White House Wants Constitutional Amendment to Sue News Outlets Administration Doesn’t Like

By David Boddiger  |  April 30, 2017 | 2:56pm
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When it comes to holding people accountable for failing to tell the truth, Donald Trump is now telling news organizations “do as I say, not as I do.” The president with the least moral standing on honesty is exploring the possibility of calling for a constitutional amendment that would allow him to sue the media for reports he thinks are libelous.

This is rich coming from the man who, as sitting president, accused former President Barack Obama on Twitter of wiretapping his phones—which would be a felony if it were true—and then refused to apologize when it quickly became clear the accusation was entirely false.

On Sunday, White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus told Jonathan Karl of ABC’s This Week that the Trump administration wants to change U.S. libel laws, which as Karl pointed out, would require a constitutional amendment.

“I think it’s something that we’ve looked at,” Priebus said, adding, “and how that gets executed or whether that goes anywhere is a different story.”

The issue stems from another Trump tweet on March 30 attacking the “failing” New York Times for allegedly being wrong on its reporting on the 45th president.

The president also floated the idea during a campaign rally last February.

“I think that newspapers and news agencies need to be more responsible with how they report the news,” Priebus said. “This is something that’s being looked at.”

Given that Trump enjoys unabashed political propaganda from one particular TV news network, the president should be very careful of what he wishes for. And thank goodness for checks and balances.

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