E111: ProJourn Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press

Rebecca Snyder sits down with Christina Piaia, Deputy Director of the ProJourn Project at the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press. Christina shares how ProJourn supports journalists and independent newsrooms with free legal resources like pre-publication reviews, public records access and non-editorial legal checkups. They discuss why bold local journalism needs strong legal backing, how ProJourn is training the next generation of media law attorneys and what reporters should know to protect their work and their newsrooms. Whether you're a freelance journalist or part of a growing newsroom, this conversation is packed with essential insights on navigating today’s legal challenges.

Chapters

• 0:00 Introducing ProJourn: Legal Support for Journalists
• 5:00 Pre-Publication Review
• 14:00 Training the Next Generation of Media Law Attorneys
• 22:00 Non-Editorial Legal Checkups
• 32:00 Fighting for Access: Public Records and Community Impact

Transcript

0:01

Hi, we're here today with Christina Pia, who is the Deputy Director of the Projourn Project of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, which is a really big, long title. So Christina, first, welcome. I'm super excited to talk to you. And second, tell us a little bit about that long string of words. What's projourn and the Reporters Committee? Thanks, Rebecca, and thanks for welcoming us here. We're excited to be able to provide some resources for journalists and explain a little bit more about the legal landscape that we're seeing a lot of people in the past few months and the past few years of the program. So as you had mentioned, Projourn is a program that's housed and operated by Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press. And we started just about five years ago as a pilot project in Washington and California. through Davis Wright Tremaine, law firm that's media law experts and Microsoft. And the idea really is to provide journalists with editorial and now non-editorial support. The program began from a concept of seeing the demand that journalists had to assist in vetting some of their news projects or accessing local records. We conducted an extensive landscape study and asked journalists where their biggest legal needs were, and it landed on these two areas. so Progeron started in those states providing pre-publication review for articles, documentary films, podcasts, and then also support for accessing local records. And those two, I mean, I'm sure you've refreshed your landscape study and have kept metrics on the work over the past five years, but just anecdotally, those are hot button issues that I hear every day. And so when you are, let's take a step back and as you were kind of creating that landscape analysis or articulating the problems that you were seeing, what happens when you don't have? pre-publication review, what happens on just a really granular level that prompts the need for program like this. Yeah, so I've spent the past few years working on the ground with journalists in a lot of different areas. Perjurn predominantly works with local news organizations and independent journalists. And so in particular, the issues that we see there is kind of weighing the risks of publishing something that they feel needs legal review, but not having. in-house counsel to review it or not having the legal funds to be able to do that. And so what we've seen over the years and heard from our clients is that this type of pre-publication review really lends itself to bold reporting. We've noticed smaller newsrooms taking on bigger risks in covering investigative pieces, pieces that are particularly perhaps not friendly to some larger named organizations, but they feel like they have the ability to do this with a thorough legal review. And in turn, that really affects how this journalism is impacting the community, both in documenting the news stories of their times, but also in making sure that the communities are aware of what's happening and also being able to make an informed decision about perhaps changes to make to better. advance their community needs. Yeah, you know, and it strikes me that, you know, there, we're broadcasting from Maryland, which right now is, is assessing whether or not to strengthen anti-slap statute. You know, DC has a, has a fairly strong anti-slap statute in Delaware as well, but there are so many states where, you know, it's not universal. Those protections are uneven and certainly you don't want to be going after the fact. to say, to defend yourself in libel or defamation or anything like that. And so when you're doing pre-publication review, I can imagine that it really does give a reporter and a small news organization really a lot of peace of mind and confidence that, yep, I am speaking truth and I'm not gonna be tripped up in the way I'm speaking it. Is that sort of how you see it or? Are you flagging like, okay, you need another source here kind of thing. Yeah, I think that one of the great things about pre-publication review is the relationship between the attorney and the client. And so I think it's a learning on both sides. So the goal of the attorney and a pre-publication review is to assess the risk for the newsroom or the journalist. Our goal is not to stop the bold reporting or counter it with something else to potentially say, but it's really to point out places where there are potential legal risks and then to share what those risks could be, what they look like. And then it's really up for the journalists and the editor and the publication to make the decision about how to move forward. But one of the things that we've