60 Minutes correspondent Lesley Stahl, among those accepting press freedom awards from the Radio Television Digital News Association tonight, told attendees that it was especially significant “because it comes now, when our precious First Amendment feels vulnerable and when my precious 60 Minutes is fighting, quite frankly, for our life.”
“I am so proud at 60 Minutes that we are standing and fighting for what is right,” Stahl said.
Either directly or indirectly, Stahl and a number of the honorees at the D.C. event talked of the Trump administration’s attacks on the news media, including efforts to dictate who is a member of the White House press pool and by the president’s references to the press as the “enemy of the people.”
Stahl did get into the details of what is happening at 60 Minutes: Trump sued the network for $20 billion, claiming that they deceptively edited an interview with Kamala Harris for an election special in October. The FCC also has launched an inquiry, with CBS turning over an unedited transcript of the interview in response to an agency demand.
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What has been disconcerting to CBS News staffers is the prospect that parent Paramount Global will settle Trump’s lawsuit, even though many legal observers say is frivolous. But Paramount Global is seeking to smooth the path for FCC regulatory approval for its acquisition by Skydance. There have been settlement talks, but Paramount Global filed a new motion to dismiss the case earlier today.
Speaking of all reporters, Stahl said, “We may be labeled as the enemy, we may be cast as the other side, but our function is the stand on the sidelines. We are supposed to look in, and report out. We’re almost like the mark at the other end of the archery field. We’re just standing there as a target, almost as a sitting duck. We hold our position, but we are not drawn in to the battle. But here’s what happens. We keep working. We don’t stop.”
Stahl called the First Amendment “the jewel at the center of our democracy,” while giving a stark warning of what is happening to it.
“It’s unfathomable that Americans are losing their jobs for speaking their minds,” Stahl said. “How can it be that Americans are afraid that if they speak up, they could face litigation or even death threats? We are living in the age of anxiety where, in the United States, reporters are being punished for doing their jobs. And here’s the thing: The public is not rising up in protest. We need fortitude. We need strength. And we need to just put our heads down and continue doing our jobs.”
Among the other honorees were Omar Jimenez of CNN; Steve Inskeep of NPR and Rachel Scott of ABC News, and Karen DeWitt of New York Public News Network received the Lifetime Achievement Award. Another First Amendment honoree, Trey Yingst, chief foreign correspondent for Fox News, recognized “the brave Palestinian journalists in Gaza who have risked and have often given their lives to practice our craft.”
“We live in a dangerous time of attacks on journalists, of misinformation, or efforts to silence those who hold truth to power,” Yingst said. “Our work is more important now than ever. The First Amendment is more important now than ever.”
He added, “Journalists are not the enemy of the people. Let me say that again, journalists are not the enemy of the people. Quite the opposite, journalists are the voice of the people.”
Also recognized at the event was The Associated Press, as it challenges Trump’s ban on its reporters and photographers from White House events because it refused to refer to the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America in its style guidance.
The lead attorney for the AP’s legal case against the Trump administration, Charles Tobin of Ballard Spahr, also was honored.
“We are facing what could be some of the most difficult times for the First Amendment and for the independence of your storytelling that we have faced since the American revolution,” Tobin told the crowd. “But let’s be clear: This White House has made it the official policy of the United States government to persecute journalists for their editorial judgment, the editorial judgment reserved to them by the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
“And while the words ‘original intent’ behind the First Amendment have become mainstream conversation at parties and such, let’s remember the framers’ original intent was to prevent the government from censoring journalists and other speakers work and forcing obedience to our leaders for an official point of view.”
The post Lesley Stahl Accepts First Amendment Award Amid Attacks On ’60 Minutes’: “We Are Standing And Fighting For What Is Right” appeared first on Deadline.
