Newsom’s plan to strengthen ‘independent’ journalism comes with a taxpayer-funded twist

BS BULLETIN:

Gavin Newsom signed a California law offering refundable tax credits to qualifying local news outlets for employing journalists.
The credits can reach $20,000 apiece for the first five full-time journalists, with additional credits for more employees and new hires.
Newsom says the program will strengthen a free and independent press. Critics have raised the rather obvious question of what happens when “independent” journalism starts receiving government money.

California has apparently discovered a fascinating new way to strengthen independent journalism:

Have the government help pay for it.

Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Assembly Bill 2222 on Wednesday, creating refundable tax credits for qualifying local news organizations beginning in 2027. The program runs through 2031 and covers print, digital, broadcast and qualifying nonprofit outlets.

Newsom celebrated the measure as a defense of local journalism and a free press.

“A free press isn’t supposed to make government comfortable. It’s supposed to make government accountable.”

Absolutely.

And apparently nothing says “holding government accountable” quite like checking the mailbox to see whether the government money arrived.

Under the law, qualifying outlets can receive $20,000 for each of their first five full-time journalists, $15,000 for additional qualifying journalists and $7,500 for part-time journalists. An additional credit can apply to new journalism positions.

Because California knows skeptics exist, the law includes eligibility rules.

Participating outlets must disclose their owners, carry media-liability insurance and publicly display a policy for corrections and clarifications. Organizations controlled by political action committees or certain 501(c)(4) groups are excluded.

Supporters say those guardrails preserve editorial independence while addressing a genuine problem: local newsrooms have been disappearing and shedding reporters for years. More than 130 media, labor and civic organizations backed the legislation.

There is another side to this, however.

California’s own Department of Finance opposed the proposal during the legislative process because the total credits were not capped, warning of potentially “unlimited fiscal liability.” The department also argued that much of the program subsidizes existing journalism jobs rather than creating new ones.

Newsom himself acknowledged that the program could benefit news organizations owned by wealthy investors, but said the decline of local journalism — and what he described as attacks on press freedom by President Donald Trump — persuaded him to sign it anyway.

And that brings us back to the wonderfully California part of all this.

The governor’s office announced the program under the banner of supporting “independent journalism.”

Independent.

With a refundable California tax credit attached.

George Orwell could have gotten six paragraphs out of that before breakfast.

MY QUICK TAKE

I understand the problem.

Local journalism really is disappearing, and towns without reporters watching the school board, courthouse and city hall lose something important.

But Rush would have had a field day with the sales pitch.

“We need journalists independent enough to hold government accountable.”

Excellent.

“How do we make them more independent?”

“Government funding!”

There may be perfectly responsible outlets that take the credit and never alter a syllable of coverage because of it.

But asking whether government financial support creates an uncomfortable relationship for organizations whose job includes scrutinizing that same government is not exactly a wild conspiracy theory.

It’s Journalism 101. Or at least it used to be.