The President's Casual Remarks on Khashoggi Killing Represents a Disturbing Development.

“Stuff occurs.” Just two words. That was enough for the US president to brush off what is arguably the most infamous journalist killing of the past ten years – and in so doing plumbed a new low in his disregard toward journalists, for the media – and for the facts.

The Context

The American leader’s dismissal of the murder of prominent journalist Jamal Khashoggi came during a media briefing with the Saudi leader, Mohammed bin Salman – a man whom the US intelligence concluded in a recent assessment had orchestrated the abduction and murder of the Washington Post columnist in that year. (Prince Mohammed has denied involvement.)

The US intelligence services were not the only ones to conclude the murder – which occurred in the Saudi diplomatic building in Turkey and in which the late journalist was drugged and dismembered – was signed off at the top echelons. An inquiry led by then UN special rapporteur, Agnès Callamard, reached similar conclusions.

Global Reactions

For a brief period, governments were in agreement in their condemnation of the kingdom’s conduct. The United States imposed penalties and travel restrictions in that year over the murder, although it stopped short of penalizing Prince Mohammed himself. Since then, the nation has been slowly rehabilitating 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 worse than could have been imagined. Not only did the president honor Prince Mohammed but he seemed to alter the facts – and then pointed fingers at the deceased. The crown prince, Trump asserted when asked, knew nothing about the killing – in clear opposition to what his country’s own spy agencies concluded four years ago. Moreover, the president said: “Many individuals disliked that gentleman that you’re talking about, whether you approve of him or disapproved, things happen.”

Pattern of Behavior

This represents a new and abject point for a president who has made no attempt to hide of his disdain for the facts – or for the media. He has smeared journalists (he called a news network, whose journalist asked the inquiry about Khashoggi at the media event “fake news”), berated them in public (he called one a “rude name” this week for asking about his connection with the disgraced financier the convicted criminal), taken legal action against media organizations for large amounts of money in frivolous cases, and called for media groups he disapproves of to lose their licenses.

He has forced established media out of the White House press pool for refusing to use language of his preference, and he has gutted funding for vital news services at home and crucial free press abroad.

Broader Implications

All of that has created an atmosphere in which reporters are clearly more vulnerable in the US, but one in which their targeting – and indeed murder – becomes not just insignificant (“things happen”) but tolerated (“a lot of people disliked that person”).

It is no surprise that that year was the deadliest year on file for journalists in the over three decades the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has been documenting this information: a ongoing neglect to hold those responsible for reporter murders has created a environment without consequences in which journalists’ killers are actually able to get away with murder and so continue to do so.

Nowhere is this clearer than in Israel, which is responsible for the killing of over two hundred journalists in the past two years.

Effect on Society

The impact on the public is deep. Targeting reporters are attacks on the truth. They are attacks on facts. They are attacks on our rights to know and on our liberty to live freely and securely.

On Thursday, the Committee to Protect Journalists gathers for its annual global journalism honors. The statement there is the identical as my one for Trump: these things may happen. But it is our duty to make sure they do not.