Defending journalistic legitimacy and authority amid rising anti-press sentiment: A decade of metajournalistic discourse at a local Wyoming newspaper

Abstract

Amid a global rise in populist anti-press rhetoric facilitated by social media platforms, journalists worldwide have struggled to define and defend their work to mistrustful audiences. Past research on anti-press rhetoric and journalistic responses has largely focused on national news, with few studies considering local journalism or audience-generated discourse. This study helps fill this gap by analyzing metajournalistic discourse from both local journalists and their audiences in a rural and politically polarized community in the western United States. Findings from a discourse analysis of 1299 online news comments and 120 newspaper articles, editorials, and other public statements from 2015 to 2025 reveal how audiences challenge, and journalists defend, the legitimacy and authority of the newspaper and institution of journalism at large. This study has several theoretical and practical implications, including applying the theory of metajournalistic discourse to an understudied context, documenting the corrosive effect of national anti-press rhetoric on local news, and identifying practical strategies for local journalists to defend themselves and their work, with the hope that they can begin rebuilding public trust in journalism as an institution central to a healthy democracy.