International Media

VOA after De-funding Disaster?

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Article in Washington post by Mark A. Thiessen 2/13/26

Headline:  “Kari Lake is making Trump’s job harder in Iran”

Subhead:  “She has gutted America’s ability to get good information to the Iranian people in a conflict.”

“For a year, Lake has worked tirelessly to cripple the U.S.-backed ‘freedom radios’ — including Voice of America and Radio Farda — that broadcast into Iran to counter regime propaganda. As an unpaid volunteer member of the board of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, which operates Radio Farda, I have seen the chaos she’s unleashed up close. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2026/02/13/kari-lake-voa-radio-farda-trump-iran-strike-messaging/

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Article in Reporters Without Borders by Staff, 2/12/26

Headline:  “USA: New funding for USAGM signals sustained bipartisan support for its crucial international journalism”

“Reporters Without Borders (RSF) welcomes the inclusion of funds for Voice of America, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, and the other public media outlets supported by the US Agency for Global Media (USAGM) in the 2026 appropriations bill signed by President Trump on February 3. The decision sends a strong, bipartisan message that USAGM outlets are vital sources of reliable news worldwide. This funding supports life-saving, critical news reporting in many closed countries where local journalists are attacked for trying to keep the public informed. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://rsf.org/en/usa-new-funding-usagm-signals-sustained-bipartisan-support-its-crucial-international-journalism

Authoritarians Always Attack Media

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Article in Common Dreams by Stephen R. Weissman, 2/12/26

Headline:  “Don Lemon’s Travail Is a Warning of Rising Authoritarianism; I Would Know”

Subhead:  “My experience as a university professor in Congo demonstrates that repressive governments may go after a variety of observers sympathizing with militant protesters by purveying false or distorted reports of their actions. . .”

“Former CNN anchor Don Lemon is under federal indictment for participating in a Minnesota protest group’s obstruction of a church service. He is scheduled to be arraigned Friday. News of his prosecution took me back more than five decades to when I was a young university professor in Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo). At that time, President Mobutu Sese Seko’s government threatened to arrest me for my alleged involvement in student disruptions.

“In both cases, increasingly authoritarian governments decided to clamp down on independent observers—journalists or others—who sympathized with community activists. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/don-lemon-authoritarianism

Media Napalm in the Morning?

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Article in FAIR by Gregory Shupak, 2/10/26

Headline:  “Leading Papers Call for Destroying Iran to Save It”

“The United States has no right to wage war on Iran, or to have a say who governs the country. The opinion pages of the New York Times and Washington Post, however, are offering facile humanitarian arguments for the US to escalate its attacks on Iran. These are based on the nonsensical assumption that the US wants to help brighten Iranians’ futures.

“In two editorials addressing the possibility of the US undertaking a bombing and shooting war on Iran, the Washington Post expressed no opposition to such policies and endorsed economic warfare as well. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://fair.org/home/leading-papers-call-for-destroying-iran-to-save-it/

Rt. Wing Media Likes Coups?

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Article in Media Matters by Zachary Pleat, 2/6/26

Headline:  “Right-wing media rally behind Trump’s efforts to trigger regime change in Cuba”

“After right-wing media pushed for and then celebrated the Trump administration’s ouster of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and seizure of the country’s oil supplies last month, they quickly pivoted to the administration’s reported efforts to overthrow Cuba’s government, which for now primarily involves starving the island of oil. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/right-wing-media-rally-behind-trumps-efforts-trigger-regime-change-cuba

Media – Gaza Short Attention Span?

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Chart from FAIR

Article in FAIR by Julie Hollar, 1/28/28

Headline:  “After Trump Declared Gaza War ‘Over,’ Media Lost Interest”

“Since President Donald Trump declared that ‘the war in Gaza is over’ on October 3, 2025, US news outlets’ interest in the occupied territory has plummeted. In a FAIR search of US-related news sites using Media Cloud, a news media database, coverage of Gaza post-ceasefire agreement averaged just 1.5% of the news hole—significantly less than the level of coverage before the agreement. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://fair.org/home/after-trump-declared-gaza-war-over-media-lost-interest/

“60 Minutes” Disappearing Staff?

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Article in Daily Beast by William Vaillancourt, 1/22/26

Headline:  “Trump-Kissing CBS Boss Is Plotting ‘60 Minutes’ Bloodbath”

“CBS News Editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss may fire two 60 Minutes correspondents amid their criticism of her leadership.

“Sharyn Alfonsi and Scott Pelley, each winners of multiple Emmys, could soon become casualties of Weiss’s overhaul of the show, sources told the New York Post on Thursday.. . .”

“Alfonsi, 53, and Weiss, 41, butted heads over the program’s delayed segment on El Salvador’s notorious CECOT prison. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-kissing-cbs-boss-bari-weiss-is-plotting-60-minutes-bloodbath/

Journalist Says, “What’s Next?”

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Article in AlterNet by Amy Goodman1/20/26

Headline:  “Journalist says what everyone’s thinking about Trump’s latest rounds of chaos “

“. . .One month has now passed since Congress’s deadline for the Justice Department to release all files on the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, but the DOJ says it’s made available less than 1% of those files. And you see many people are saying, ‘Is he going after Minneapolis, saying he’s going to take Greenland, you know, taking the president of Venezuela, and possibly threatening to bomb Iran to take attention away?’ . . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.alternet.org/trump-distractions-epstein-2674914497/

Reporting on Land-Grab?

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Article in AP by Emma Burrows, 1/15/26

Headline: “International media flock to Greenland as Trump turns the Arctic island into a geopolitical hot spot”

“For several weeks, international journalists and camera crews have been scurrying up to people in Greenland’s capital to ask them for their thoughts on the twists and turns of a political crisis that has turned the Arctic island into a geopolitical hot spot. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://apnews.com/article/greenland-united-states-journalists-international-media-56700602f0873102e94b3c5c43cc5a1a

US Media Bias on Venezuela?

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Article in Poynter by Amaris Castillo, 1/12/26

Headline:  “Venezuelan journalists see gaps — and risks — in coverage of Nicolás Maduro’s capture”

Subhead:  “Journalists say U.S. outlets often lack Venezuelan voices and the long-term context needed to explain what comes next”

“. . . For U.S. newsrooms, Maduro’s capture is a dramatic foreign policy story. For Venezuelan journalists, it’s far more complicated. As American outlets work to explain what comes next, many of the journalists with the deepest knowledge of Venezuela are hesitant to speak publicly, fearful of reprisal, skeptical or superficial coverage and unsure whether U.S. media can fully capture the country’s legal and political complexity. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.poynter.org/reporting-editing/2026/venezuelan-coverage-nicolas-maduro-capture/

Media Covering-Up Venezuela?

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Article in The Nation by Jack Mirkinson, 1/9/26

Headline:  “The Media’s Coverage of the Venezuelan Coup Has Been Dreadful”

Subhead:  “War may be the health of state, but it’s death to honest journalism.”

“We live in a turbulent, unpredictable world. Few things feel certain. But there are some truths we can hold fast to. The sun will rise. We’ll grow older each day. And the media will bend over backward to celebrate US imperialism.

“For evidence of this, just review the past week’s coverage of President Donald Trump’s illegal abduction and overthrow of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. Once the kidnapping operation swung into gear, our most prominent newsrooms obediently adopted their time-honored patterns: indulging war lust, sidestepping or downplaying the rule of law, and uncritically cheerleading yet another violent foreign intervention by the US military. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.thenation.com/article/society/media-venezuela-tony-dokoupil/