‘What’s at stake is the world’: Nobel winner Maria Ressa warns US election a ‘tipping point’ for democracy

Nobel laureate and journalist Maria Ressa wants to scare some sense into American voters. The U.S. election is just a month away, and she considers the outcome to be a “tipping point” in the fight for democracy over autocracy.

And when it comes to American tech companies, Ressa argues they’ve chosen a side. “I would say Big Tech right now is on the side of autocrats and dictators,” she said. “It enables their rise. It breaks down our shared reality.”

Ressa founded the news site Rappler in the Philippines in 2012 and faced relentless persecution for her journalism under former President Rodrigo Duterte. Her fight for press freedom earned her the Nobel Peace Prize in 2021 alongside Russian journalist Dmitry Muratov.

Ressa warns that the erosion of trust in public institutions that she witnessed in the Philippines is happening in the U.S. And that reversing course will require the collective action of fact-based media and a fresh set of guardrails on technology companies.

POLITICO Tech host Steven Overly sat down with Ressa at POLITICO’s headquarters outside Washington to talk about the state of journalism, Big Tech and disinformation as she sees it today. Listen to the full interview .

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