Hundreds of news outlets coordinated to publish scathing editorials against Trump's attacks on the press

Boston Globe leads campaign against Trump on free press.
(Image credit: JOSEPH PREZIOSO/AFP/Getty Images)

President Trump keeps calling media "the enemy of the people," and journalists have had enough. On Thursday, hundreds of news outlets answered a call from The Boston Globe to join forces and reaffirm the importance of the Fourth Estate. The theme was consistent, with more than 350 news organizations large and small banding together to defend the press against denigrations of "fake news."

"Unable to carry on in the light, the president attempts to drag us all into a dark labyrinth where rules don't apply and some vacant concept of winning seems attainable," said the Record-Journal in Meriden, Connecticut. "But news organizations do not play in that dark playground. They perform in the light."

"Our country's leader shouldn't be making it easier for dictators to harass and silence journalists in places where freedom of the press remains a dream," wrote the Sun Sentinel, a Florida paper just down the coast from Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort.

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"The true enemies of the people — and democracy — are those who try to suffocate truth by vilifying and demonizing the messenger," said the Des Moines Register in Iowa. "The response to that cannot be silence."

"We are the watchdogs, the questioners, the annoying voice that refuses to accept this moment in time as the best we can do," wrote the Capital Gazette, the Maryland newspaper that suffered an attack from a gunman in June. The publication opted not to coordinate with national outlets, citing its focus on more local issues.

"We are not the enemy," the Longview News Journal in Texas wrote. "We, like you, are the American people."

Trump responded by tweeting Thursday morning that "THE FAKE NEWS MEDIA IS THE OPPOSITION PARTY." Read more of the most arresting excerpts, and check to see if your local paper published an editorial, at The Boston Globe.

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Summer Meza, The Week US

Summer Meza has worked at The Week since 2018, serving as a staff writer, a news writer and currently the deputy editor. As a proud news generalist, she edits everything from political punditry and science news to personal finance advice and film reviews. Summer has previously written for Newsweek and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, covering national politics, transportation and the cannabis industry.