President Trump has made his animus clear for regular media organizations. Now he is becoming more personal.
Mr. Trump and his most important lieutenant, Elon Musk, who has been able to run what they call the Ministry of Government Efficiency as a 'special government officer', have attacked journalists by name on the social media platforms they possess: Truth Social and X.
On his truth social report on Friday, Mr Trump called on the Washington Post to dismiss Eugene Robinson, a Pulitzer-Prize-winning columnist, and to manage him 'incompetent'. Mr. Trump often places the bill on his bill and condemns regularly observed enemies.
Mr. Robinson had written in an opinion column on Thursday that top republican senators would “be ashamed of themselves” because they do not rise against Mr. Trump during the confirmation process for some of his cabinet picks and because they did not protest against Mr. Musk's taking an ax For government services such as the United States Agency for International Development, which manages foreign utility programs. Mr. Robinson also appeared on “Morning Joe” on MSNBC on Friday to discuss his column.
“So sad to see him try to justify the waste, fraud and corruption at USAID with his pathetic radical left spider,” Mr Trump wrote. “He must be fired immediately !!!”
In an e-mail, a post spokeswoman said: “Eugene Robinson is a Pulitzer-Prize-winning columnist with a 45-year record of integrity, professionalism and meticulous reporting and commentary. The Washington Post is behind Gene – just like it stands behind all journalists and news organizations that focus on independent coverage and a free press. “
Mr. Musk focused on a Wall Street Journal Investigative Reporter, Katherine Long. Mrs. Long was the first to reveal in a report in the Journal on Thursday that Marko Elez, one of Mr. Musk's lieutenants at the Department of Government Efficiency, was linked to a racist social media account that had been placed since then, such as: “You couldn't pay myself to get married outside of my ethnicity.”
Mr Elez resigned after the magazine had approached the White House for comment, according to the article. It was Mrs. Long's first article in her new job at the journal.
Mr. Musk said on Friday in separate answers to X that Mrs. Long was “a disgusting and cruel person” and should be “immediately fired”.
Vice -President JD Vance also weighed X on Friday and said that he did not agree with some posts from Mr Elez, but that they should not “ruin the life of a child.” (Mr. Elez is 25 years old.)
“We should not reward journalists who try to destroy people. Once, “wrote Mr. Vance.
The Wall Street Journal did not immediately respond to a request for comments.
“Journalists have a task to do and may never be attacked by high-ranking government officials to do this,” said Timothy Richardson, the director of the journalism and disinformation program at Pen America, a non-profit free expression, in a statement.
He added: “Musk's call for shooting this journalist is in contradiction with his self -proclaimed Advocacy of free speech and reveals his hypocrisy.”
The behavior is not new for Mr. Trump. In his first term, he often criticized controversial journalists, including Jim Acosta from CNN, Katy Tur from NBC News and Maggie Haberman of the New York Times.
Since his inauguration in January, Mr. Trump has quickly demonized what he calls 'the fake news media'. This week he promoted a false claim to his social account that government agencies had given “billions of dollars” to news organizations “as a” payment “for creating good stories about the Democrats.”
The cited figures even showed that millions of dollars were paid in subscriptions to media and professional subscription services.
Mr. Trump's administration has said that it will cancel some government subscriptions for news organizations while trying to lower government spending. The Pers Secretary of the White House, Karoline Leavitt, said reporters that the Trump government would cancel all subscriptions of the government polito. The Times reported on Thursday that the agricultural department had canceled its subscriptions to Politico Pro, the professional subscription service of Politico, which reports on policy and legislation.
The leaders of Politico said on Thursday in a memorandum to the readers that Politico was a private company that had never received government financing.
“Government agencies that subscribe do this through standard public purchasing processes – just like any other tool they buy to work smarter and to be more efficient,” said the statement.
