The Bill That Did Not Pass: The Local Journalism Sustainability Act
A Tax Credit That Never Cleared Committee
The bill proposed payroll credits for local newsrooms. It was introduced and never enacted.
Photo: Phát Trương / Pexels
The Local Journalism Sustainability Act proposed two interlocking federal tax incentives for local news: a payroll tax credit that would allow qualifying local news employers to offset a portion of wages paid to journalists, and a subscriber tax credit that would let individual readers deduct the cost of a local newspaper or digital news subscription. The bill's architects presented it as a market-neutral intervention — one that did not pick winners editorially but instead made the economics of local news employment marginally less punishing.
Representative Ann Kirkpatrick of Arizona and Senator Maria Cantwell of Washington introduced versions of the legislation in 2021, with the House bill drawing co-sponsors from both parties. Under the terms introduced that session, news organizations with fewer than 1,500 employees could claim a credit covering up to 50 percent of journalist wages in the first year, tapering in subsequent years. Individual subscribers could claim up to $250 annually toward a qualifying local news subscription.
The masthead stays on the door after the newsroom goes.
Photo: Ekaterina Belinskaya / Pexels
The bill attracted support from the News Media Alliance, the Local Media Association, and a coalition of regional newspaper publishers who argued that the payroll credit would slow — if not reverse — the workforce reductions that had gutted local reporting across the country. Penny Muse Abernathy's research at the Medill School of Journalism, which tracked the accelerating loss of local outlets and the spread of news deserts, was frequently cited in floor statements and committee testimony as the empirical backdrop for the legislation.
Opposition came from a different direction than might be expected. Some press-freedom advocates raised concern that a government-administered eligibility standard — however formula-based — could over time create a de facto licensing mechanism, giving federal authorities implicit influence over which outlets qualified as legitimate local news. Heritage Foundation economists argued the credits amounted to an industry subsidy with no guarantee of editorial output. The bill also found no natural home in a Congress divided over broader tax legislation.
In both the 117th and 118th Congresses, the Act was referred to the House Ways and Means Committee and the Senate Finance Committee, where it expired without a floor vote either time. No markup hearing was scheduled in either chamber during either session. Reintroduction in subsequent sessions followed the same pattern: co-sponsor lists, advocacy-group endorsements, and committee referral — then silence.
The legislation remained the most detailed federal proposal for sustaining local journalism through the tax code rather than direct subsidy, and its repeated failure illustrated the difficulty of translating documented local news collapse into enacted policy.
