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/

Negative vs. Biased News

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Article in Daily Kos by Trenz Pruca, 1/20/26

Headline:  “Media Bias, Negative News, and a Persistent Myth”

Subhead:  “You must be a Republican if you believe that: Fox News, MAGA influencers, and professional outrage merchants tell the truth; scientists, judges, journalists, and civil servants are the deep state.”

“Is the media biased? — the Patterson Study. (2018). . .”

“. . .What the study does examine is the long-term trend toward negative news coverage in broadcast media, a shift that began in the early 1960s as television news expanded in length and became increasingly image-driven. Negative events—conflict, scandal, disaster—are simply easier to visualize. This is why automobile accidents receive more coverage than random acts of kindness. The accident happened. Reporting it is neither fake nor biased; it is merely well suited to the medium.

“Patterson explicitly warns against conflating negative news with biased news. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2026/1/20/2364428/-Media-Bias-Negative-News-and-a-Persistent-Myth?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=more_community&pm_medium=web

Media Kidnapped or Captured?

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Article in FAIR by Gregory Shupak, 1/20/26

Headline: “Labeling Kidnapping a ‘Capture,’ Media Legitimate Violation of International Law”

“Corporate media have deployed a lexicon of legitimation in their coverage of the deadly US invasion of Venezuela and the abduction of President Nicolás Maduro, along with his wife and fellow politician Cilia Flores. Major news outlets have routinely described these events using words like ‘capture’ (New York Times, 1/3/26) or ‘arrest’ (BBC, 1/3/26), which presents them as a matter of enforcing the law against fugitives or criminals, and carries the built-in but false assumption that the US had the right or even duty to conduct its operation in the first place.

“The ludicrous premise is that any time an arrest warrant is issued somewhere in the United States, the US has the right to do anything, anywhere in the world, in pursuit of the subject—including bombing another country, invading it, killing its citizens, and spiriting away its president and first lady. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://fair.org/home/labeling-kidnapping-a-capture-media-legitimate-violation-of-international-law/

Better Late Than. . . With Edits

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Article in Poynter by Tom Jones, 1/20/26

Headline:  “Opinion- ‘60 Minutes’ finally aired the story that stirred up a storm inside CBS News”

Subhead: “The delayed report aired after weeks of internal conflict over editorial independence between veteran journalists and new editor-in-chief Bari Weiss”

“Nearly a month ago, new CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss tried her best to break her new toy by making the extraordinary decision to yank a ‘60 Minutes’ story right before it was set to air. Even though the story — about Venezuelan men deported by the U.S. to a notorious prison in El Salvador — went through five internal screenings, Weiss held the story by claiming it wasn’t ready for air.

Those inside CBS News were furious that Weiss, who has no TV news experience, was telling ‘60 Minutes,’ the gold standard of TV news, what’s appropriate to air.  . . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.poynter.org/commentary/2026/60-minutes-cecot-story-aired/

Greenland Not Enough?

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Arti9cle in Raw Story by Matthew Chapman, 1/20/26

Headline: “Fox News host claims Trump can seize Bermuda too ‘if we need’ it”

“Fox News anchor Jesse Watters casually suggested on Tuesday night that not only could the United States annex Greenland at will, but they could also seize control of the island of Bermuda.

“Watters, a firebrand who has been accused of dropping casual racism and sexual harassment, laughed at the horror from European leaders at President Donald Trump’s escalating threats to seize control of Greenland from Denmark, a critical NATO ally of the United States. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.rawstory.com/jesse-watters-2674914697/

Minneapolis Journalists Attacked

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Article in Reporters Without Borders by Staff, 1/20/26

Headline:  “Attacks on journalists in Minnesota cap Trump’s first year back in office”

“Federal agents and officials are increasingly targeting journalists in the state of Minnesota covering widespread protests against the government’s sweeping immigration crackdown. At least six journalists have been violently attacked by agents in the state’s twin cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul since the start of the new year. Federal officials have also threatened independent journalist Don Lemon with criminal charges for his reporting on a protest inside a church. The attacks cap Donald Trump’s first year back in office, which has been defined by his explosive war on press freedom. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://rsf.org/en/attacks-journalists-minnesota-cap-trump-s-first-year-back-office

Venezuelan Media – Same Old

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Article in Columbia Journalism Review by Carolina Abbott Galvao & Ivan L. Nagy, 1/16/26

Headline:  “For Venezuelan Journalists, It’s Like Maduro Never Left”

Subhead:  ” ‘If you have contacts or sensitive information that you’re not supposed to have, you could be thrown in jail.’ “

“. . .This is less a function of recent American interference than business as usual. Under the leadership of Hugo Chávez, through Nicolás Maduro’s tenure to today, official narratives have echoed across state-controlled TV, radio, and print media; authorities have declined visas for foreign journalists to enter the country; independent news outlets are banned and accessible only via VPN. In the week following the US incursion, police, military forces, and colectivos—pro-government paramilitaries—roamed the streets, cracking down on protesters, members of the opposition, and independent journalists. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.cjr.org/news/for-venezuelan-journalists-its-like-maduro-never-left.php

Searching Reporter’s House Portends?

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Article in Chicago Defender by Konstantin Zhukov, 1/14/26

Headline: “Searching reporters’ homes, suing journalists and repressing citizen dissent are well-known steps toward autocracy”

“The FBI search of a Washington Post reporter’s home on Jan. 14, 2026, was a rare and intimidating move by an administration focused on repressing criticism and dissent.

“In its story about the search at Hannah Natanson’s home, at which FBI agents said they were searching for materials related to a federal government employee, Washington Post reporter Perry Stein wrote that ‘[it is highly unusual and aggressive for law enforcement to conduct a search on a reporter’s home.’. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://chicagodefender.com/searching-reporters-homes-suing-journalists-and-repressing-citizen-dissent-are-well-known-steps-toward-autocracy/

Journalists, Don’t be Intimidated!

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Article in The New Republic by Felipe La Hoz, 1/19/26

Headline:  “The Crisis Year for Journalism Is Here”

Subhead:  “Journalists have an inherent right and professional duty to defend their industry and its mission against those who want to derail it—even when those threats are coming from the inside.”

“. . .In-depth reporting is difficult work. It’s not easy to unearth hidden information on the one hand and parse avalanches of it on the other—much of it offered in bad faith—on deadline, especially as newsrooms have shrunk in tandem with the growth and entrenchment of PR and spin. . .”

“As increasingly emboldened interests amp up efforts to buy, sue, steal from, and use official power to coerce the news media into submission, we have to embrace a self-defense posture that won’t interfere with our news gathering but will acknowledge that we can’t continue news gathering if we’ve been knocked over by the powers we’re meant to hold accountable. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://newrepublic.com/article/205099/journalists-right-self-defense-cbs

Hope For Local News?

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Article in The New York Times by Sarabeth Berman, 1/18/26

Headline:  “Local Newspapers Are Closing. Local News Is Surviving.”

“The consequences of the collapse of the local newspaper business have been severe. When communities lose their local news outlets, civic engagement drops, corruption rises, government waste increases and political polarization worsens. Communities no longer know themselves. No number of headlines about goings-on in Washington can change that. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/18/opinion/local-newspapers-closing.html