Ladder: funding and ownership pressure
A government uses money, or its power over owners, instead of acting against reporters directly. Examples are cutting the funds of public broadcasters, forcing the sale of an outlet, steering state advertising away from some publications, and using licence reviews or merger approvals to press an outlet's owners.
The number of entries reflects the depth of this record, not the severity of a country's conduct.
Pressure
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.
| Date | Country | Head of government | What was done | Outcome | Sources |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| August 16, 1971 | Focal case United States (RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180) | Richard Nixon | White House Counsel John Dean wrote a memo on how to use federal agencies against President Nixon's political opponents, and the resulting list of more than 200 names included journalists such as CBS News correspondent Daniel Schorr. Full entry | Reversed (June 27, 1973) | 2 |
| January 22, 2025 | Focal case United States (RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180) | Donald Trump | 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. Full entry | Ongoing | 1 |
| April 22, 2025 | Focal case United States (RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180) | Donald Trump | 60 Minutes executive producer Bill Owens resigned, saying corporate owner Paramount had begun supervising the program's content in new ways while it faced President Trump's lawsuit over a Harris interview and pursued a sale requiring federal approval; the program publicly said on air that it had lo… Full entry | Sustained (April 22, 2025) | 1 |
| May 1, 2025 | Focal case United States (RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180) | Donald Trump | On May 1, 2025, the president of the United States, Donald Trump, signed Executive Order 14290, "Ending Taxpayer Subsidization of Biased Media." Full entry | Unknown | 3 |
| July 18, 2025 | Focal case United States (RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180) | Donald Trump | At President Trump's request, Congress passed a rescissions package clawing back roughly $1.1 billion already appropriated to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, eliminating federal funding for NPR, PBS and their member stations. Full entry | Sustained (July 24, 2025) | 2 |
| July 24, 2025 | Focal case United States (RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180) | Donald Trump | The Federal Communications Commission approved Paramount's sale to Skydance Media after Skydance agreed to install an ombudsman to review complaints of bias at CBS News for two years and pledged to end diversity, equity and inclusion programs, over the objection of the commission's sole Democratic… Full entry | Sustained (July 24, 2025) | 1 |
| September 17, 2025 | Focal case United States (RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180) | Donald Trump | On September 17, 2025, the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), the United States regulator of broadcasting, Brendan Carr, said broadcasters could "do this the easy way or the hard way" over remarks by the television host Jimmy Kimmel, and warned of "additional work for the FCC… Full entry | Reversed (September 23, 2025) | 2 |
| April 28, 2026 | Focal case United States (RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180) | Donald Trump | A bipartisan group of former Federal Communications Commission chairs, commissioners and the Radio Television Digital News Association petitioned a federal appeals court to force the FCC to act on a long-pending request to rescind its decades-old 'news distortion' policy after Chair Brendan Carr re… Full entry | Ongoing (April 28, 2026) | 1 |
| September 20, 1998 | Malaysia (RSF 2026 rank: 95th of 180) | Mahathir Mohamad | After Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad's government arrested former deputy prime minister Anwar Ibrahim in September 1998, party-linked newspapers pressured staff to follow the official line, police visited journalists who interviewed his wife, and authorities said they would monitor internet traffi… Full entry | Unknown | 2 |
| December 21, 2010 | Hungary (RSF 2026 rank: 74th of 180) | Viktor Orban | Hungary's parliament, controlled by Prime Minister Viktor Orban's Fidesz party, passed a media law creating a government-appointed National Media and Infocommunications Authority empowered to fine any outlet, print, broadcast or online, for coverage it deemed unbalanced or offensive to public moral… Full entry | Sustained (January 1, 2011) | 1 |
| June 25, 2013 | Ecuador (RSF 2026 rank: 125th of 180) | Rafael Correa | Ecuador's National Assembly passed the Organic Communication Law under President Rafael Correa, creating the Superintendency of Information and Communication (SUPERCOM), a regulator that issued more than 675 sanctions against journalists and media outlets over the following four years. Full entry | Reversed (February 20, 2019) | 3 |
| December 31, 2015 | Poland (RSF 2026 rank: 27th of 180) | Beata Szydlo | Weeks after winning power, Poland's Law and Justice (PiS) party passed a law letting the treasury minister directly appoint and dismiss the heads of public radio and television, and dozens of journalists at the public broadcaster were subsequently dismissed or resigned. Full entry | Sustained (December 31, 2019) | 2 |
