The fence will be tested

“That’s right, but they never attack the same place twice. They were testing the fences for weaknesses, systematically. They remember.”

— Robert Muldoon, game warden, Jurassic Park (1993)

If we learned anything from the blockbuster film Jurassic Park, other than we all had a crush on Jeff Goldblum, it’s that threats thrive if given the right environment.

In the 1993 movie, the very clever, very vicious velociraptors were kept within a giant electric fence. The predators would fling themselves against their enclosure time and again. “They were testing the fences for weaknesses, systematically,” the game warden told us.

As managing editor of the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, a database cataloging aggressions against the press in the United States, the attacks I’ve seen on journalism and journalists this year are as clever as a velociraptor. I predict these assaults on our First Amendment — and those who work within it — are going to increase in frequency. And as we head into another heated national election, the fence is going to be tested.

This year, the Tracker cataloged attacks on the most basic functions of newsgathering. In March, then-State Sen. Wendy Rogers asked Arizona senate leadership to bar a reporter from entering the senate building. Rogers’ issue with the reporter? Camryn Sanchez was investigating Rogers’ residency claims — whether she lived in the Flagstaff-area district she was elected to represent in 2020. Sanchez visited two of Rogers’ homes and knocked on doors in her neighborhoods. Senate leadership denied Rogers’ request to kick Sanchez out of the Senate, but did tell the reporter not to approach the publicly elected senator on the floor.

Rogers then got a restraining order against the reporter, citing harassment. Sanchez’s attorney highlighted the absurdity of the request: “If this court’s going to interpret a reporter asking a sitting senator about legislation they sponsored as being the first in a series of harassing events then it’s complete restrictions on the First Amendment,” he said. “It’s complete prior restraint on the ability of a reporter to do their job.” About a month after it went into effect, the order was struck down.

In Marion, Kansas, this summer, local law enforcement raided the Marion County Record’s newsroom, seizing computers, personal cell phones and storage devices. Then they went to the home of publisher Eric Meyer and his mother, Record co-owner Joan Meyer, and raided that, seizing more computers, cell phones, and storage devices. Joan Meyer died the next day.

Reasoning on the search warrants for the raids? An investigation into alleged unlawful use of a computer and identity theft. Another possible reason? Eric Meyer said the Record had been investigating Marion police chief Gideon Cody’s background and allegations of wrongdoing. National outcry followed, and the search warrants were dropped and publishing equipment returned. Cody later resigned.

In October in Illinois, reporter Hank Sanders was issued three citations from Calumet City officials for “interference or hampering of city officials.” The mayor also sought an order barring Sanders from city hall. Their complaints? The Daily Southtown journalist asked too many questions.

Those charges were dropped in less than a week, but they represent something larger, the outlet’s executive editor told us: “They represent a continued assault on journalists who, like Hank, are guilty of nothing more than engaging in the practice of journalism.”

A few weeks after that, in Atmore, Alabama, a reporter and publisher were arrested. Those charges? Reporting on and publishing grand jury information leaked to them. When the journalists were released on bond, there was a catch: They couldn’t publish about the grand jury investigation. As of today, the charges and prior restraints remain in place.

Asking questions, knocking on doors, reporting on local news and newsmakers are all standard journalistic practices. Why, then, would anyone try to criminalize them? Because if the velociraptors taught us anything, it’s to keep throwing yourself at the fence — you never know when the electric grid may be shut off.

Attacks on journalism, and journalists themselves, are going to keep coming. We need to be prepared to protect the fence — to document threats against the press, to raise alarms and to pass permanent, federal protections for journalists and newsgathering, like the PRESS Act.