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Tuesday, September 9, 2025 |
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Hey, good morning. Here's the latest on "Trump Country," the NYT, CBS, Emma Heming Willis, Google, Techmeme, "SNL," Rian Johnson, and more... |
Rupert Murdoch is both the big winner and the big loser this week.
A couple of years ago, fearing that some of his children would try to straighten out the right-wing bent of his media brands, Rupert went to court to try to rewrite his family trust. He wanted to ensure that even after his death, his chosen son Lachlan, who shares his conservative politics, would remain in control of Fox Corp and News Corp.
Rupert lost in court last winter. But his lawyers and bankers have now negotiated a solution that gives the patriarch what he wanted all along. As longtime Murdoch watcher David Folkenflik put it, Rupert "has pulled one final rabbit out of his hat." The 94-year-old mogul has bought out three of his children's shares in the media empire and built a new trust "with Lachlan in full control." And it all got firmed up yesterday, on the same day as Lachlan's 54th birthday.
It's an ending worthy of a dramatic series finale. It's such big news that The New York Times gave it the lead spot on Page One this morning. But the resolution comes at a very steep cost.
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Project Family Harmony... |
The reengineering of the trust is complex. James Murdoch, Elisabeth Murdoch and Prudence MacLeod, described in legal filings as the "departing members," will receive about $1 billion each for their shares, a person with knowledge of the transaction said. And then they'll be free and clear of the family business – putting an end to about five years of informed speculation that maybe, just maybe, after Rupert dies, they'll team up and seize power from Lachlan.
As the NYT first reported in this February story that's worth rereading today, Rupert and Lachlan's lawyers had named their Fox-protection plan Project Family Harmony.
It sounds like an impossibility, right? How could a convoluted legal scheme to cut three kids out of the trust lead to family harmony? But Rupert, in a 2023 email obtained by the NYT, said what he wanted most was "peace all around."
However, he also wanted to forestall any attempt by James to take over the business: "Fox and our papers are the only faintly conservative voices against the monolithic liberal media. I believe maintaining this is vital to the future of the English-speaking world."
So, in that way, Rupert has won. He has ensured that Lachlan will remain in charge. But this battle has absolutely torn the family apart.
The big unknown: Why did James, Elisabeth and Pru agree to resolve all the litigation and accept the payout? I suspect we will find out in due time. But for the time being, "Project Family Harmony" sounds like a bleak joke of a name.
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These takes showed up back-to-back in my social media feed last night. First, Clay Travis of OutKick, a Fox-owned brand: "Lachlan Murdoch buys out his siblings, will control Fox for decades to come. Huge win if you care about a true marketplace of ideas in the country, it's basically Fox vs every other left wing legacy media outlet in TV & newspapers." Second, Matt Gertz of the anti-Fox group Media Matters: With Lachlan firmly in charge, "the lie factory will continue manufacturing lies for another generation, deliberately deceiving audiences in service of authoritarian politics on three continents."
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The local to social to POTUS pipeline |
Fox is playing a key role in keeping the stabbing death of Iryna Zarutska in the national news. Last month's gruesome murder was back on the local news radar last week when Charlotte officials released surveillance video of the attack. Then it took off on right-wing social media, with pro-Trump influencers blasting the national media for not covering the story.
President Trump's Monday morning remarks about Zarutska showed how this trickle-up effect worked. Reacting to the video, Trump made it sound like the stabbing happened the night before, because it was new to him.
Numerous Fox shows led with the Charlotte video and the fallout yesterday, and some hosts admonished me for pointing out that X has been a cesspool of baldly racist comments relating to the murder. Maybe they don't want to hear about that, but the racist rhetoric is a relevant part of the story. As I said on CNN, hopefully the vitriol doesn't distract from the very serious criminal justice Qs in this case.
While we're still on the subject of Murdochworld...
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Fox's near-silence on Epstein letter |
Liam Reilly writes: We've all now seen the "bawdy" birthday letter to Jeffrey Epstein signed with Trump's signature, which the president called a "fake" when he he sued Murdoch's Wall Street Journal for reporting about it. The signature is quite similar to other Trump letters from the same era, including a letter to the late great CNN host Larry King.
But the denialism continues. So, too, does the near-total blackout on Fox News. Fox barely covered the original WSJ story, and this time around, the network has only mentioned the developments one time, on Bret Baier's newscast. Fox's website posted a story about the Epstein document dump that focused on Bill Clinton's birthday letter to Epstein and barely mentioned Trump.
>> CNN senior legal analyst Elie Honig said on "The Lead" that the letter makes Trump's defamation case against the WSJ "way more difficult..."
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Paramount picks its CBS ombudsman |
Paramount has revealed its pick for CBS News ombudsman: Kenneth R. Weinstein. The former Hudson Institute CEO, who "has had a long career in right-leaning and neoconservative public policy circles," will now be tasked with reviewing complaints about bias at the network.
Scrutiny of Weinstein was immediate, as media reporters dug up his columns bashing "media elites" and praising Trump and VP JD Vance; his donations to Republican and pro-Trump groups; and his now-deleted tweet suggesting CBS News faces "utter condemnation." Paramount must have known about all this ahead of time, right? The company is overtly trying to win the trust of Trump-aligned audiences, though doing so risks alienating other audiences.