seen happening, which I think is... is why I feel very inspired by local news and by what's happening on the ground. I know there's a lot of tension and challenges, but what I'm seeing happening on the ground with local news is really incredible. There's a lot of organizations that are building together as collaboratives. There are organizations that are cross-publishing and sharing resources. And when you build a relationship with an attorney or a firm, you start to learn more about things to look out for. So perhaps you don't have access to an attorney for every story, but you start to learn more about the things to look for. And I think as attorneys working on these cases, we of course want to encourage bold reporting and we want the public to receive this like crucial service. And so we're looking always to find ways to better service journalists and newsrooms. I also feel like the world is changing a little bit. I'm seeing more in the local standpoint. There's more independent journalists. There are more people who are kind of working in much, much smaller newsrooms. So for those people who don't have ready access to a pre-publication review or an attorney, I definitely want you to make sure you're getting your information out there. But before we do that, what are the top couple things that you feel like a reporter or an editor should be thinking through as they're kind of doing their own sort of ad hoc pre-publication review? Do you have top tips? Yeah, so I think one of the things to think about is to understand the risk of your newsroom and where you're situated. So you had just mentioned smaller newsrooms or independent journalists, certainly making sure that your understanding of your risk level and the level of reporting that you're doing. There's a few different things that are looked at. One of the unique qualities of pre-publication review is that it works in many different areas of law. And so, yes, you are looking for things like defamation or libel, but you're also looking for news gathering. You have this incredible picture. Did you take it with a drone? Did you have access to the area where you took the image? You're using a confidential source. How secure are you in that reporting? Are there other ways to be able to do this? And I think what we hear a lot from newsrooms is being able to make that determination about what stories need legal reviews. And Projourn also offers training programs for newsrooms and journalists to be able to better understand these things like you're saying, like the top tips or ways to be able to understand when a story should receive legal review and if there's a capability for that. So training and education are also great ways to be able to build on. the learning or the relationship that you have with the attorney. And it's helpful to have all parts of the newsrooms involved in that. Everyone from the on the ground, the reporters to the editorial team, this way that people are kind of all looking at things from the same viewpoint. And I imagine you're learning and being more collaborative about, gosh, you know, I'm the photographer and I'm looking out to make sure, I double check access? I, you know, am I flying my drone in the appropriate way and so forth? So you've talked. concerns, copyright, all of those are part of the legal review. And that's why the other mission, dual mission of ProJourn is also to grow the bench of media law attorneys. We haven't touched on that just yet, but there's a very small number of individuals that are working as media law attorneys. And part of our goal is to build a bench of attorneys. And so we have a unique program where we work. what we call a two in a box where we pair a law firm attorney with an in-house corporate counsel attorney so they can learn how to do this pre-publication review. We also do that in a law firm to law firm model for law firms that don't have media law experience in hopes of expanding the number of attorneys that can do this very technical specific type of pre-publication and vetting review. Well, and that's what I wanted to ask a little bit more about. You had mentioned a couple of times about the relationship between the newsroom and the attorney, but now you're also sharing the relationship sort of attorney to attorney and sort of almost an apprenticeship model kind of way. So could you talk about the some of the mechanics of that program? Because I'm thinking, you know, if I'm an independent journalist, I'm calling up Projour and I'm saying I have a public I have a story that I'm going to send off and I want to make sure I'm covered. Can you help me? But how am I developing that relationship and sort of how does that sit in context with, you know, others in the program and as you're trying to get more media law attorneys trained up? Yeah, sure. So when a journalist comes to us, we have certain eligibility criteria that we look at to make sure that we're helping journalists that need it most. So whether you're an independent journalist, a news organization, perhaps working in a rural area or serving audiences where English isn't your first language, we kind of review the eligibility criteria and then we accept you into the program. Once you're in the program, there's an intake link. So each time you have a matter, that comes for pre-publication or editorial. You can fill that out. There's conflicts information, a little bit more about the story so we can best pair you. Part of our goal is to make sure that we're working with the journalists where they are. And so that's why Projourn has expanded from the two states to seven states now for local records access. So in addition to California and Washington, we're also on the ground in