Journalism after 9/11: Azmat Khan on the lessons reporters still can't afford to ignore

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Twenty-five years after the attacks of September 11 reshaped America, the journalism profession is still grappling with the consequences of how it covered the War on Terror. Did news organizations ask enough questions? Did they become too dependent on government sources? And are those same challenges still influencing reporting today?

Those were the questions explored during The Forever War and the First Amendment, a two-day symposium at Columbia University marking the 25th anniversary of 9/11. Fresh from hosting the event, Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter Azmat Khan joined E&P Reports to discuss what journalism learned, what it failed to learn and why those lessons remain essential for today's newsroom leaders.

A war that changed journalism

Khan argues that the War on Terror altered far more than foreign policy. It fundamentally changed the way journalism operates.

"There was a really clear understanding that the War on Terror... created an infrastructure, created rhetoric, and created standards and attitudes that persist to this day," she said, explaining that those changes extend beyond government institutions to the practice of journalism itself. "We've seen the infrastructure of government change, but we've also seen the way that journalism is practiced change."

In the immediate aftermath of 9/11, newsrooms understandably focused on preventing another attack. Reporters asked, How did this happen? What went wrong? But Khan noted that those questions required extraordinary dependence on government officials and classified sources. That dependency, she warned, created opportunities for governments to shape public understanding through selective disclosures. "The reliance on sources in government to tell you things still exists today," she said, adding that officials continue to "selectively leak things in their favor or for their political ambitions."

Getting closer to the truth

Khan's Pulitzer Prize-winning investigation into civilian casualties in Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan illustrates why independent reporting on the ground remains indispensable.

After suing the U.S. military for thousands of pages of civilian casualty assessments, Khan traveled to investigate the incidents herself. What she discovered often differed dramatically from official accounts.

"The reality on the ground was far different than what our government was telling us," she said. "On average, I was finding civilian casualty rates that were 31 times higher than what the government had assessed to be true."

Her reporting uncovered repeated examples of outdated intelligence, mistaken targets and civilians incorrectly classified as combatants. More troubling, she found little effort to determine what had gone wrong. "Very little effort" had been made "to learn those lessons of what went wrong and how," Khan said, arguing that accurate reporting is essential not only for accountability but also for making better policy decisions.

The growing challenge of secrecy

While investigative journalism has produced extraordinary work over the past two decades, Khan believes government secrecy has become an increasingly difficult obstacle.

"There is a massive overclassification system in the United States today," she said, explaining that excessive secrecy leaves journalists dependent on anonymous sources while simultaneously placing those sources at greater legal risk.

Khan pointed to prosecutions under the Espionage Act and the chilling effect they have had on reporters and whistleblowers alike. Yet she also highlighted examples of courageous accountability journalism, citing Dana Priest's reporting that exposed the CIA's network of secret prisons.

Ultimately, she worries that too many journalists have become overly reliant on official narratives. "It's our job as journalists to look at all of these different parts," Khan said. "It's our job to be on the ground... to verify" information, whether it comes from civilians or government officials.

Why local publishers should care

Although many E&P readers lead community news organizations far removed from Washington, Khan believes the legacy of the War on Terror reaches every newsroom.

She pointed to the nationwide network of intelligence fusion centers created after 9/11 and encouraged local journalists to examine how federal security policies have influenced policing, surveillance technologies and public spending in their own communities.

"If I were on a local level trying to understand what I'm seeing in real time," she said, "I would look at our own police departments and what part of that military-industrial complex... has become part of local policing."

For Khan, accountability journalism is not confined to foreign battlefields. The same questions about government power, transparency and oversight apply equally at city hall and county government.

Hope through accountability

Despite her concerns about growing distrust in the media, Khan remains optimistic about investigative journalism itself.

She sees younger audiences placing greater confidence in reporters who consistently hold powerful institutions accountable, even while expressing skepticism toward traditional media organizations. "I do find that among younger populations... there's a real distrust of media in general, but a greater trust in investigative journalists," she observed.

Looking ahead, Khan's greatest concern is what she calls "journalism from a distance" — reporting that relies too heavily on remote sources without fighting for direct access, documents or firsthand reporting. She also worries about an information environment overwhelmed by disinformation and the growing tendency to rely on artificial intelligence to interpret the news.

Yet she sees tremendous promise in the expanding field of open-source investigations. By combining satellite imagery, digital verification, public records and traditional shoe-leather reporting, journalists now possess more powerful accountability tools than ever before.

"I think the accessibility of open-source investigation... is a big part of how this becomes more of a community-driven project," Khan said. Combined with on-the-ground reporting and rigorous verification, those tools, she believes, will help journalism continue doing what it does best: bringing important truths into the world.