For nearly 50 years, the National Press Foundation has worked to make good journalists better.

We are hard-pressed to recall any violation of freedom of the press during our existence as egregious as that which occurred last Friday, August 11, when the offices of the Marion County Record in Kansas were raided by local law enforcement.   

In a dramatic reversal Wednesday, the Marion County attorney withdrew the warrant and arranged for the return of the seized materials, concluding there was “insufficient evidence” to support an alleged crime based on the “places searched and the items seized.” The Kansas Bureau of Investigation is now leading an inquiry related to the law enforcement action, the agency said.

This is the right result under the Privacy Protection Act of 1980, the federal law limiting searches of newsrooms and seizures of documentary materials and other journalist work product. The Record engaged in no illegal activity, which was the only potentially applicable – and now rejected – justification for Judge Laura Viar issuing this warrant.  We hope the same conclusion will be reached by the Kansas Bureau of Investigation.

Police chief Gideon Cody and his officers did not just attack a free press, they attacked an entire town by depriving it of its one local news outlet. Meanwhile, the Record reels from the shock of a police raid, mourns the loss of its co-owner Joan Meyers and wonders about its future.

At a time when local news outlets in communities like Marion are vanishing across the country, the importance of the work they are doing — the work the Record was doing here — cannot be overstated.  Far from profitable, many of these publications serve their cities and towns week in and week out, providing not just news and information but a sense of community. Studies show that the presence of local news not only improves social cohesion and voter turnout, but every dollar spent on local news produces hundreds of dollars in public benefit by exposing corruption and monitoring government spending.

Acts like this can end their already tenuous existence.

This is yet another reminder that journalism matters, the First Amendment matters, and standing up for both matters.  With our voice and through our training and resources, the National Press Foundation will continue to do just that. 

For more information on the Privacy Protection Act of 1980 and its application, we recommend these resources: 

• Text of the Privacy Protection Act of 1980 (found at 42 U.S.C. Sec. 2000aa)
• A letter drafted by the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press and signed by 34 other organizations condemning law enforcement for violating the Privacy Protection Act
• The story as told by the Marion Record itself
• An update from the Kansas City Star 
• Journalists, Know Your Rights at Police Scenes, Protests
• An easy to understand explanation of the Privacy Protection Act written by the Student Press Law Center after a similar raid on the offices of The Breeze, the student newspaper at James Madison University in Virginia