Chilling Statement

Total cases	36

President Trump tries to stop release of journalist’s book ‘Fire and Fury’

January 4, 2018

On January 4, 2018, President Donald Trump’s attorney sent a cease-and-desist letter to journalist Michael Wolff, the author of an …

President Trump says ABC News reporter Brian Ross should be fired

December 10, 2017

On December 9, 2017, President Trump tweeted that ABC News investigative reporter Brian Ross “should be immediately fired.”

Donald Trump says Washington Post should fire reporter Dave Weigel

December 10, 2017

On December 9, 2017, President Trump tweeted that Washington Post reporter Dave Weigel “should be fired” for tweeting a misleading …

President Trump says that CNN International is ‘fake news’

December 6, 2017

President Donald Trump criticized CNN International on Twitter on November 25, 2017, calling the network “fake news” and accusing it …

Republican Senate candidate Roy Moore threatens to sue the Washington Post

November 14, 2017

Roy Moore, the Republican candidate in Alabama’s special election for Senate, said on November 12, 2017, that he would sue …

Montana GOP official says she ‘would have shot’ Guardian reporter who was assaulted by Rep. Gianforte

October 26, 2017

Montana official Karen Marshall resigned on Wednesday in response to uproar over her comment.

Trump calls NBC ‘fake news’ and suggests FCC should challenge its broadcast license

October 11, 2017

On October 11, 2017, President Trump called NBC News “fake news” and suggested that the FCC should challenge the network’s …

White House press secretary says tweets criticizing Trump are ‘a fireable offense’

November 7, 2017

At a White House press briefing on September 13, 2017, White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said that it …

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.