Governor Newsom adds to California’s legacy of stifling prison media access

Over the past five years, Steven Brooks has faced write-ups, accusations by prison staff, a ban from the prison media center, and dismissal from his role of editor-in-chief of San Quentin News.

An incarcerated journalist working from inside San Quentin Rehabilitation Center in California, Brooks, who writes about issues and redemption in California prisons, has repeatedly been told by San Quentin’s public information officer that his work was not authorized. 

“With any journalist who’s reporting on hard topics, there’s a lot of fear of retaliation involved, even on the outside, for the stories that they tell,” Brooks said. “In prison, we’re just trapped in a very small world, and the prison authorities have absolute control over us, our life, our program.

While Governor Gavin Newsom has touted progressive reform with the California Model, advocates and incarcerated people still say that the state — which incarcerates almost 90,000 people in state prisons, the second-most in the U.S. — is behind in media access. Incarcerated people fear retaliation for speaking to the media even though it is outlawed in the California Code of Regulations, and journalists on the inside and outside alike face restrictions on press freedom. While media had more freedoms before the tough-on-crime era in the 1990s, now most information and accommodations have to go through the the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation public information officer. 

Since then, there have been several legislative attempts to expand press freedoms in prison, most recently with a bill in 2024. Between 1999 to 2008, six bills allowing for prearranged interviews with incarcerated people were introduced. All bills successfully made it through the legislature before being vetoed by California’s then-governors. Jerry Brown also vetoed a similar bill in 2012. The most recent bill, Senate Bill 254 in 2024, was similarly vetoed by Newsom and would have outlawed retaliation for people who worked with the media, as well as, streamlined access for outside press.

Timeline of California’s prison media access bills from 1999 to 2008.

Brooks observed the fight for more media access in prisons intensified after the COVID-19 pandemic began in 2020, when there were calls for more transparency about how the CDCR was handling the outbreak. That motivated Brooks to become a freelance journalist — he felt like people on the outside needed to get information about what was going on in the prisons, and continues to believe in the importance of transparency around prisons, especially as the Newsom administration touts the California Model to transform prisons into rehabilitation centers.

The bill was supported by media access and prison reform organizations, including the First Amendment Coalition, California Broadcasters Association, California News Publishers Association, the Anti-Recidivism Coalition, Initiate Justice, and ACLU California Action. However, it was opposed by the California State Sheriffs Association and the sheriff departments in Los Angeles and Riverside.

In his veto statement, Newsom said that SB 254’s “expansive provisions risk significant unintended consequences for public safety and victims of crime.” He said that he was concerned that allowing the media to have unfettered access to prisons could create or elevate the celebrity status of certain incarcerated individuals.

Newsom’s office did not respond to request for comment from The Objective before publication.

“Lots of people in prison get that status regardless,” Brooks said. “Charles Manson and the Menendez brothers are two examples. I think they don’t want the public to become more empathetic of people once they hear the stories.”

He added that the state is going to waste a lot of money and effort on the model if incarcerated people are afraid to speak about what really needs to change and if the outside news media can’t report the truth. While there are platforms like San Quentin News and the CCWF Paper Trail that exist as newspapers by and for incarcerated people, Brooks is concerned about protections for freelance journalists.

“We’re trying to change prisons, we’re trying to get rid of mass incarceration, we’re trying to do things better, and we’re not going to be able to do things better if we can’t face the truth,” Brooks said. “There’s nothing that’s going to get resolved because people can’t face the truth.”

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Related: Incarcerated journalists lead first-ever conference on strengthening U.S. prison journalism

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Lee Gibson, who runs Initiate Justice’s inside organizing program as a community advocacy manager, said that he has heard of many cases where incarcerated people are afraid to talk to journalists for fear of retaliation. Many fear they could get a write up or other infraction that could lead to things like a loss of commissary, phone calls, packages or recreational activities, Gibson added.

“If the threat of retaliation is happening at the ground level, and [the problem] never gets identified, it never gets a spotlight put on it like the media would be able to do, then nobody ever knows,” he said. “It just continues to get swept under the rug.”

As a result of current California policies, he described the information coming out of prisons as “a void” and said he feels like information from the CDCR is only freely given in two cases: when there’s some type of violence that is happening inside, or if there’s some types of programs that CDCR has claimed to have initiated that puts them in a good light.

“There is a lack of information about how things are being done or conducted, or even when there’s claims of abuse or misappropriations of funds,” Gibson said.

When asked for comment about this lack of information, the CDCR did not directly respond and pointed The Objective to press releases, videos, and social media they produced.

Ginny LaRoe, advocacy director for the First Amendment Coalition, which supported AB 254, said that she is familiar with the roadblocks that journalists face in being able to conduct interviews and do tours because of policies and practices at state prisons. While the CDCR amended media policy in 2021 to allow escorted tours and interviews at its discretion, many journalists still face roadblocks the bill would have helped.

“Sometimes they were denied access or couldn’t get a firm answer, and there seemed to be times where there weren’t really good answers for why a journalist couldn’t have access,” LaRoe said. “We think it’s important that there be clear rules and consistent rules to increase press access so it’s not so inconsistent.”

While there is no current legislation addressing media access in prisons, Gibson and Brooks plan to continue fighting for the rights of incarcerated people. As California continues to make changes to prison conditions due to its budget, from cutting an undisclosed amount of rehabilitative programs and classes to employing incarcerated people as fire alarms to save money, media access remains important as a lever of accountability for incarcerated people’s lives and dignity. 

Brooks said that if the media does get unfettered access to prisons, it is important they handle it responsibly and do not sensationalize stories. He is concerned about how corporate media sometimes vilifies incarcerated people and urged support for incarcerated journalists doing freelance work, too.

There is a movement, largely in independent media, to provide writing opportunities to incarcerated journalists like the Prison Journalism Project, The Marshall Project’s “Life Inside” series, and Prism’s “Right to Write”. Some of the incarcerated journalists who have contributed to these outlets have won awards for their work.

“I would like to say that I’m totally in favor of the media coming into prison, but I also think that incarcerated people should have agency and the height and the ability to tell their own stories so that the public can get a full, rounded perspective of what they should believe when it comes to journalism,” Brooks said.

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Victoria Valenzuela is an independent journalist in California covering individuals and families impacted by incarceration.

This piece was edited by James Salanga. Copy edits by Jen Ramos Eisen.