, and a media too scared — or too worried about
its bottom line — to fight back.

THIS IS AUTHORITARIANISM IN A DESIGNER SUIT. AND IT’S ALREADY HERE.

Right-wing billionaires have bought up local newspapers and radio
stations, converting once-independent voices into megaphones for MAGA
talking points. “Citizen journalists” on social media — and
Russian troll farms — parrot conspiracy theories generated by
AI-enhanced bots that are then amplified by secret algorithms. The
line between “news” and “propaganda” has blurred beyond
recognition.

MEANWHILE, GENUINE INVESTIGATIVE REPORTERS — THOSE WHO DIG INTO
GOVERNMENT CORRUPTION, ENVIRONMENTAL DEVASTATION, AND POLICE ABUSE —
ARE UNDER CONSTANT THREAT. FINANCIALLY. LEGALLY. SOMETIMES PHYSICALLY.

Just ask the journalists shot or arrested during Black Lives Matter
protests. Or the ones surveilled by ICE for uncovering abuses in
detention centers.

THIS ISN’T ABOUT CNN. IT’S ABOUT WHETHER TRUTH STILL HAS A PLACE
IN THE AMERICAN CONVERSATION.

If this prosecution threat succeeds — whether through actual charges
or through the intimidation it provokes — the consequences will be
draconian.

— WHISTLEBLOWERS WILL GO SILENT. Why leak evidence of government
wrongdoing if the journalists who publish it are dragged into court
and forced to reveal their sources?

— INVESTIGATIVE JOURNALISM WILL WITHER. Why invest time and money
into reporting if the legal risks outweigh losing your job or going to
prison?

— CIVIC IGNORANCE WILL GROW. Without trusted sources of
information, citizens turn to whatever confirms their biases: YouTube
grifters, Twitter trolls, or state-run propaganda.

— CORRUPTION WILL THRIVE. From corporate polluters to racist
sheriffs to masked agents of the state, the worst among us flourish in
darkness.

This is how democracies die, not with a bang, but with a threat and a
few individuals or organizations destroyed to “make them an
example.”

SO WHAT DO WE DO?

FIRST, we demand that every member of Congress — Democrat and
Republican — publicly condemn this threat against CNN. Silence is
complicity.

SECOND, we urge our courts to defend the First Amendment with the
vigor it demands. The press must remain free from government
intimidation, or it is not truly free.

THIRD, we support independent journalism with our wallets. Subscribe.
Donate. Share their stories. The corporate media won’t save us. _We
the people,_ must.

FOURTH, we organize. Not just around press freedom, but around every
interconnected pillar of democracy under threat: voting rights,
judicial integrity, environmental justice, and yes, immigration reform
rooted in compassion, not cruelty.

AND FINALLY, WE REMEMBER: THE FOUNDERS GAVE US A ROADMAP. _WE THE
PEOPLE_ ARE THE ULTIMATE CHECK ON TYRANNY.

BUT ONLY IF WE SHOW UP. ONLY IF WE SPEAK OUT.

July 2, 2025, when Trump made that threat, will go down as a dark day
in American history, unless we choose to make it a turning point.

TRUMP’S ASSAULT ON THE PRESS IS NOT A SIDESHOW. IT IS NOT A
DISTRACTION. IT IS THE WHOLE GAME. CONTROL THE NARRATIVE, AND YOU
CONTROL THE COUNTRY. SILENCE DISSENT, AND YOU CAN DO _ANYTHING_.

The American experiment survives only as long as we defend the
institutions that make it possible. And a free press is not just one
of those institutions: it’s the _first_ _line of defense._

So today, we stand with CNN. Tomorrow, it might be ProPublica. Or
Mother Jones. Or your local paper. Or this newsletter.

When the truth becomes a crime, then we are _all_ criminals. And in
that case, I say proudly: print the truth anyway.

Let them come.

_Thom Hartmann is a NY Times bestselling author of 34 books in 17
languages & nation's #1 progressive radio host. Psychotherapist,
international relief worker. Politics, history, spirituality,
psychology, science, anthropology, pre-history, culture, and the
natural world._

* freedom of the press
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* Trump Administration
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* CNN
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* lawsuit
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