from International Women’s Media Foundation
This year, we set out on an ambitious national initiative to provide safety training to as many local journalists as possible ahead of the 2024 U.S. presidential elections. We collected in-depth information from training participants, surveying 610 journalists who attended 26 IWMF safety trainings across 11 states.
This data revealed a shocking number of threats to American journalists’ safety and well-being.
Journalists reported incidents ranging from physical violence and harassment to threats of gun violence, verbal attacks and sexual harassment while on assignment and in the workplace:
- 36% (of 597) respondents reported being threatened with or experiencing physical violence while working as a journalist.
- 33% (of 566) respondents reported being threatened with or experiencing digital violence while working as a journalist.
- 28% (of 568) respondents reported legal threats or action against them while working as a journalist.
- 24% (of 582) respondents experienced sexual harassment and an additional 6% (of 582) were threatened with sexual violence.
Our new report, “Journalists Under Fire: US Media Report Daily Threats, Harassment and Attacks at Home,” summarizes the survey data and interviews collected from these trainings, providing context on the situations reporting threats, state-specific contexts, critical areas for industry improvement, and actionable recommendations for newsrooms to enhance staff and freelancers’ safety.
