Few journalists have ventured as deep into the shadows of American power as The Intercept’s James Risen. A Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter, Risen waged a remarkable seven-year battle against the federal government to protect his sources, risking imprisonment to defend press freedom.
As he prepares to retire from journalism, he joins this week’s Intercept Briefing to reflect on his extraordinary career with longtime friend and colleague David Bralow, The Intercept’s general counsel.
Recently, Risen has written extensively on Donald Trump and the dangers he poses to American democracy and is working on a new book about Christian nationalism and extremism. He warns about what lays ahead: “Trump has appointed a bunch of lunatics and conspiracy theorists to positions of power and he’s turned the government over to oligarchs, so I think it’s gonna get bad really, really fast.”
And Risen foresees that reporters and news organizations are at even more peril than in the past because of changing public attitudes and the legal approach embraced by those in power. “The wealthy can now use libel law against the press endlessly, not to try to win cases, but just to financially exhaust news organizations,” he says. “In most libel cases brought against news organizations, the other side almost never really cares about winning. What they want to do is impose large costs on news organizations to defend against frivolous libel suits.”
To hear more of the conversation, check out this week’s episode of The Intercept Briefing.
IT’S EVEN WORSE THAN WE THOUGHT.
What we’re seeing right now from Donald Trump is a full-on authoritarian takeover of the U.S. government.
This is not hyperbole.
Court orders are being ignored. MAGA loyalists have been put in charge of the military and federal law enforcement agencies. The Department of Government Efficiency has stripped Congress of its power of the purse. News outlets that challenge Trump have been banished or put under investigation.
Yet far too many are still covering Trump’s assault on democracy like politics as usual, with flattering headlines describing Trump as “unconventional,” “testing the boundaries,” and “aggressively flexing power.”
The Intercept has long covered authoritarian governments, billionaire oligarchs, and backsliding democracies around the world. We understand the challenge we face in Trump and the vital importance of press freedom in defending democracy.
We’re independent of corporate interests. Will you help us?
IT’S BEEN A DEVASTATING year for journalism — the worst in modern U.S. history.
We have a president with utter contempt for truth aggressively using the government’s full powers to dismantle the free press. Corporate news outlets have cowered, becoming accessories in Trump’s project to create a post-truth America. Right-wing billionaires have pounced, buying up media organizations and rebuilding the information environment to their liking.
In this most perilous moment for democracy, The Intercept is fighting back. But to do so effectively, we need to grow.
That’s where you come in. Will you help us expand our reporting capacity in time to hit the ground running in 2026?
We’re independent of corporate interests. Will you help us?
I’M BEN MUESSIG, The Intercept’s editor-in-chief. It’s been a devastating year for journalism — the worst in modern U.S. history.
We have a president with utter contempt for truth aggressively using the government’s full powers to dismantle the free press. Corporate news outlets have cowered, becoming accessories in Trump’s project to create a post-truth America. Right-wing billionaires have pounced, buying up media organizations and rebuilding the information environment to their liking.
In this most perilous moment for democracy, The Intercept is fighting back. But to do so effectively, we need to grow.
That’s where you come in. Will you help us expand our reporting capacity in time to hit the ground running in 2026?
We’re independent of corporate interests. Will you help us?
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