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Channels with Peter Kafka

Free speech is under attack

Channels with Peter Kafka

Vox Media Podcast Network

Technology, Tv & Film, Business News, News

4.4585 Ratings

🗓️ 26 February 2025

⏱️ 53 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The most useful class I ever took in college was a media law class, where I learned two things: 1) Journalists in the U.S. (along every other American citizen) have enormous freedom to say and write what they want, without fear of a defamation suit and 2) this freedom exists largely because of New York Times v Sullivan, a seminal Supreme Court case. Now NYT v Sullivan is under concerted attack, from a group that includes wealthy and powerful people and companies; lawyers who see an opportunity; and, of course, Donald Trump. David Enrich, an editor who oversees business investigations at the Times, gets to do his work in large part because of the court precedent set decades ago. His upcoming book Murder the Truth takes us on a tour of incidents that show what losing NYT v Sullivan could mean for journalism in the U.S. — and how powerful people are already chipping away at press freedom. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0

In today's fast-changing digital world, proving your company is trustworthy isn't just important for growth, it's essential.

0:08.8

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0:20.3

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0:22.8

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0:31.8

quicker, easier and more scalable. The results? According to a recent IDC study, Vanta customers slash over

0:40.4

$500,000 a year in costs and are three times more productive. Establishing trust isn't optional.

0:48.7

Vanta makes it automatic. Visit vanta.com slash Voxpod to sign up for a free demo today.

0:56.3

That's V-A-N-T-A-com slash Voxpod.

1:05.0

From the V-A-Media podcast network, this is Channels with Peter Kofka.

1:13.2

That is me.

1:14.1

I'm also the chief correspondent at Business Insider.

1:17.0

And today we're talking about my ability to talk on this podcast.

1:20.8

And for the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times and every other publisher to publish hard-hitting stories about powerful people and institutions,

1:28.3

about local newspapers or bloggers or really any American, having the ability to speak and

1:33.2

write without fear that a rich person or a powerful business can tie them up in court.

1:38.0

This is something most of us take for granted, and it's because of rights established under

1:41.2

a 1964 Supreme Court case, and those rights in that case are

1:45.2

very much under attack right now. Here to talk with me about that case, it's called New York Times

1:50.2

v. Sullivan, is David Enrich, who both works for the Times. He runs their business investigations

1:54.7

and has just written a book about the case, and it's after effects and what's happening now.

1:59.6

We also talk about threats to the press that

2:01.2

aren't directly tied to Times versus Holvin, like, say, Donald Trump suing CBS over a 60 minutes

...

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