Will Buss, who is one of our Shop Talk panelists, writes a weekly column for the McDonough County Voice. In last week's column he wrote that some news organizations are questioning whether to assign reporters to cover the Trump campaign if the president and his followers refuse to follow COVID-19 protocols. The news organizations say they don't want to endanger their reporters.
The Shop Talk crew said covering the president is usually a prestigious assignment for reporters, though it’s easy to understand in this case why some journalists are worried about their health and safety.
They also said this is just the latest example of how the Trump administration has endangered journalists and held them in low regard.
Shop Talk is a weekly panel discussion about journalism issues. This week’s program featured Will Buss, who teaches in the Department of Broadcasting and Journalism at Western Illinois University and advises the student editors at the Western Courier, the students at student radio station The Dog, and the WIU chapter of the National Association of Black Journalists; Rajvee Subramanian, who teaches in the Department of Broadcasting and Journalism at Western Illinois University; and TSPR News Director Rich Egger.
