Masha Gessen Quotes

Donald Trump intimidated the press and bullied the press.

If you know anything about Ethiopia, they are very security conscious, a very closed environment. It's a repressive place were journalists and bloggers are arrested all the time.

I've learned over the years to hear what Putin is railing against in his own railing way.

We never make editorial decisions with people who are working closely with Vladimir Putin, unless you consider myself a person who is working closely with Vladimir Putin.

Bad leaders believe that they have to project control at all times.

The United States is paradise compared to China, Russia, Ecuador and Cuba, with regard to the press. And with regard to secrecy and transparency.

The government that has imprisoned more journalists than any other in the world was democratically elected.

Vladimir Putin has to create foreign enemies, and he also has to justify... he has to claim... he can't acknowledge that there's a legitimate protest against his authoritarian rule, so he's got to blame it on Hilary Clinton.

I really can't abide conspiracy theories, because I believe that everything in the world stems from idiocy and incompetence. That's certainly true of most of what's happened in Russia under Putin.

There are many world leaders who are worse than [Donald] Trump.They don't just talk about violence, they practice it on an extreme scale. And we welcome them to our country.

Russia is a country that has supported, propped up the worst of anti-democratic regimes in the Middle East, that has practiced - mistreated its own press, mistreated its own civil society, and economic intimidation of its neighbors, including invasion of its neighbors.I mean, this is the one country on the face of the earth with the capacity to obliterate the United States.

The military has a very prickly relationship with the press.

Turkey still has one of the highest number of imprisoned journalists in the world.

Saddam Hussein admired, studied, and copied Stalin, the paragon of modern dictators.

The one source of criticism even the most repressive authoritarian leader cannot silence is the outside world. Autocrats are usually thin-skinned and like to be admired, so at least, at first, they often seek to be praised abroad.

I will not ascribe to the 'Blame America' club for vicious abuses of human rights, systemic exploitation of Cuban labor, unrelenting repression, and stifling censorship.

When Trump attacks the news media, he's kicking a wounded animal.

As there is in Germany - as well as in Russia and Italy - no art which is not approved of by the government, any criticizing remark about the present policy made by me would easily be taken as a hostile act. I cannot have my name put up against an official report from Germany without risking very unpleasant consequences.

For decades, Robert Mugabe has thumbed his nose at the world. The long-time dictator has ruled Zimbabwe with an iron fist, repeatedly insulted foreign dignitaries, ignored regional and international agreements to which he was a signatory, and isolated the country from any legitimate international economic or political engagement.

Given an opportunity, Modi has violated the freedom of press both in letter and spirit. He destroys freedom of the press whenever he gets a chance.

In their efforts to discredit human freedom, the Putinites denounce the sins that may occur under the reign of liberty with the same ardor, the same sincerity, and the same purpose that animated their Soviet forebears.

By heralding President Xi Jinping's accession to permanent leadership, soliciting Vladimir Putin's reentry into the Group of Seven, and declaring that Kim Jong Un is 'beloved by his people,' Trump legitimizes the very behavior that U.S. presidents opposed for decades.

I don't want my kids to grow up in a country where the press is called the enemy of the people.

When Senator Cruz, with all due respect, tries to throw my network and CNN under the bus, let me stand up for my colleagues and journalists here.

We have all these strong men in politics - whether it's Brazil, or the Philippines, or Trump, or Putin. They're all big men: it's let's look up to them, don't be afraid, they're looking after things. It's so fundamentally anti-democratic.