The FBI search of a Washington Post reporter’s home on Jan. 14, 2026, was a rare and intimidating move by an administration focused on repressing criticism and dissent.

In its story about the search at Hannah Natanson’s home, at which FBI agents said they were searching for materials related to a federal government contractor, Washington Post reporter Perry Stein wrote that “it is highly unusual and aggressive for law enforcement to conduct a search on a reporter’s home.”

And Jameel Jaffer, director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, told The New York Times the raid was “intensely concerning,” and could have a chilling effect “on legitimate journalistic activity.”

Free speech and independent media play a vital role in holding governments accountable by informing the public about government wrongdoing.

This is precisely why autocrats like Russia’s Vladimir Putin have worked to silence independent media, eliminating checks on their power and extending their rule. In Russia, for example, public ignorance about Putin’s responsibility for military failures in the war on Ukraine has allowed state propaganda to shift blame to senior military officials instead.

While the United States remains institutionally far removed from countries like Russia, the Trump administration has taken troubling early steps toward autocracy by threatening – and in some cases implementing – restrictions on free speech and independent media.

Ignorance about what public officials do exists in every political system.

In democracies, citizens often remain uninformed because learning about politics takes time and effort, while one vote rarely changes an election. American economist Anthony Downs called this “rational ignorance,” and it is made worse by complex laws and bureaucracy that few people fully understand.

As a result, voters often lack the information........

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