Friend,

Welcome to the August 2025 Free Press Update, our monthly newsletter recapping as much of our work from the last month as possible into one email. Let’s get started:

🚨Take action: Stop the dangerous giveaway to Big Media

Right now, the FCC is preparing to scrap the national broadcast-ownership cap, a safeguard that prevents any one company from controlling too much of our local media.

If this rule is eliminated, billionaire-owned conglomerates like Sinclair and Fox could take over even more stations, further drowning out independent voices and local news.

This isn’t just another technical policy change — it’s a massive power grab that would accelerate newsroom layoffs, slash community coverage and hand Trump-aligned media giants even more influence.

We need to flood the FCC with our comments opposing this change before it’s too late — if you haven’t already, add your name today to stop this dangerous giveaway to Big Media:

Who’s caving to Trump?

Free Press just released our first-ever Media Capitulation Index, a sweeping investigation into how 35 of the country’s biggest media companies — from Disney and Paramount to The Los Angeles Times — are bowing to political pressure from the Trump administration.

The findings are alarming: Many of the most powerful companies are failing to defend democracy and a free press against authoritarian threats.

The index ranks each conglomerate on a scale from “independent” to “propaganda” and exposes the deep ties between media corporations, government power and billionaire influence. It’s a must-read.

ICE is detaining journalist Mario Guevara for doing his job

Photo credit: Facebook page for Mario Guevara

ICE arrested Emmy-winning reporter Mario Guevara while he was covering a protest in Atlanta — and has kept him in custody for more than two months even though the charges against him were dropped.

He’s now the only journalist in the United States jailed for newsgathering — and his case sends a chilling message about the Trump administration’s escalating assault on press freedom.

Free Press is standing with allies to demand Guevara’s immediate release and to defend the First Amendment against authoritarian attacks. This fight is bigger than one journalist — it’s about protecting everyone’s right to speak truth to power.

Defunding public media = defunding democracy

A journalist from a local PBS affiliate interviews SXSW participants in Austin, Texas. Photo: Flickr user Jeanine

Last month, Congress gutted $1.1 billion in funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting — a longtime dream of Trump and his allies.

This reckless move will devastate local stations that provide educational programming, accountability journalism and lifesaving emergency alerts.

But the fight isn’t over. New Jersey is already investing in public-interest journalism — acting as a role model for other states to follow — and we must push for federal solutions to ensure that people across the country have the news and information they need. It won’t be easy to rebuild what Trump has ruined, but we must.

A View from the Field

Advocates speaking out against the unjust detention of Mario Guevara.

Check out the latest updates from the field as our team works alongside our amazing allies and activists to create a more just and equitable media system. Below are snippets from our latest View from the Field blog — read the entire post!

• Director of Digital Justice and Civil Rights Nora Benavidez is working with the Georgia First Amendment Foundation and other groups to call for the release of unjustly detained journalist Mario Guevara.
• Senior Producer and Strategist Julio Ricardo Varela took part in “Strengthening Latino Representation in Newsrooms,” a webinar that the UCLA Latino Policy & Politics Institute hosted. The conversation explored strategies for change and considered how to shift toward more inclusive, accurate and empowering media coverage.
• Vice President of Policy and General Counsel Matt Wood took part in the NARUC Summer Policy Summit in Boston, where he discussed the FCC’s “Delete, Delete, Delete” proceeding — a brazen attempt to roll back consumer safeguards for industry’s convenience.

Get Us In Your Feeds

Are you connected with Free Press on social media? If not, we’ve featured some posts from the past month below — and you can stay in the loop by following Free Press on platforms like Bluesky, Facebook, Instagram and TikTok.

• Over on Blueksky, we posted a link to our Senior Advisor of Economic and Policy Analysis Derek Turner’s interview with Common Dreams on why a coalition of press-freedom, labor and civil-liberties groups is urging the Trump FCC to reject plans to weaken media-ownership limits. Check it out.
• On Facebook, we shared a piece that Senior Director of Strategy and Communications Timothy Karr wrote on how Sinclair stations and other outlets are helping normalize Trump’s authoritarian power grab in D.C. Read it here.
• On Instagram, we created an explainer carousel on the FCC’s dangerous media-ownership proceeding. Get the facts.
• And finally on TikTok, Campaign Manager Ruth L. Nuñez highlighted our toolkit on how to fight authoritarianism. Take a look.

Thank you for reading!

Free Press has an important role to play in the months and years ahead. Our team has specialized skills that will be needed to confront and combat the country’s slide toward authoritarianism. We’ve fought a Trump administration and the media moguls enabling it before, and we’re doing it again. Will you rush a donation to Free Press today? Your gift will help us do what’s needed to fight authoritarianism.

Thank you for everything you do to help power our movement,

All of us at Free Press and Free Press Action
freepress.net