Media Intimidation

Media Political Victim?

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Article in Rolling Stone by Alan Spinwall, 7/22/25

Headline:  “Politics, Not Performance, Killed ‘The Late Show With Stephen Colbert”

Subhead:  “The end of ‘The Late Show With Stephen Colbert’ signals a much bigger shift for late night. But it’s not just about money”

“At the start of Thursday night’s episode of The Late Show With Stephen Colbert, the veteran talk show host announced that on Wednesday, his bosses at CBS informed him that Late Show would be coming to an end next May. As the studio audience booed at great length and volume, Colbert acknowledged, ‘Yeah, I share your feelings.’ Then he inspired additional sympathetic boos by adding, “It’s not just the end of our show, but it’s the end of The Late Show on CBS. I’m not being replaced. This is all just going away. . .”

“. . . A specific merger with Skydance Media was proposed last year, and it is still awaiting approval by the Federal Communications Commission — an agency whose chief reports to the man who lives at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., and who earlier this month received a $16 million settlement in a lawsuit he filed against CBS regarding the editing of a 60 Minutes episode. Colbert has been one of the most vocal critics of the current administration of anyone on television. . .

Read the full article at:

https://au.rollingstone.com/tv/tv-features/late-show-with-stephen-colbert-ending-analysis-80208/

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Article in The Guardian by Adrian Horton, 7/22/25

Headline: “Losing Stephen Colbert and The Late Show is a crushing blow, whatever the reason”

Subhead: “After watching the comedian’s smart and incisive assessment of America’s daily chaos for years, there’s something major to be mourned as he leaves the air”

“. . .or the better part of six years, I have watched every late-night monologue as part of my job at the Guardian (hello, late-night roundup), and though I often grumble about it, The Late Show has become a staple of my media diet and my principle source of news; as a millennial, I haven’t known a television landscape without it. There are many bleaker, deadlier things happening daily in this country, and the field of late-night comedy has been dying slowly for years, but the cancellation of The Late Show, three days after Colbert called out its parent company for settling a lawsuit with Donald Trump, felt especially and pointedly depressing – more a sign of cultural powerlessness and corporate fecklessness in the face of a bully president than the inevitable result of long-shifting tastes. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/jul/22/stephen-colbert-cancelled-trump-late-night

Shiving the Media

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Article in New York Times by Jess Bidgood, 7/21/25

Headline: “Trump Sharpens Attacks on a Favorite Foe: The News Media”

Subhead: “How the president is using the levers of government power against the news industry.”

“In declaring war on The Wall Street Journal over its coverage of his years long friendship with the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, President Trump tapped his supporters’ distrust of his favorite foe — the news media — in an effort to put down a mutiny within his base, as my colleague Erica Green explained.

“It was a familiar move that might have been lifted straight from his playbook in the 2016 presidential campaign.

“But this is a very different moment. If Trump’s complaints about the media feel like a throwback to his first term, his actions toward the industry have gone much further than that. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/21/us/politics/trump-news-media.html

Jack-booting the Press

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Article in The Atlantic by Paul Farhi, 7/21/25

Headline: “Trump’s Campaign to Crush the Media”

Subhead: “The president has launched a frontal assault on the journalism business. So far, he’s winning.”

“President Donald Trump’s latest assault on the news media came in the form of another lawsuit last week. After The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump had allegedly written a birthday note, complete with ‘bawdy’ doodling, to the convicted sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein in 2003, Trump boiled over with indignation. He denied writing the note and filed a libel suit the next day, demanding $10 billion in damages from the Journal, its parent company, and its principal owner, Rupert Murdoch, a sometime Trump ally.

“Although Trump faces considerable legal obstacles to win in court, betting against him would be unwise. In his first six months in office, he has been on a winning streak in his campaign to punish and diminish the press. His dispute with the Journal, after all, hijacked the news cycle from another Trump “victory”: eliminating federal support for public broadcasting. Early Friday morning, Congress voted to cancel $1.1 billion in subsidies for NPR, PBS, and their affiliated stations, marking the first time Congress has cut off public broadcasters since its funding began nearly 60 years ago. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2025/07/donald-trump-campaign-media/683600/

How to Control: Ban Access

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Article in the New York Times by Katie Robertson, 7/21/25

Headline: “White House Bans Wall Street Journal From Press Pool on Trump’s Scotland Trip”

Subhead: “The president sued the publication last week, accusing it of defamation for an article about his ties to the disgraced former financier Jeffrey Epstein.”

“The White House said on Monday that it had barred Wall Street Journal reporters from the traveling press pool for President Trump’s coming trip to Scotland, attacking the publication again for its reporting on ties between the president and the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

“On Thursday, The Journal published an article saying that Mr. Trump had sent Mr. Epstein a lewd birthday note in 2003. It included a drawing of a nude woman, The Journal reported, and ended with Mr. Trump writing, “Happy Birthday — and may every day be another wonderful secret. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/21/business/media/trump-scotland-wsj-press-pool.html

Native American Media in Jeopardy

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Article in Indian Country Today by AP & Kevin Abourezk, 7/18/25

Headline:  “Native public media reels after federal budget cuts”

Subhead:  “Congress approves Trump’s $9 billion cut to public broadcasting and foreign aid”

Francene Blythe-Lewis spent Friday morning crying at her desk, trying to assess how the loss of nearly half of her organization’s $2.8 million annual budget would impact its ability to support public media by and about Native people.

“ ‘It’s been very stressful,’ she said. ‘I don’t know 100 percent how it’s going to affect us. It’s not going to close Vision Maker Media.’

“Vision Maker Media’s woes were realized early Friday when the U.S. House approved President Donald Trump’s request to claw back about $9 billion for public broadcasting and foreign aid . . .”

