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“Stuff occurs.” Just two words. That was enough for the US president to effectively dismiss what is arguably the most infamous journalist killing of the past ten years – and in so doing plumbed a new low in his disregard toward the press, for journalism – and for the facts.

The Context

The American leader’s dismissive attitude of the killing of well-known reporter Jamal Khashoggi came during a media briefing with the Saudi crown prince, MBS – a man whom the CIA found in a 2021 report had ordered the kidnap and killing of the Washington Post columnist in 2018. (Prince Mohammed has denied involvement.)

The US intelligence services were not the sole entities to conclude the murder – which occurred in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul and in which the 59-year-old journalist was drugged and cut apart – was approved at the top echelons. An inquiry led by then UN special rapporteur, Agnès Callamard, reached similar conclusions.

International Response

For a short time, governments were in agreement in their condemnation of Saudi Arabia’s actions. The United States enacted penalties and visa bans in 2021 over the murder, although it stopped short of penalizing the crown prince himself. Since then, the nation has been slowly rehabilitating itself – and the crown prince’s visit to the US capital seemed to be the ultimate sign of that rehabilitation.

Presidential Comments

Opponents of the regime had strongly criticized the meeting. But what was on display at the White House was worse than could have been imagined. Not only did the president fete the Saudi leader but he effectively rewrote history – and then pointed fingers at the victim. Prince Mohammed, he asserted when asked, knew nothing about the killing – in clear opposition to what his nation’s intelligence services determined four years ago. Moreover, Trump said: “A lot of people didn’t like that gentleman that you’re talking about, whether you like him or didn’t like him, things happen.”

Established Conduct

This represents a fresh and shameful low for a leader who has made little secret of his contempt for the truth – or for the press. He has defamed reporters (he called a news network, whose journalist asked the question about Khashoggi at the media event “false information”), scolded them in open settings (he called one a “piggy” this week for asking about his relationship with the convicted sex offender financier Jeffrey Epstein), sued media organizations for large amounts of money in vexatious law suits, and called for media groups he disapproves of to be shut down.

He has pressured established media out of the official briefing group for refusing to use language of his preference, and he has slashed financial support for essential public media at domestically and vital independent media abroad.

Wider Consequences

All of that has created an atmosphere in which journalists are manifestly less safe in the United States, but one in which their victimization – and indeed murder – becomes not just unimportant (“things happen”) but acceptable (“a lot of people didn’t like that person”).

It is no surprise that 2024 was the deadliest year on record for the press in the over three decades the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has been tracking this information: a ongoing neglect to hold those accountable for reporter murders has established a culture of impunity in which those who murder reporters are literally able to get away with murder and so persist in these actions.

Nowhere is this clearer than in the Middle Eastern nation, which is responsible for the deaths of over two hundred media workers in the recent period.

Effect on Society

The impact on the public is deep. Attacks on journalists are attacks on the truth. They are attacks on facts. They are violations of our entitlement to information and on our freedom to exist without fear and safely.

On Thursday, CPJ meets for its annual International Press Freedom awards. The statement at the event is the identical as my message for Trump: these things may occur. But it is our duty to make sure they do not.