Chilling Statement

Total cases	48

State Department removes NPR reporter from official trip

January 27, 2020

In apparent retaliation for an NPR reporter’s interview with Mike Pompeo, the State Department removed a different NPR reporter from …

State agency sends cease-and-desist letter to NBC journalists

January 24, 2020

The Wisconsin Department of Children and Families sent a cease-and-desist letter to an NBC reporter and producer on Jan. 24, …

Indiana governor sends cease-and-desist letters to news outlets following investigative report

November 29, 2019

On Nov. 29, four days after Reveal from The Center for Investigative Reporting published a lengthy investigative piece into injuries …

Congressman Nunes alleges CNN, Daily Beast ‘committed crimes’ in reporting, says will sue

November 24, 2019

California Congressman Devin Nunes said that he plans to sue CNN and The Daily Beast for defamation during an interview …

White House plans to instruct federal agencies to cancel subscriptions to two major news outlets

October 24, 2019

The White House announced that President Donald Trump plans to instruct federal agencies to not renew their subscriptions to The …

Reporter says White House senior adviser threatened to ‘delve’ into her personal life

October 23, 2019

Caitlin Yilek, a breaking news reporter for the Washington Examiner, wrote that she was berated and threatened by top White …

Former House Speaker Gingrich says, if he could, he would eliminate the White House press corps

October 21, 2019

Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich said during a CBS News interview on Oct. 21, 2019, that he would …

Trump’s anti-press language on Twitter mirrored in violent video created by supporter

October 19, 2019

More than half of the news outlets depicted in a graphic fake video of President Donald Trump assaulting his critics …

More Incidents

How we track Chilling Statements

Selected public threats made to reporters and media organizations by U.S. politicians and other public figures, which can have a chilling effect on journalism.

FEATURED STORY

From ‘fake news’ to ‘enemy of the people’: An Anatomy of Trump’s tweets

From June 16, 2015, when Donald Trump declared his candidacy for president, to today, where he sits as leader of the free world, every tweet in which he mentions the media, individual journalists, news outlets, or journalistic sources in a negative tone is being tracked in a database.

Contributor Stephanie Sugars, who created that database with the Committee to Protect Journalists and manages its ongoing accounting, explored rhetoric from the first two years of Trump’s presidency in a blog post.

As the president continues to communicate through Twitter, this live database offers a continued tracking.