Trinidad and Tobago Journalists Oppose Bill Expanding Search Powers, Warn of Press Freedom Threat

Journalists in Trinidad and Tobago are calling for urgent amendments to the Special Operations Bill 2026, passed on September 24, arguing that expanded police powers of search and seizure could threaten the press freedom for which the Caribbean island nation is widely praised.

According to the government, the bill is designed to counter crime and alarming homicide rates. The country has spent more than a year in what amounts to a near-permanent state of emergency, under which police have been granted powers that override ordinary constitutional rights regarding arrest, detention and search.

Journalists want the bill to include an explicit exemption preventing police from searching and seizing their notebooks, phones and laptops. In the past, they have had to challenge orders allowing police to search their homes and offices.

Although the country prides itself on protecting freedom of expression and ranked 19th out of 180 countries in Reporters Without Borders' 2025 Press Freedom Index, this year Trinidad and Tobago fell 13 places to 32nd. Journalists voiced deep concern about the ability to protect whistleblowers and vulnerable sources who share information on the promise of protection.

Prior Beharry, president of the Trinidad and Tobago Media Association (MATT), said the organisation had sought an urgent amendment to Section 15 of the bill "to clearly protect journalists' equipment, documents and confidential source information from being seized by police under ordinary procedure."

Section 15 currently prevents police from seizing "the tools of a lawful trade or business" or documents protected by lawyer-client privilege. However, MATT argues that journalism is not explicitly recognised as a protected profession, and that the bill establishes no procedure for handling confidential journalistic material seized during a search. The association wants the clause amended to "make clear that journalism is a protected lawful profession, while protecting journalists' equipment, documents and confidential sources."

Beharry said the bill's search and seizure powers are especially worrying in the digital age, when "a journalist's tool is often a mobile phone." He said that although journalists have not been directly threatened during recent states of emergency, other restrictions are mounting.

"One of the problems we face is access to government, to the executive, including the prime minister, who has not held an official news conference in more than a year," he said. "Ministries use state resources but we are not invited, while state media are."

Independent journalist Pearce Robinson argued that the combination of surveillance capacity, expanded search powers without clear protections for journalism, and increasingly restricted access to ministers has created a "concrete" threat to press freedom, particularly affecting investigative reporting.

"If your phone, laptop and notes can be searched or seized without clear protection for journalistic material, that raises serious constitutional concerns," he said. "Investigative journalism depends on people being able to talk in confidence."

He also raised concerns about phone tapping and surveillance, citing an investigation by the Trinidad and Tobago Guardian which reported that "judges approved 314 communication interception orders in Trinidad and Tobago between 2020 and May 2026."

"My concern is not that press freedom has disappeared," he said. "It is that many of these pressures are accumulating at the same time."

Pedro Cárdenas of the press freedom and human rights organisation Article 19 voiced concern about a provision in the new bill. "This clause gives law enforcement officers the power to seize any equipment, item or document deemed to be of substantial value. We find this provision particularly problematic because it is vague and opens up debate about what constitutes substantial value," he said.

He added that the clause "could directly conflict" with existing international human rights law.

The Office of the Prime Minister did not respond to a request for comment.

Stuart Young, a former prime minister of Trinidad and Tobago, called the bill "unconstitutional and very dangerous," saying it "violates fundamental and longstanding constitutional rights" and was passed "without the necessary constitutional majority in very questionable circumstances."

He warned that the government's past use of emergency powers — including detaining citizens without charge — showed a "real potential for abuse" under the new bill.