| March 16, 2018 | Tanzania (RSF 2026 rank: 117th of 180) | John Magufuli | Tanzania's government, under President John Magufuli, issued regulations requiring anyone running a blog or website with user content to register with the telecoms regulator and pay an annual fee reported at roughly $930, with vaguely worded content bans. Full entry | Unknown (April 12, 2018) | 2 |
| December 20, 2023 | Hungary (RSF 2026 rank: 74th of 180) | Viktor Orban | On December 20, 2023, the president of Hungary, Katalin Novák, promulgated the National Sovereignty Protection Act, passed by the National Assembly, Hungary's parliament, during the government of the prime minister, Viktor Orbán. Full entry | Reversed (June 30, 2026) | 3 |
| May 28, 2024 | Georgia (RSF 2026 rank: 135th of 180) | Irakli Kobakhidze | Georgia's parliament passed a law requiring media and civil-society groups that receive 20 percent or more of their funding from abroad to register as organizations "serving the interests of a foreign power," over mass street protests and international criticism that the label would be used to marg… Full entry | Sustained | 1 |
| June 20, 2024 | Slovakia (RSF 2026 rank: 37th of 180) | Robert Fico | Slovakia's parliament, controlled by Prime Minister Robert Fico's coalition, dissolved public broadcaster RTVS and replaced it with a new entity, STVR, whose director is now chosen through a process giving parliament and the culture ministry more direct control, prompting protests and criticism fro… Full entry | Sustained (July 1, 2024) | 2 |
| April 2026 | El Salvador (RSF 2026 rank: 143rd of 180) | Nayib Bukele | Between February and April 2026, the government of El Salvador, headed by the president, Nayib Bukele, placed "preventative annotations" on a bank account and real estate belonging to two partners of Trípode S.A. de C.V., the parent company of the investigative news outlet El Faro, according to the… Full entry | Sustained (May 8, 2026) | 3 |
| August 4, 2026 | Russia (RSF 2026 rank: 172nd of 180) | Vladimir Putin | On August 4, 2026, the president of Russia, Vladimir Putin, signed a law, adopted unanimously by the Russian parliament on July 24, 2026, that allows the authorities to freeze bank accounts, block property and vehicle sales and deny consular services such as passport renewal to Russians in exile wh… Full entry | Sustained (August 4, 2026) | 3 |
Punish
Legal or physical action against individual journalists or sources: subpoenas and record seizures, prosecutions, arrests, detention, expulsions, visa denials, assault where a government actor is involved.
| Date | Country | Head of government | What was done | Outcome | Sources |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| October 20, 1998 | Serbia (RSF 2026 rank: 104th of 180) | Slobodan Milosevic | Serbia's parliament passed a Public Information Act allowing courts to levy same-day fines against newspapers for vaguely defined offenses against the state's interests, and independent papers were fined far more often and more heavily than pro-government ones. Full entry | Reversed (January 1, 2001) | 1 |
Silence
Removing outlets or channels from the public sphere: closures, licence withdrawals, forced sales, blocking and shutdowns, prior restraint, nationalisation.
| Date | Country | Head of government | What was done | Outcome | Sources |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| March 15, 2025 | Focal case United States (RSF 2026 rank: 64th of 180) | Donald Trump | Beginning on March 15, 2025, the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM), the United States federal agency that oversees the government's international broadcasters, placed most of its staff on paid administrative leave and moved to shut down the operations of Voice of America (VOA), the United States… Full entry | Ongoing (March 28, 2025) | 5 |
| May 24, 1960 | Egypt (RSF 2026 rank: 169th of 180) | Gamal Abdel Nasser | President Gamal Abdel Nasser's government issued a decree on May 24, 1960 placing every newspaper and magazine in Egypt under state ownership and management, with the government appointing editors and deciding content, ending private control of the country's press. Full entry | Ongoing (January 1, 1989) | 2 |
| April 14, 2001 | Russia (RSF 2026 rank: 172nd of 180) | Vladimir Putin | Gazprom, Russia's state-controlled gas company, used debts owed by NTV's parent company to take control of the country's last major independent television network at a shareholders' meeting, replacing its owner and top editors with its own appointees. Full entry | Sustained (April 14, 2001) | 1 |
| September 4, 2017 | Cambodia (RSF 2026 rank: 151st of 180) | Hun Sen | Cambodia's tax authority presented the independent, English-language Cambodia Daily with a $6.3 million bill the paper called arbitrary and undocumented, forcing the 24-year-old newspaper to close rather than pay, amid a wider campaign against independent media before 2018 elections. Full entry | Sustained (September 4, 2017) | 2 |
| March 4, 2024 | Argentina (RSF 2026 rank: 98th of 180) | Javier Milei | President Javier Milei's government fenced off and shut down Telam, Argentina's state-owned news agency, calling it a public-relations operation for the prior Kirchnerist governments; unions and journalist groups called the closure one of the most serious blows to press freedom in decades of Argent… Full entry | Sustained | 1 |
All ladders · Funding and ownership pressure: by country and year · The United States chapter