Texas, North Carolina. Georgia, New York, and Illinois as of last year. For the pre-publication work, we do that nationally. And as I had mentioned, we expanded last year to include non-editorial. We recognize that newsrooms, especially smaller newsrooms, had additional legal concerns, corporate governance, intellectual property, and other types of areas. So we also provide support now in non-editorial as well. But the relationship builds, we make an introduction between the client and the attorneys. They'll have an introductory call to talk about the article or the film or the podcast. And perhaps the attorneys have already reviewed some of the materials. If not, they might just get a sense of where they are in the story, things that they're feeling perhaps some concerns about. And then the attorneys will take some time to review the piece. And then they'll reengage. in additional discussions as needed. And the attorneys from the in-house and the corporate, the corporate or the in-house and the law firms work in tandem, as you said, similar to an apprenticeship program. And so they'll work on a number of cases together and they learn from each other similar to how an associate at a law firm would work with a partner. And over time, we also provide extensive training for attorneys as well in these areas over time. The goal is to hopefully have those attorneys be able to take on those matters. Of course, we always have a dedicated partner or expert in media law to work on these, but expanding the scope requires a lot of work and a lot of on the ground time to train up attorneys to meet this demand. Absolutely, and it sounds like that demand is growing. I want to get to non-editorial support in just a minute, but while we're on pre-publication review, which is, as you said, national, so literally anyone listening to this program could be eligible for pre-publication support review from the ProJourn project. Can you tell us, though, earlier you had talked a little bit about that you're prioritizing certain either types of individuals or communities. What do those eligibility requirements look like? Because, you know, I would imagine you do get a ton of requests. So tell us about eligibility. So Perjurn, it works in the US. So the organizations have to either be incorporated or working here in the US. We do work with for-profits and non-profits. We recognize the diversity of types of news organizations that exist. And so we support both for-profit and non-profits. We require a standardized code of ethics. So that can either be perhaps something that if it's a news organization or an independent journalist, it might be on their website or it's something maybe they use a standard code of ethics or one that they've developed themselves. And then we're looking for organizations that are working on local community news. That doesn't mean that it can't have a national scope. And oftentimes we do see that local news that's well reported does go national, which is really important. but we want to make sure that we're reaching news organizations that wouldn't otherwise be able to have a budget for legal support. We don't have a threshold for a budget, but we do ask to provide legal budget and organizational budget materials and numbers. Some of the law firms that we work with do have restrictions, but we work with all sizes and scopes of different newsrooms. And I also wanted to take the opportunity while we're talking about this, our colleagues at the Reporters Committee run a legal hotline that also takes in cases for pre-publication, but also answers a myriad of legal questions, both for journalists and attorneys. They help every news organization, every type of journalist here in the U.S. You can reach them at rcfp.org slash hotline. or you can give them a call at 1-800-336-4243. We also have incredible set of legal guides on the Reporters Committee website that talks about everything from accessing local records to recording permissions and we work in tandem. So whether you reach the ProJourn team or the Reporters team, we'll be able to help you with your legal needs. And I thank you for that. And I perceive that so just to make sure I have it right in my head, the Reporters Committee has sort of like the general hotline, like I have something that I need to know, like in the moment, in the immediate, I have an immediate need. So I call the 800 number and they theoretically can answer my question. If I want to develop a longer lasting relationship to say, okay, I need more ongoing help to support the investigative journalism that I'm doing or whatnot. That's where you would go check your eligibility requirements and that's where you'd go to pro-journ. Am I getting that right? That's right, but our colleagues at the Reporters Committee also, from that intake that you do, they also can help develop, take cases in-house depending on the need and where it is, and they can also make referrals to law firms. So I think the general goal that I like to put out there for journalists is you can contact us in a number of ways, but we all work together. So we'll find a way to fit, to match your needs. But the Reporters Committee takes on direct representation as well in cases. And sometimes we'll send things from Projourn to our colleagues at the Reporters Committee as well. if you reach out, we'll find a way to get you help. So that's the message, reach out. So the rcfp.org website is a great resource. I've used it many a time because it's a wonderful way to, if I'm looking at like, where does Maryland or Delaware stack up against other states on a particular issue, Reporters Committee usually has that information. So it's always been helpful. Now, of course, I have