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A country radio station in Fort Myers, Florida, has rebranded itself as "Trump Country," using what seems like the same typeface as the Trump-Vance campaign. The station's president, who is running for a House seat in a GOP primary, says Trump Country "has tripled its ratings among adults 25-54 since March." Scott MacFarlane and Jennifer Jacobs have the full story for CBS here...
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And this is... the opposite |
After a five-week summer break, Jon Stewart returned to "The Daily Show" last night and went "straight for Trump's jugular," Bill Carter writes for LateNighter. Here's the recap... |
"It’s the equivalent of Super Bowl Day for diehard Apple fans," CNN's Clare Duffy writes. "Apple is expected to announce the latest iterations of the iPhone, Apple Watch and AirPods at its annual hardware event." It kicks off at 1 p.m. ET. Here's the curtain-raiser...
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This afternoon the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee is holding a hearing titled "Hidden Harms: Examining Whistleblower Allegations that Meta Buried Child Safety Research." Two former Meta employees are the witnesses. A Meta spokesman told me "the claims at the heart of this hearing are nonsense; they're based on selectively leaked internal documents that were picked specifically to craft a false narrative."
Meta is also pushing back on this NYT story: "Whistle-Blower Sues Meta Over Claims of WhatsApp Security Flaws." The company says the former employee "wasn't right for the job" and charges that the NYT didn't ask for comment "until moments before publishing its story..."
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Tons of buzzy new books today |
This is one of the busiest nonfiction weeks of the year. Justice Amy Coney Barrett's "Listening to the Law" is already near the top of Amazon's new releases list thanks to her TV tour. "The Unexpected Journey" by Emma Heming Willis, "Art Work: On the Creative Life" by Sally Mann, and "Shadow Cell" by Andrew and Jihi Bustamante are also selling well.
Also out today: "Science Under Siege" by Michael E. Mann and Peter J. Hotez; "The World's Worst Bet," about globalization's rise and fall, by David J. Lynch; and "Separation of Church and Hate," billed as "a sane person's guide to taking back the Bible" from fascists, by John Fugelsang. Personally, I'm looking forward to reading "Dirtbag Billionaire" by David Gelles. And I'll list more of today's new releases on Wednesday...
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>> The New York Times is launching a new "family subscription offering." Sarah Scire says it means "separate Wordles for everyone." (NiemanLab)
>> John Ourand says ESPN has signed "PTI" hosts Mike Wilbon and Tony Kornheiser to new three-year deals. (Puck)
>> The ratings are in for YouTube's first exclusive NFL game. (THR)
>> "Food critic Grace Dent and chef Anna Haugh are the new hosts of MasterChef after Gregg Wallace and John Torode were sacked." (BBC)
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'Unilateral act of disarmament' |
"The US has informed countries in Europe that it is stepping back from joint efforts to combat disinformation from countries such as Russia, China and Iran," the FT's Amy Mackinnon reports.
The efforts were part of the State Department's Global Engagement Center, which has been demonized and defunded by Republicans. "James Rubin, who served as head of the center until December, described the move as a 'unilateral act of disarmament' in the information war with Russia and China."
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>> Google is expanding AI Mode to five new languages and "opening access to additional users around the world." (TechCrunch)
>> Citing a federal judge's recent search monopoly ruling, an ad exchange called PubMatic is suing Google. (Bloomberg)
>> Speaking of... John Herrman writes that "Google's monopoly isn't going anywhere." (NYMag)
>> The judge overseeing Anthropic's proposed $1.5 billion copyright settlement "is concerned class lawyers are striking a deal behind the scenes that will be forced 'down the throat of authors,'" Annelise Levy reports. (Bloomberg)
>> Fred Vogelstein profiled Techmeme as the O.G. tech news aggregator turns 20. (Crazy Stupid Tech)
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'Hollywood is at war with itself over Gaza' |
"Gaza has pitted Hollywood against itself. And as the season of serious filmmaking arrives with the Venice and Toronto International Film Festivals, the divisions it has wrought are back in the spotlight," TheWrap founder Sharon Waxman writes in this NYT guest essay.
>> Here's a fresh example from Monday: "Figures from across the film and TV world, including Oscar, BAFTA, Emmy and Palme d'Or winners, have signed a pledge saying they will refuse to work with Israeli institutions and companies that are 'implicated in genocide and apartheid against the Palestinian people,'" Alex Ritman reports for Variety...
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Entertainment odds and ends |
>> Trump praised West Point on Truth Social yesterday "after news broke that the West Point Association of Graduates canceled an award ceremony intended to honor Tom Hanks." Trump bashed Hanks as a "destructive, WOKE" recipient, prompting many to wonder why he'd want to pick a fight with one of the world's most beloved actors. (Variety)
>> "SNL" confirmed the cast for its upcoming 51st season, including "five new faces." (THR)
>> Ella Langley, Megan Moroney and Lainey Wilson topped the CMA Awards nomination list with six noms each. (CNN)
>> Last but not least, critics are praising Rian Johnson's "Knives Out" threequel, with TheWrap's Chase Hutchinson calling it "the best 'Knives Out' movie yet" and Deadline's Damon Wise christening it "an intelligent Gothic delight." Netflix has dropped its official teaser for the movie. (YouTube)
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