Ladder
Ladder: official labels, in North America
A government officially brands a news outlet or a journalist as a source of disinformation or "fake news", or requires it to register as an agent of another country. Such labels often carry reporting duties and restrictions, and can cost the outlet its audience and advertisers.
The number of entries reflects the depth of this record, not the severity of a country's conduct.
Narrow this ladder
2Pressure
Using state power short of prosecution to change coverage: regulatory threats, licence reviews, funding cuts, lawsuits by officials, official "fake news" or "foreign agent" labels, advertising pressure, tax audits.
Federal Communications Commission Chair Brendan Carr reopened complaints alleging CBS and NBC distorted the news, demanding CBS turn over the full tape and transcript of a 60 Minutes interview and later accusing NBC's parent Comcast of misleading coverage of an immigration case.
Ongoing · 1 source · Full entry
In a September 28, 1959 television appearance, Cuban Prime Minister Fidel Castro criticized Havana newspapers, including Diario de la Marina, that had questioned his government's actions, along with the Inter American Press Association's decision to examine press freedom in Cuba.
Sustained 11 May 1960 · 2 sources · Full entry
5Eliminate
Long imprisonment, killing, disappearance or forced exile of journalists, with state involvement as the sources state it.
A Nicaraguan appeals court stripped 94 government opponents, including exiled journalists Carlos Fernando Chamorro and Alvaro Navarro, of their citizenship, days after President Daniel Ortega released 222 political prisoners to the United States and immediately declared them stateless too.
Sustained · 2 sources · Full entry
All ladders · Official labels: by country and year · The United States chapter