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“Things happen.” Just two words. That’s all it took for Donald Trump to effectively dismiss what is probably the most infamous murder of a reporter of the past ten years – and in so doing plumbed a new low in his disregard toward journalists, for the media – and for the truth.

The Context

The US president’s dismissive attitude of the murder of well-known reporter Jamal Khashoggi came during a media briefing with the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman – a man whom the US intelligence found in a recent assessment had ordered the abduction and murder of the Washington Post columnist in that year. (The crown prince has rejected accusations.)

The US intelligence services were not the sole entities to determine the homicide – which occurred in the Saudi diplomatic building in Turkey and in which the 59-year-old Khashoggi was sedated and dismembered – was approved at the highest levels. An inquiry led by then UN special rapporteur, the UN investigator, reached comparable findings.

International Response

For a brief period, governments were in agreement in their criticism of Saudi Arabia’s actions. The United States enacted penalties and visa bans in 2021 over the killing, although it stopped short of sanctioning the crown prince himself. Since then, the nation has been gradually restoring itself – and the crown prince’s visit to the US capital seemed to be the final confirmation of that rehabilitation.

White House Remarks

Critics of the regime had roundly condemned the visit. But what was on display at the White House was more alarming than could have been anticipated. Not only did the president honor Prince Mohammed but he effectively rewrote history – and then pointed fingers at the victim. Prince Mohammed, he claimed when asked, knew nothing about the killing – in clear opposition to what his country’s own intelligence services concluded four years ago. Moreover, the president said: “Many individuals didn’t like that gentleman that you’re talking about, whether you approve of him or didn’t like him, things happen.”

Established Conduct

This marks a new and abject point for a leader who has made no attempt to hide of his contempt for the truth – or for the press. He has defamed journalists (he called a news network, whose journalist asked the question about Khashoggi at the Saudi press conference “false information”), berated them in public (he called one a “piggy” this week for asking about his relationship with the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein), taken legal action against media organizations for eye-watering sums of money in vexatious law suits, and called for media groups he disapproves of to lose their licenses.

He has pressured veteran news services out of the White House press pool for declining to use language of his preference, and he has slashed financial support for essential public media at domestically and crucial free press internationally.

Wider Consequences

All of that has created an atmosphere in which reporters are clearly more vulnerable in the US, but one in which their victimization – and indeed killing – becomes not just unimportant (“things happen”) but tolerated (“a lot of people didn’t like that gentleman”).

It is no surprise that 2024 was the most lethal year on file for journalists in the more than 30 years the press freedom organization has been documenting this data: a ongoing neglect to bring to justice those responsible for reporter murders has established a environment without consequences in which journalists’ killers are actually able to get away with murder and so persist in these actions.

In no place is this more evident than in the Middle Eastern nation, which is responsible for the killing of over two hundred journalists in the past two years.

Societal Impact

The impact on the public is profound. Attacks on journalists are assaults on facts. They are attacks on facts. They are violations of our entitlement to information and on our liberty to live freely and securely.

On Thursday, CPJ gathers for its yearly International Press Freedom awards. The statement at the event is the same as my one for the president: these things may occur. But it is our responsibility to make sure they do not.