Reading the “Fake News” Now?

Article in The Washington Post by Meryl Kornfield, Hannah Natanson, and Azi Paybarag, 12/25/25

Headline:  “Despite anti-media rhetoric, the government is still reading the news”

Subhead:  “The Trump administration is spending tens of thousands of dollars on paywalled news sites, including Politico and Bloomberg, despite earlier criticism of media outlets.”

“Agencies across the Trump administration have taken out subscriptions in recent months to news organizations that officials had very publicly cut off this year, reversing an earlier decision to cancel them that Elon Musk, senior White House aides and President Donald Trump had declared was necessary to end what they called a scandal. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/12/24/paywalled-news-sites-trump-administration/

From White House to TV Host?

Article in Raw Story by Alexander Willis, 12/23/25

Headline:  ” ‘Would you like me to leave?’ Trump floats ditching White House for TV hosting gig”

“President Donald Trump floated the idea of ditching the Oval Office Tuesday to instead pursue a career as a television host, asking his followers whether they supported the idea of an abrupt career change.

“Whether serious or in jest, Trump made the remarks after announcing that he would be hosting the Kennedy Center Honors ceremony scheduled for Tuesday evening, which he said he’d be doing ‘at the request of the board, and just about everybody else in America.’ . . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.rawstory.com/trump-2674824636/

CBS’s Bari Weiss – Waking-up


Article in Status by Natalie Korach, 12/17/25

Headline:  “Weiss’ Wake-Up Call”

Subhead: “As her first major CBS News town hall draws underwhelming ratings, Bari Weiss gets a public crash course in the metrics of television success. Now, Status has learned she’s delayed a planned address to staffers about the network’s future.”

“In the days leading up to the holidays, Bari Weiss had planned to address CBS News staffers with a broader vision of where she sees the network heading under her new leadership. But by Tuesday, as early Nielsen numbers for her high-profile Erika Kirk town hall circulated—and headlines began using words like “flop”—those plans quietly changed. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.status.news/p/bari-weiss-cbs-news-erika-kirk-town-hall-ratings

No Pulitzer for President?

Article in Daily Beast by Leigh Kimmins 12/16/25

Headline:  “Trump, 79, Told to Hand Over His Medical Records”

Subhead:  “The president’s revenge tour against the “fake news media” is coming back to bite him. “

“. . .The demand was made in legal papers filed by the board of journalism’s most prestigious prize, the Pulitzer, as part of a defamation lawsuit Trump filed in 2022 over reporting on an investigation into his Russia ties. Now, however, the Pulitzer board’s attorneys have hit back in the most personal way possible for the ailing, 79-year-old president. They have given him 30 days to hand over all tax documents and all documents concerning his medical or psychological health. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-79-may-be-forced-to-hand-over-his-medical-records/

Fire in the FCC?


Article in Status by Oliver Darcy, 12/16/25

Headline:  “Carr’s Collision Course”

Subhead: “FCC Chair Brendan Carr will be on Capitol Hill for rare Congressional testimony on Wednesday—a hearing in which fellow commissioner Anna Gomez will sharply criticize the agency under his watch, Status has learned.”

“On Wednesday morning at 10 a.m ET, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr will take a seat before the Senate Commerce Committee for a rare appearance before Congress. Carr won’t be alone. Commissioners Olivia Trusty and Anna Gomez will join him, marking the first Senate Commerce oversight hearing with all FCC commissioners present in more than five years—a notable moment for an agency that has largely not been subjected to tough congressional scrutiny. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.status.news/p/brendan-carr-fcc-senate-hearing-testimony

Media Health Coverage Adequate?

 

Article in Mediaite by Charlie Nash, 12/15/25

Headline:  “Jake Tapper Says He’s Covering Trump’s Health ‘All the Time’ Now Because He ‘Didn’t Ask as Many Questions as We Should Have’ About Biden”

“. . .During an interview with Tapper on Pod Save America, host and former Obama spokesman Tommy Vietor asked, ‘How do you think the media is handling, kind of, these growing instances of Trump falling asleep in meetings or maybe seeming like he’s losing a step? Like, when is it a critical mass that it becomes book-worthy’? ”

“It’s a great question,” replied Tapper. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.mediaite.com/media/tv/jake-tapper-says-hes-covering-trumps-health-all-the-time-now-because-he-didnt-ask-as-many-questions-as-we-should-have-about-biden/

Reporting on Violence

Article in Poynter by Tom Jones, 12/15/25

Headline:  “How journalists covered a weekend of mass shootings across two continents”

Subhead:  “Coverage of the Bondi Beach and Brown University attacks grappled with terror, trauma and accountability”

“The horrors continue.

“This past weekend was marred by two mass shootings — one in Australia and one in the U.S. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.poynter.org/commentary/2025/shootings-brown-bondi-beach-coverage/

Predicting Future of the Media

Articles in Columbia Journalism Review by various staff 12/8/25

Headline:  “Forecasting”

Subhead:  “Introducing the Journalism 2050 Issue.”

“We don’t know what exactly the future holds, much as we may want to believe we do. Looking at the transformations of the media industry, and at shifting habits of news consumption, maybe we can do something like meteorology, and put together a forecast. In this issue and an accompanying podcast series, we are watching where the wind blows . . .”

Read the articles at:

https://www.cjr.org/the-journalism-2050-issue

Students Fill Gap of Local Coverage?

Article in Columbia Journalism Review by Riddhi Setty & Carolina Abbot Galvao, 12/2/25

Headline:  “How Students Are Trying to Save Local News”

Subhead:  “Across the country, university programs are filling gaps in the coverage.”

At twenty-one, just after her graduation from the University of Vermont, Holly Sullivan became the editor of the Winooski News, the sole paper in Vermont’s smallest city—spanning a mile and a half, with about eight thousand residents who speak more than thirty languages. In the course of a few months, Sullivan went from being a student to editing articles and a newsletter that serve the area at large, written entirely by university students.

Read the full article at:

https://www.cjr.org/news/how-students-are-trying-to-save-local-news.php