An MSNBC contributor said on the network's program Morning Joe that former president Donald Trump will shut down the show if he retakes the presidency in 2024.
"Do you not understand that if Donald Trump wins, nothing else matters because it's over," author Donny Deutsch told Morning Joe host Joe Scarborough. He went on to say that Trump is an "autocrat" and that "he will cancel this show."
"It's over. Freedom is over if Donald Trump gets elected," Deutsch said.
Members of the media were criticized during the Trump administration for exaggerating the dangers they faced by covering the Republican president.
CNN's Jim Acosta, who earned a reputation for verbally sparring with Trump at press conferences, wrote a 2019 book detailing his experience covering Trump. The subtitle of the book called the Trump era "a dangerous time to tell the truth in America."
Acosta in his book asserted that "members of the press have been so savaged by Trump and his propagandists in the media that journalists seem almost foreign or anti-American to his supporters." He also recounted an experience at one of Trump's press conferences. While he confronted Trump, he "faced a choice: Do we just absorb Trump's attacks? Or do we push back and stand up for ourselves?"