When the closely divided U.S. House takes up important legislation, unanimous votes are practically impossible. If a bill carries real consequences, someone in the chamber is bound to have a problem with it for one reason or another.
But in January, when House GOP leaders agreed to bring the Protect Reporters from Exploitative State Spying Act — or PRESS Act — to the floor, it passed without objection. Any one member from the left, right or center could’ve balked, but no one did.
That’s probably because the legislation appeared to be one of the year’s least controversial bills. The basic idea behind the effort was straightforward: Early on in Attorney General Merrick Garland’s tenure, he created a policy that prohibited federal prosecutors from going after reporters’ private information or forcing them to testify about their confidential sources.
The PRESS Act would simply codify the existing policy into federal law, creating a permanent shield law for media professionals.
The legislation was written by a Democrat and a Republican, and it enjoyed equal numbers of Democratic and Republican co-sponsors in the House. For those who assumed that bipartisan policymaking was simply impossible in 2024, especially in the lower chamber, this one bill offered at least some evidence to the contrary.
That is, until this week. The Hill reported:
Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) blocked a federal shield law that would protect journalists from revealing their sources and material to the government. In the Senate on Tuesday, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) asked for unanimous consent for the Senate to pass the Protect Reporters from Exploitative State Spying Act, known as the PRESS Act, and Cotton objected.
By way of an explanation, the Arkansas Republican told his colleagues on the Senate floor, “The liberal media doesn’t deserve more protections.”
The argument was so absurd that it seems implausible that Cotton actually believed it.
When I talked to my MSNBC colleague Lisa Rubin about the measure, she commented, “The irony of Sen. Cotton’s response yesterday is that the most prominent recent examples of alleged investigative or prosecutorial overreach against the media involve journalists who are not known to be liberals.”
Indeed, whether Cotton appreciates this or not, the PRESS Act is not merely a progressive endeavor. Tucker Carlson, for example, has been as eager to tout the bill as anyone on the left.
What’s more, in the Senate, the bill has three co-sponsors — two of whom are Republican Sens. Mike Lee of Utah and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina.
While we’re at it, let’s not forget that this is an idea with a lengthy Republican pedigree: As far back as 2005, then-Rep. Mike Pence of Indiana — more than a decade before he became vice president — championed similar legislation after reporter Judith Miller was jailed as part of the investigation into who revealed Valerie Plame’s identity. But if Cotton’s official explanation is simply too foolish to take seriously, why did the Arkansan derail the PRESS Act? It might very well be because Donald Trump told him to. In fact, it was just a couple of weeks ago when the Republican president-elect issued an online edict that said GOP senators “MUST KILL” the legislation. As we discussed soon after, it wasn’t altogether clear why. One possible explanation was that Trump did a detailed and thoughtful analysis of the bill and had concerns about how the policy would be implemented. The far more likely explanation was that Trump saw a headline about protections for journalists, remembered that he hates the free press, and responded reflexively without doing any research or even taking the time to understand the bill at its most basic level. Either way, the incoming president called for the demise of the bipartisan measure — and Cotton played his part, support for the bill from the right notwithstanding. It’s still possible that the Senate will be able to reconsider the legislation before the lame-duck session ends, but given the limited number of days remaining, and the outgoing Senate Democratic majority’s to-do list, Cotton (and Trump) will likely succeed in killing one of the year’s most bipartisan bills. This post updates our related earlier coverage.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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