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“Stuff occurs.” A mere phrase. That’s all it took for Donald Trump to brush off what is arguably the most infamous journalist killing of the last decade – and in so doing plumbed a new low in his contempt for journalists, for journalism – and for the truth.

Background Details

The US president’s dismissal of the murder of prominent journalist Jamal Khashoggi came during a media briefing with the Saudi crown prince, MBS – a man whom the CIA found in a recent assessment had ordered the abduction and murder of the Washington Post columnist in 2018. (Prince Mohammed has denied involvement.)

The American spy agencies were not the only ones to conclude the homicide – which took place in the Saudi diplomatic building in Turkey and in which the late Khashoggi was drugged and cut apart – was approved at the top echelons. An inquiry led by then UN special rapporteur, Agnès Callamard, reached comparable findings.

International Response

For a short time, governments were in agreement in their criticism of the kingdom’s conduct. The US enacted sanctions and travel restrictions in that year over the murder, although it stopped short of penalizing the crown prince himself. Since then, the kingdom has been gradually restoring itself – and the leader’s trip to the US capital seemed to be the ultimate sign of that rehabilitation.

Presidential Comments

Opponents of the government had roundly condemned the meeting. But what was evident at the presidential residence was more alarming than could have been imagined. Not only did Trump fete Prince Mohammed but he effectively rewrote history – and then blamed the victim. The crown prince, he asserted when asked, knew nothing about the killing – in clear opposition to what his nation’s spy agencies concluded previously. Moreover, the president said: “A lot of people disliked that person that you’re talking about, whether you like him or didn’t like him, incidents occur.”

Pattern of Behavior

This represents a fresh and shameful point for a leader who has made no attempt to hide of his contempt for the facts – or for the media. He has defamed reporters (he called a news network, whose journalist asked the question about the journalist at the media event “false information”), berated them in public (he called one a “rude name” this week for asking about his connection with the disgraced financier the convicted criminal), sued media organizations for eye-watering sums of money in frivolous cases, and called for media groups he doesn’t like to be shut down.

He has pressured established media out of the White House press pool for declining to use language of his choosing, and he has slashed financial support for essential public media at domestically and vital independent media internationally.

Wider Consequences

All of that has fostered an atmosphere in which reporters are manifestly less safe in the US, but one in which their victimization – and indeed killing – becomes not just unimportant (“things happen”) but acceptable (“many individuals disliked that gentleman”).

It is unsurprising that 2024 was the deadliest year on file for the press in the more than 30 years the press freedom organization has been tracking this data: a persistent failure to bring to justice those accountable for reporter murders has established a environment without consequences in which journalists’ killers are actually able to escape punishment and so persist in these actions.

In no place is this clearer than in the Middle Eastern nation, which is accountable for the killing of more than 200 journalists in the recent period.

Societal Impact

The effect on society is deep. Attacks on journalists are assaults on facts. They are undermining of reality. They are attacks on our entitlement to information and on our freedom to live freely and securely.

On Thursday, the Committee to Protect Journalists gathers for its annual global journalism honors. The statement at the event is the identical as my one for Trump: such events may occur. But it is our duty to make sure they cease.