Journalists in Lithuania are slowly freeing themselves after years of oppression by local media moguls. Independent investigative initiatives are gaining strength. Recently, however, press freedom has fallen victim to government initiatives. Securing the public sphere from Kremlin led disinformation campaigns is the goal of several new top-down regulation initiatives. While the ruling majority and opposition fight over the management reform of public service broadcasting, the number of verbal attacks against journalists is increasing. At the end of 2018, the media’s access to public registry was restricted by new finacial barriers, where it had previously been free of charge. During debate on this restirction, Lithuania’s Prime Minister allegedly called journalists ‘dung-beetles’ to justify that journalists and media are not worthy of free access to registry data. After journalists requested the recording of these comments, it was deleted.