The founding fathers believed that the right to freedom was the most prevalent point of the United States Constitution: establishing freedom of speech, press, religion, etc. as the first amendment. Since then, freedom of the press has been practiced by news outlets across the country with no limitation on what can and can not be written or published.
On February 26, 2025, Jeff Bezos, current owner of the Washington Post, limited that right. He declared that the Washington Post was only going to cover topics which agree with and/or cover “personal liberties and free markets”. Anything that does not align with his ideals on those topics has been restricted from being published in the Post.
That is not free; that is a cage built by a rich dictator who wants to make a political statement at the price of his writers’ liberties.
Freedom of the press is necessary for a functional society, and while these rules don’t apply to every outlet across the nation, they do reflect the growing tensions in our society. This lack of freedom in the Washington Post threatens the freedom of all of us. It threatens the very paper on which I write these words.
Freedom of the press is how this paper exists. Within these pages, we are free to express our opinions, no matter if they oppose the opinions of those who fund us.
Kris Daughters, Journalism advisor, does not agree with every word we write. Especially the opinions we articulate in this very section. There is no world in which every single word I write aligns with Daughters’ ideals. But she lets us write them regardless, because that is freedom of the press.
Even Hellen Chung and I, the Opinion section editors, do not agree with every opinion proposed to us. And yet, we let them go to print.
I understand that Bezos owns and funds the Washington Post. But the writers and the readers of the Post have the right to freedom of the press without any if, ands, or buts. While the events at the Post seem isolated, the allowance of Bezos’ actions are a serious threat to every freedom the first amendment is built to protect.
The Washington Post has defied its very own mottos and principals with these new policies.
In 2017, the paper adapted the slogan, “Democracy Dies in Darkness”. If that is so, then the lights have truly gone out within the Washington Post.