this conception of just a ton of attorneys waiting for our call. which sounds really spendy. So tell us a little bit about how the project is funded and sort of the ongoing concerns. Yeah, sure. So the program was initially started with a grant from the Knight Foundation for the pilot project, and that enabled us to hire the director and do a landscape study. And then that was followed up by a three-year grant from the Knight Foundation. We also received support in kind and monetarily from our colleagues at Microsoft. and then other funding resources, but the Knight Foundation is the grant that started ProJourn and keeps us running. We have been able to be so fortunate to have, I think now almost 30 law firms that have signed up to be ProJourn partners, and they've provided over $5 million in legal services alone in 2024. And that, I think we started out with 300,000 our first year. And so we've seen the program grow and expand. And I think that's both a response to seeing a need on the ground, as well as law firms really stepping up to understand how crucial journalism and accountability is. people are really excited to work with journalists. They're, you know, the people that are on the ground to tell us what's happening. they're informing the public about our democracy and what's going on with our country and so many crucial areas. And we have seen attorneys step up in a number of different ways to help both with editorial and now with a non-editorial work as well. And so it's really that work with them and our partners that have been able to keep the program going. And we have a lot of what we call repeat clients, which are clients that come back to us and spread the pro-journ word to word to other colleagues, which is really exciting to be able to build relationships and work with newsrooms time and time again. Absolutely. I do feel like, you know, there's a, most people support, especially local news and want to see, you we all want to know what's going on in our communities. And so glad that attorneys are really being drawn to that. You know, for your part, how did you get involved in this type of work? Yeah, well, I was actually a photo editor at the Associated Press as my first career. And so I always was, felt committed to journalism. I left journalism to pursue a legal career in human rights and civil rights work. And I did that for many years, but I always stayed closely connected on boards of news organizations and with colleagues and friends to the journalism community. And so when this opportunity came around again to be able to use my legal skills and my journalism background. It just feels like a perfect fit. It feels so useful and meaningful to be able to either work with a journalist or an attorney every day. And as I mentioned, I'm very excited about where local journalism is and where it's going and the commitment that it places. to show the impact on communities and educate us about what's happening on the ground. And that often translates to something that we see on a national level, but really kind of hearing people and feeling like we know what's happening with them just seems more important than ever. And so supporting local journalism. it feels like it's come full circle for you. You're telling stories and now you're facilitating people bringing stories to light. I think that's a wonderful piece. You're doing human rights work still in many respects. So we had talked a little bit about the non-editorial issues that are available for consult or whatnot. Is there anything that's off the table or anything that you're prioritizing? with the clients that you serve through Proderm. Yeah, so back in November and December, Projourns started to create what we call a legal checkup, which is essentially a group of about 60 questions where we can help news organizations assess their legal risks from a governance standpoint. And so we look into their business and corporate structure. We look into questions around if there are 501c3, making sure they understand fundraising responsibilities. And this initial checklist takes about an hour to complete. You'll meet one-on-one with an attorney and they'll go through the different areas. We also are looking into safety and legal security. So questions around if you have reporters that are working on the ground in protest, what are their legal rights? There are a lot of concerns around nonprofit organizations and how they might potentially face legal challenges related to their nonprofit status. And so these legal checkups are a way to be able to do a risk assessment within your organization. And then we help you prioritize what legal issues you may have. And then we can send those off to law firms to be able to create legal matters if there are things that you need help working on. And so we've seen quite an interest in this. In the past, the change of administration has led to different legal challenges that organizations feel perhaps more vulnerable to. And we've conducted about six of those so far, and we're going to be doing it on a monthly basis. if you go to projurn.org, there's an area for you to check for checkoff in eligibility and be able to share your interest in that legal checkup. And that's what we've seen a lot of on the ground. We've seen a lot of news organizations coming to us and saying, hey, we've heard about a bill that's going forward that could affect our nonprofit status. How can we report on these issues that perhaps at one time weren't controversial or now maybe considered more controversial? How can we, again, protect our newsroom and make sure that we're reporting out to communities? Well, and I think that's such an interesting point about how the nonprofit