“The package cancels about $1.1 billion for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and nearly $8 billion for a variety of foreign aid programs, many designed to help countries where drought, disease and political unrest endure. . .”

The cancellation of $1.1 billion for the CPB represents the full amount it is due to receive during the next two budget years. . .”

The corporation distributes more than two-thirds of the money to more than 1,500 locally operated public television and radio stations, with much of the remainder assigned to National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting Service to support national programming. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://ictnews.org/news/native-public-media-reels-after-federal-budget-cuts/

Senators ask FCC to end Hunt?

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Article in Reuters by David Shepardson, 7/16/25

Headline:  “Senators urge FCC chair to end probes into CBS News, other media outlets”

“Two Democratic U.S. senators on Wednesday urged Federal Communications Commission chair Brendan Carr to end investigations into CBS News and other media outlets.

“Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer and Senator Ed Markey, in a letter to Carr first reported by Reuters, urged the commission ‘to end its partisan attacks on CBS and cease interfering with the judgment of independent news organizations. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/senators-urge-fcc-chair-end-probes-into-cbs-other-outlets-2025-07-16/

Cuts Coming Soon?

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Article in Common Dreams by Stephen Prager, 7/16/25

Headline: “Senate GOP Set to Eviscerate Public Media Funding, ‘Dismantle’ Outlets Relied on by Millions”

“The bill threatens “emergency alerts that save lives, local journalism that informs communities, and educational tools that support families, job seekers, and teachers,” according to Protect My Public Media

“The Republican-controlled U.S. Senate is on the verge of stripping more than a billion dollars from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which could decimate local news stations.

“On Tuesday, the chamber voted 50-50, with a tie broken by Vice President JD Vance to move forward with debate on the package, which is underway as of Wednesday morning. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.commondreams.org/news/senate-gop-set-to-eviscerate-public-media-funding-dismantle-outlets-relied-on-by-millions

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Article in The Hill by Aris Folley, 7/15/25

Headline:  “Bill to claw back public media, foreign aid funds clears key Senate hurdle with Vance breaking tie”

“Senate Republicans on Tuesday narrowly cleared a key procedural hurdle on the path to clawing back billions of dollars in funding previously authorized by Congress for foreign aid and public broadcasting.

“Vice President Vance had to break the 50-50 tie vote after three Republicans — Sens. Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), Susan Collins (Maine) and Mitch McConnell (Ky.) — voted against a motion to discharge the rescissions package out of the Senate Appropriations Committee, allowing the full upper chamber to advance to consideration of the package.

“The bill, which passed the House last month, calls for $8.3 billion in cuts to the United States Agency for International Development and foreign aid, and more than $1 billion in cuts to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB). . .”

Read the full article at:

https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/5403141-public-media-foreign-aid-cuts-senate/

Foreign Journalists Scared

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rticle in Poynter by Angela Fu, 7/14/25

Headline:  “Foreign journalists in the U.S. are self-censoring to protect themselves from the Trump administration”

Subhead:  “Non-citizen journalists working in the U.S. report wiping their social media accounts, canceling travel plans and pulling bylines”

“In 2021, Venezuelan journalist Luz Mely Reyes moved to the United States because she didn’t want to be silenced. As an outspoken advocate for the freedom of expression, Reyes no longer felt safe in Venezuela, where reporters have been threatened, arrested and beaten.

“Now in the U.S., however, she finds that she must often silence herself.

“ ‘In my country (Venezuela), I never self-censored. Here, I have to avoid some topics because I feel that it’s dangerous for my status,’ said Reyes, who as a green card holder is a permanent legal resident of the U.S. but not a citizen. . .

Read the full story at:

https://www.poynter.org/reporting-editing/2025/foreign-journalists-in-the-u-s-are-self-censoring-to-protect-themselves-from-the-trump-administration/

Press Secretary in a Huff

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Article in The New Republic by Greg Sargent, 7/9/25

Headline:  “Trump Press Sec’s Fury at Media Over Texas Flood Exposes Worst of MAGA”

Subhead:  “As Karoline Leavitt rages at the media and Democrats for probing whether Trump policies made the Texas disaster worse, a writer on climate change argues that this absolutely is the time for such hard questions.”

“At least 109 people have died amid devastating flooding in Texas. Distressingly, 27 deaths occurred at a summer camp for girls, and the toll continues to rise. This week, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt angrily lashed out at the news media and Democrats for asking whether Trump administration policies bear any blame for the disaster’s impact. What struck us, though, is her demand that we all treat this as a ‘national’ tragedy. She’s right that we should do this. But that solicitude is precisely what Donald Trump and MAGA deny to non-MAGA America at other urgent moments. And that’s the true MAGA ethic at its ugliest. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://newrepublic.com/article/197723/trump-press-sec-fury-media-texas-flood-exposes-worst-maga

How do you Cover Extremism?

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Article in Columbia Journalism Review by Liam Scott

Headline: “How Local Reporters Manage the Dangers of Covering Extremism”

Subhead: “The extremism beat has gone mainstream—but in local markets, it’s still intensely personal.”

“Last Thanksgiving, Steven Monacelli was awoken early in the morning by the sound of police officers knocking on the door of his Dallas home. Someone had called the cops to report that Monacelli, a freelance investigative correspondent for the Texas Observer, was abusing his girlfriend. Monacelli’s girlfriend—who has since become his fiancée—came to the door to demonstrate that the abuse claims were false.

Monacelli was disturbed—but not particularly shocked. ‘I pretty much immediately knew why they were there,’ he said. For more than four years, he’s been covering the rise of far-right extremism across the state of Texas, including stories about right-wing influence in Texas schools and a so-called ‘white nationalist fight club.’ . . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.cjr.org/analysis/local-reporters-dangers-covering-extremism.php