Media Guild of the West members support the California Journalism Preservation Act

Media Guild of the West members, at an April 4, 2023, quarterly membership meeting, voted 100% to 0% to pass the following resolution supporting the California Journalism Preservation Act (AB-886, Wicks) and similar measures:

Whereas, public enlightenment is the foundation of self-government, and the First Amendment’s protections for a free press necessarily requires that there’s still a free press left to protect;

Whereas, the U.S. is experiencing a nationwide decline in the production and availability of quality local journalism, with newsroom employment falling 26% since 2008, and newspaper newsroom employment falling 57%;

Whereas, as America’s frontline news workers, we have fought against corruption, newsroom layoffs, hedge fund takeovers and the spread of “news deserts” in communities large and small;

Whereas, unions of journalists and media workers, like ours, have been locked in an escalating cycle of labor disputes with publishers as news revenues falter or dwindle, with newsroom work stoppages and strike threats on the rise since 2021; 

Whereas, democracies around the world have raised concerns that one factor driving local journalism’s economic decline has been the concentrated power of tech platforms such as Facebook and Google, which have been accused of unfairly undercutting news publishers in the advertising marketplace;

Whereas, a 449-page antitrust investigation by the U.S. House Judiciary Committee into competition in digital markets in 2020 raised broad concerns that “Google and Facebook have an outsized influence over the distribution and monetization of trustworthy sources of news online, undermining the quality and availability of high-quality sources of journalism”;

Whereas, while we support and embrace new technologies as journalists, recent artificial intelligence models raise concerns that our work could be exploited for commercial gain without rightful compensation for the human labor – our labor – that’s still necessary to produce accurate, rigorous, ethical journalism about what’s new in the world;

Whereas, as a union of working journalists, corporate exploitation is the same whether it comes from a news publisher’s boardroom or a tech platform’s boardroom, and if any corporation unfairly profits from our labor, we will demand fair pay for that labor;

Whereas, we support a broad range of commercial and noncommercial policy discussions to address the journalism crisis, and the public must have confidence that policy interventions are undertaken in pursuit of the public good, not out of political favoritism or private gain; 

Whereas, revenues from proposed policies such as the federal Journalism Competition and Preservation Act or the California Journalism Preservation Act must go to newsrooms, not boardrooms, or we will not support such bills;

Whereas, journalists should be consulted on public policy matters affecting journalism,

Therefore, be it resolved:

The members of the Media Guild of the West, TNG-CWA Local 39213, support efforts by their local union to engage in advocacy addressing the tech industry’s market power and the potential abuse of artificial intelligence models. The Guild will support measures such as the California Journalism Preservation Act (AB 886, Wicks) and similar bills on the condition that such measures serve the public interest and support the protection or creation of journalism jobs.

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Media Guild of the West, The NewsGuild-CWA Local 39213, was founded in 2019 and represents unionized journalists and media workers at the Los Angeles Times, Arizona Republic, Phoenix New Times, Desert Sun, Austin American-Statesman, Dallas Morning News, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, and Southern California News Group.