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Over the past seven months, there probably has been a moment for many of us when we experienced firsthand that something terribly wrong is going on in the United States. For this lady, it was likely when she got injured by a tank* in Washington, DC. For this veteran and US citizen, it may have been when ICE thugs broke the window of his car, pepper-sprayed him, and then detained him for three days for no reason whatsoever. For millions of conservatives, it was when Cracker Barrel changed its logo.

For us, one of these moments came last week.

WhoWhatWhy runs a popular internship program that teaches the ins and outs of journalism to (primarily) young people in the United States and (in some cases) abroad.

While the application deadline for this fall term has not yet passed (and you can still apply or find out more about this opportunity here), we have already begun interviewing candidates.

And, for the first time in more than a quarter century of hiring journalists, we were forced to talk to applicants about the possibility of facing retribution from the US government for doing their jobs.

This is not something our US reporters had to worry about before.

We were a thorn in the side of Bill Clinton’s Department of Labor.

During the Bush administration, we covered the effort to push the US into a war with Iraq under false pretenses, its torture program, the kidnapping of suspected terrorists from allied countries, and the other dubious things all presidents try to get away with.

Under the relatively scandal-free Obama administration, we wrote about corporate bailouts, Benghazi, extrajudicial drone killings, and incompetence related to the rollout of the Affordable Care Act.

Then, of course, there was Donald Trump’s first term, during which we covered the GOP’s assault on voting rights, a bungled pandemic response, and his coup attempt.

Finally, long before many others did, we said Joe Biden should only serve for one term and frequently criticized him, his son, and his party.

At no point were we concerned that the Department of Justice or any other government agency would come after us.

Not once!

And it never even crossed our mind to discuss the possibility of that happening with job applicants (apart from one case where the intern was based in China, which is very telling).

Last week, however, we felt compelled to broach this subject in interviews with prospective interns.

This is especially true because we want to make the Trump administration’s immigration and deportation policies a focal point of the upcoming term. We plan to highlight the inhumane treatment of migrants, potentially illegal actions by federal agents, and the propaganda that has led to the GOP’s embrace of xenophobia.

And the fact that possible retribution is something that we now have to take into account, and warn our interns about, is truly a testament to how far down the road toward authoritarianism Trump has taken the country (and it bears repeating that this was not a concern during his first term).

Obviously, none of this will stop us from fearless journalism… it’s just that the risks of doing so have increased.

*Yes, we know it wasn’t an actual tank, “just” a 14-ton mine-resistant ambush protected vehicle, but no military hardware (and personnel) should be deployed on American streets… especially not in pursuit of an authoritarian takeover of the United States.