status of journalists may be challenged because for the past couple of years, it has felt like, go nonprofit, be a nonprofit newsroom. That's the way forward. So are you seeing, you know, sort of valid challenges or is it more just sort of the way one navigates through those waters? I think it's a way to navigate and to be able to do an assessment. think we all, as nonprofits, I think there are several things that you have to do to maintain your 501c3 status where you're kind of making yourself a bit audit proof from that. So these are kind of ways to really check in on those policies and procedures, making sure that they're up to date and if there are perhaps things that you can do to add. It's not really to create. a world of fear, but it's really to create a world of security within your organization. We have not seen, you know, coming to a specific challenges, but we have seen the anxiety around that and concerns that if those challenges do happen, are we best prepared to do that? So for example, a few weeks ago, we did a one hour webinar where we talked about a lot of the legal challenges that potentially nonprofit and 501c3s can look out for and some perhaps some tips for them to be able to protect their organizations. And was that webinar archived on your website so if people are interested? No? record our legal trainings because as you can imagine, things change very quickly. But for anyone that's interested, we offer these on a somewhat regular basis. And again, we're also there to offer individual one-on-one support to answer questions, provide guidance, or if you need to develop an attorney-client relationship to talk through things. Absolutely, that makes perfect sense. And so I think in this sort of national environment where you have the AP now, theoretically temporarily banned from the White House and you have a lot of sort of consternation around national news media, how do you see that filtering down to the local level? Is it more just the anxiety that news reporters are having or are you seeing like material changes in terms of how local government is reacting to reporters in their midst. I think right now what we're working are with on preventative measures for newsrooms and news organizations to make sure they're best prepared for challenges, some of which we potentially can foresee happening and others that happen that weren't as expected. Projourn is increasing some of our work and support for immigration. We see perhaps journalists or individuals that are working for news organizations have challenges around immigration. So that's an area that we're looking to increase our pro bono support in. depending on how the nonprofit is situated, there are state attorney generals that sometimes have additional powers to be able to audit and look at news organizations. So we want to be mindful of people understanding within their own jurisdiction. the laws that could potentially apply to them and the regulations that they're already aware of likely, but perhaps there is some heightened concern around those areas. And that makes sense. It's sort of situational awareness. Wherever you are, you need to know where you are and what your challenges could be. I wanted to turn now to the public records work that you're doing. I know that's in seven states and none of them are Maryland, Delaware or the district. But I did want to check in with you to talk about what that support looks like in the seven states. And I'm sure you'll refresh us and sort of how that project is going. We've seen quite a dramatic increase in requests for assistance in local records. To me, local records requests are the heart of investigative journalism and work that's being done on the ground. we really firmly believe that journalists need legal support to be able to access these records. So journalists and news organizations come to us at several different stages sometimes. they, most times they've already submitted a request and have either gotten a denial that they feel is not in compliance with the law or they've received pushback on the amount of time. And so sometimes our attorneys are providing guidance on how to challenge those responses that they've received. Other times we've had incredible cases where attorneys have taken the state or if it's FOIA to court to be able to obtain these records. There's some really interesting work that we've done with a longtime ProJourn client, Open Vallejo, where we've worked on public records access cases and some of the challenges that they were facing with the local police department. And that led to incredible community impact change and also release of information that's that was really crucial to make sure that the police department was being held accountable. I will say that we feel free to contact the hotline or Pro-Journ about records in other places. The Reporters Committee works to help place or sometimes takes on those cases themselves. And we always try to help people. But part of the reason why we're deliberate about moving from state to state is to make sure that we're working with attorneys on the ground. that understand those areas of law and that can take it on from a capacity standpoint, but we also know attorneys in every state that we work with. And so always feel free to reach out and we'll brainstorm to try to see if we can help. That makes sense. What kind of cases are you seeing come through in the states where you're active? Do they tend to focus in one sort of, police the bugaboos here, or is it more not being able to get contract records or something else? Is there any rhyme or reason? Yeah, the cases really range. What I notice about them is that they're very closely connected to community needs