Trump is a tyrant. CBS and the media are obeying him. | Your Turn

Trump is a tyrant. CBS and the media are obeying him. | Your Turn

'The media has to stop being afraid, period! Democrats and Republicans alike need to be held accountable.'

Opinion Forum

USA TODAY

Feb. 23, 2026, 6:05 a.m. ET

Stephen Colbert may be the latest flashpoint in the battle over media, free speech and President Donald Trump's low tolerance for bad press, but it's clear readers have been troubled by this moment in media long before the recent CBS-centered spat.

So we asked: Is the Trump administration trampling on the media and free speech? Or is he giving broadcasters the push they need to root out bias? What worries you about the media's coverage of politics more broadly, and where do we go from here?

Beyond Colbert and CBS, the fight highlights the ongoing conflict over media independence and perceived bias, made clear by many of your responses.

You can read a collection of those responses below. Look for more opportunities to weigh in at usatoday.com/forum, or drop us a note at [email protected].

Democracy dies when the media is strangled

President Donald Trump is absolutely trampling on free speech. Many of the major media outlets like NBC, CBS and ABC are obeying in advance to this tyrant. They are obeying so they can get what they want when it comes to merger deals. Trump uses lawsuits as a way to stop the truth about him from being revealed. By arresting former CNN news anchor Don Lemon and other reporters, he is trying to scare others from reporting the truth.

Some news outlets like MS NOW or CNN are biased, but other outlets like Fox and Newsmax are also biased. Before, the old CBS stated the truth. ABC and NBC have a right to report honest news. Unfortunately, Trump is doing a lot of illegal things. It needs to be reported to the public. Hiding the bad is not good news; in fact, Fox News is not a news station ‒ it is simply MAGA entertainment.

We do not need to hear from both sides on everything. Sometimes bad things Trump does are bad; we don’t need to hear from some idiot trying to justify the unjustifiable. CBS has already sold out; Bari Weiss is not a journalist.

I listen to NPR every day. Its journalists report the facts. I don’t need to hear from someone saying the facts aren’t the facts. That is not journalism

Democracy dies with our media being strangled. To Trump and the Federal Communications Commission: Leave our media alone. To CBS: Be ashamed.

— Jo Harris, California

Shows like Colbert's shouldn't be free ads for Democrats

President Joe Biden's administration suppressed free speech by pressuring Twitter, YouTube and Meta on a wide range of topics. Washington officials actually used the pressure of the FBI to ensure certain topics and persons were banned. The Fairness Doctrine does have some validity when news shows turn into free political ad for the Democratic Party. If one of the late-night hosts were as pro-Trump and conservative, there would be an outcry on the left for a ban or outright cancellation.

Free speech is the ability to say what you want, when you want, regardless of who chooses to get offended. As long as you are not inciting violence.

You can't watch the way the news media covers this administration without recognizing the blatant hostility and biases most journalists hold. It's in the nuances of how they ask questions and how much they push back, compared with when they are interviewing members of the Democratic Party.

I think the networks should just provide the facts and stop providing their own interpretations of what is actually happening. Provide a point and counterpoint, and stop pretending they don't have a bias.

— Brian Knight, Vermont

We've passed the point of no return on media bias

It is evident that the president cannot take a joke and cannot stand any sort of criticism, therefore, he has tried to silence these critics – and succeeded with Stephen Colbert. Trump has also succeeded in putting fear in the media. With one tweet, Trump can move his sycophantic followers to take reprisals against the media in the form of boycotts. If you want to wage a successful war against your critics, hit them in the wallet and you will always win.

Free speech is clearly defined in the Constitution. In the America I grew up in (the 1960s), you could say whatever you wanted about whomever you wanted as long as the message was not hateful or incited others to violence. America is the land of liberty, and that liberty is expressed through words. Even if we do not agree with the words, everyone has the right to express them.

I am a former journalist. In my day, the news was objective. You could not go to print without proof and a minimum of two verified sources. Truth was more important than being first with the news. Today, even a "front page" article contains the writer's opinion. This was forbidden in my time. Having said that, yes, the news is biased. Just to mention two: Fox News is pro-Trump, CNN is anti-Trump.

We passed the point of no return in terms of removing bias. Fear has been Trump's greatest weapon, and media outlets rely on advertising for income. Even the mere mention that a sponsor could remove its advertising, that subscribers could cancel their subscriptions (or stop watching/listening) and, more important, that public opinion could turn against the media outlet is enough for broadcasters and media outlets to give Trump a free pass.

The media has to stop being afraid, period! Democrats and Republicans alike need to be held accountable. What happened to investigative journalism? Where are the Woodwards, Bernsteins, Bradlees and Cronkites?

— Adrian Febles, Florida

Media is finally being held accountable for anti-Trump bias

I do not believe Trump is stepping on free speech. Rather, the media is being held accountable to fairness and balance, something that we have not had in a long time. Having had a biased media for so long, any effort to make it balanced and unbiased and move it closer to an objective viewpoint is going to seem like "repression."

As someone who has worked in the academic world, I can fully attest that free speech does not exist if you are a conservative or even a middle-of-the-road person. Liberalism is the norm, and anything other than that is not only considered "wrong" but "inappropriate" and "heretic."

The media has consistently shown an anti-Trump (and also anti-conservative) bias. I look at so many of USA TODAY's family of papers and see it routinely. We are now into the third generation of journalists who cannot even conceive of a non-liberal bias.

I think that rarely does the media use factual statements to cover the Trump administration. Rather, it is opinion and hearsay presented under the guise of "facts."

Notice at CBS, now that balanced reporting is being mandated, there is pushback. Liberal viewpoints have been accepted for so long that not to accept them is accused of "trampling" free speech and press on objectivity. When was the last time you saw one of the major news outlets give equal time and present both sides of a story?