and impact. So in one state, you might have questions about from the local Department of Health about some of the ways that they proceeded with a certain investigation. In another state, you might see some challenges that are being made about allowing manufacturers or companies to be able to come on to public land and use public land that potentially could affect water or resources for the communities. I think in other areas they're looking into police activity. what I always, the through line for me is that it's always connected to community impact and what people want to hear about on the ground. And what we particularly see happen with local records cases A lot of the negotiating that we can do through the lawyers does result in these records being released or a significant decrease in the amount of fees that are charged. But we often see that those stories then start growing and growing and become statewide. And then also a lot of times have a national reach as well. So they require quite a significant commitment, both with the attorneys and the newsrooms, because they're often ongoing. They might involve litigation. But I think the result of obtaining those records is probably some of the best reporting that we've seen in the country. Well, then that makes sense because if you're going to gnaw on that issue for a while and public records litigation and conflict doesn't, it's not just like you meet once and you say, my bad, of course, we'll give you this or I didn't realize you wanted that. Those tend to be long-term issues, but the stakes are really high. And it's information that you can't get. anywhere else. I'm always amazed by, you the resourcefulness of reporters to say, okay, a door is closed here, let me find another path to that information. But there are some times where the only path is the public information that's being withheld. And so it does, it stands to reason that those would be really high stakes cases with huge community impact. I'm glad you're joining. gravity of the outcome when it either means that that particular lease wasn't granted for the public land or there was a change in the police department that led to fewer deaths or that's really where we see the inner workings of governments and oftentimes journalists are stonewalled against governments for obtaining these records. And it's not without a fight that we get them, but that often can also create great case law to be able to allow other journalists to more easily access these records. So we're firm believers in. point because it's the power of precedent. And that's why it also feels like big stakes, like everyone that you lose has repercussions down the line for other reporters seeking to get that information. And conversely, your wins are wins for everyone. And I think also some states look to others, again, for precedent and also for laws and what needs to change legislatively. So as we think ahead to the future, what are you seeing for Projourner? Are you looking to maybe expand your public records work or is it just do more and do it well or do you have some other initiatives that you're focusing on? Yeah, well this spring, early summer, we'll be celebrating five years of supporting journalists in newsrooms. And we're always looking to make sure that we're expanding our reach to journalists. And so we're often going on the ground to conferences, meeting with news organizations, meeting with independent journalists, societies to make sure that people know who we are, that we're there to help, that the legal support is always pro bono, free. for journalists, documentary filmmakers, people that are working on podcasts, news organizations. And I think we're also really mindful of increasing the number of attorneys that can assist on these cases. So local records cases, for example, are a bit easier to train on. And so we're making sure that we're putting programs and trainings in place to work on that. We like to try to expand each year to one or two states from the local records perspective. So we're working on that right now and making sure that we can stay true to our commitment that editorial work that is really the heart of what Projourn is doing right now, making sure that we can always continue to provide sell us advocacy on that end. And this newer area of law is is something that we feel like can really make sure that news organizations are feeling safe and secure with the corporate structure that they've picked. And we know that a lot of newsrooms are one, two, three, four, five people. And if there's ways that we can listen to their needs and support them holistically, that feels really crucial for us as well going forward. understand but well thank you for the work that you have been doing over the past five years and will continue to do in the future. We'll have to have you back at some time to talk more about some of the projects that you're working on and I just appreciate you spending time with us to to talk about ProJourn and as we close out you want to give that web address and 800 number again so that people know where to reach you. sure. So rcfp.org has many of the legal resources, also a link to the legal hotline. If you want to reach them by phone, it's 800-336-4243. Projourn.org or projourn at rcfp.org via email is the best way to reach us. Our website has all of the information for you to. access ProChurn, access the Reporters Committee legal hotline, or sign up for more information about those legal checkups. And thank you again, Rebecca, for listening and for all of the journalists and newsrooms out there. Thank you for continuing to do this calling. It's such crucial, important work and we're so grateful for it. Thank you. Talk soon.