🌷 Happy first day of spring for all of us in the Northern Hemisphere. Here's the latest on March Madness, Sarah Wynn-Williams, Will Lewis, OpenAI, "Words of War," and more...
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In Hong Kong, national security police "are increasingly monitoring people's social media interactions." In China, a detained Taiwanese publisher has faced trial "on charges of 'secession.'" In Vietnam, a state-run TV station has apologized after a program showed a South Vietnamese flag, "a taboo image in the communist country."
Those are just a few of this week's reports from Radio Free Asia. But the coverage may not last much longer as RFA's money dries up. While the broadcaster is trying to fight President Trump's termination order, it is making tough decisions to preserve resources. Yesterday about 75% of the Washington staff was told they're being furloughed, effective Friday, sources at the broadcaster said.
Managers at RFA are trying to protect workers who are in the U.S. on H-1B visas because, as one of the sources said, "we have some people on staff who would basically be arrested upon arrival if they're sent back."
There are similar concerns over at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, as we wrote earlier this week. The heads of the U.S-funded international broadcasters have sought to meet with U.S. Agency for Global Media "senior adviser" Kari Lake, partly to seek help protecting journalists in harm's way, but no such meeting has materialized, sources said.
RFA CEO Bay Fang wrote to Lake yesterday and said last weekend's termination order "has no basis in law or fact and violates the U.S. Constitution, a litany of federal statutes and regulations, and the plain terms of RFA's grant agreement." Further legal maneuvers are forthcoming...
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China's chance to 'fill the void' |
Last night on "Erin Burnett OutFront," correspondent Will Ripley said that "while America pulls back" on international broadcasting, China is pushing ahead: "Beijing is pouring billions into its state-run outlets like CGTN and China Daily – aggressively growing its media influence worldwide."
Ripley said VOA RFA "reached millions, including those in China, who bypassed censorship to access outside news. Now that counterbalance is in jeopardy. With America's voice fading, China's megaphone is only growing louder, and its military is only growing stronger."
"If this is a shifting information war, many believe that Beijing is really more than happy to fill the void being left by the U.S.," Ripley added. Here's the full report.
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What is Lake's plan for VOA? |
The Desk notes that Voice of America "has been airing this 45-second video on a loop since Saturday." The video says VOA "will present the policies of the U.S." and provide "accurate" news – implying that Lake still does have a plan to restore VOA in some form. She wrote on X last night, "let's reduce this to the bare minimum and start fresh."
>> Last weekend The Washington Post reported that Lake "had big plans" for the outlet, but then came Trump's shutdown order...
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>> "How Trump and Musk built their own reality:" This is a powerful read by The Verge's Elizabeth Lopatto about two leaders who have "gotten lost in the illusions they created."
>> A new Fox poll shows only 40% of Americans "approve of the job Elon Musk is doing working with DOGE, while 58% disapprove."
>> The same poll showed widespread concerns about DOGE, including 65% who "worry that not enough thought and planning has gone into the cuts."
>> In a new note this morning, Tesla bull Dan Ives says Musk needs to "end this crisis" by taking a "step back" and say he is going to "balance DOGE and being Tesla CEO."
>> Last night on Fox, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick urged viewers to buy Tesla stock. The Axios headline this morning: "Tesla falls after Commerce secretary recommends buying stock."
>> Ella Yurman sat down with Musk's estranged daughter Vivian Jenna Wilson for a new Teen Vogue digital cover story.
>> Brand new from Hadas Gold: "Around a dozen (if not more) influencers on X have been targeted by swattings recently. Almost all are pro Trump, many have interacted with Elon Musk on here. I talked to two of them..."
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The Pentagon's 'unpublishing' continues... |
"Articles about the Holocaust, September 11, cancer awareness, sexual assault, and suicide prevention are among the tens of thousands either removed or flagged for removal from Pentagon websites as the department has scrambled to comply with Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s order to scrub 'diversity' content from all its platforms," CNN's Natasha Bertrand, Haley Britzky and Oren Liebermann report.
Dozens of the articles reviewed by CNN "have no ostensible connection to DEI programs; race theory; gender ideology, or identity-based programs." Simply put: It's a mess. "People don't understand the scope and the carelessness of ‘unpublishing’ that’s happened," a defense official said.
>> Jake Tapper highlighted the Pentagon's (now-corrected) removal of an article about baseball great Jackie Robinson and asked, "Does the new civilian leadership of the Pentagon think they're a better judge of Jackie Robinson's army story than Jackie Robinson?" Watch...
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Trump bashes Fox correspondent |
Trump dumped on Fox WH correspondent Jacqui Heinrich yesterday, calling her "absolutely terrible" and saying "she should be working for CNN, not Fox." He said "she's a fan of the White House Correspondents Association" (she's on the board), taking a shot at the organization his administration has sought to bypass.
Fox PR didn't have any comment on the attack (in keeping with the network's no-comment approach about Trump's criticism since 2017) but Fox vet Brit Hume wrote back to Trump, "She plays it straight, covering both sides of a story and has certainly played fair with you."
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I'm glad to see "60 Minutes" getting more recognition for this: "As CBS corporate leaders ponder settling President Donald Trump's $20 billion lawsuit against the network’s '60 Minutes,' America’s storied newsmagazine has produced some fast and hard-hitting stories critical of the new administration in every episode since Trump was inaugurated," The AP's David Bauder writes...
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Political media notes and quotes |
>> I really liked this Kashmir Hill story about Reddit pages for federal workers becoming "crowded forums for fears, anxieties and tidbits of intra-agency observation." (NYT)
>> Angela Fu's latest: "The source behind your local weather report is facing cuts. Meteorologists are sounding the alarm." (Poynter)
>> At his Kennedy Center board meeting earlier this week, Trump called himself "the king of ratings." (NYT)
>> Dick Tofel considers "how journalism should cover a world with the U.S. no longer at its center." (Second Rough Draft)
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>> Ziff Davis has acquired TheSkimm. (Axios)
>> David Novak will be chairman of Comcast's SpinCo. (Variety)
>> Nancy Han has returned to CNN "as senior VP of video editorial." (Variety)
>> "After a decade at the helm, Charlie Sennott is leaving the GroundTruth Project." (NiemanLab)
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No Post-ing about the Post |
NYT reporter Ben Mullin caught wind of a recent memo from Washington Post publisher Will Lewis to the Opinions section staff saying "they would not be writing about The Post."
Lewis wrote that he wanted to "restate our house policy on using our own pages to comment on the inner workings of The Washington Post. This is not permitted."
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Facebook whistleblower hits #1 |
Sarah Wynn-Williams' memoir "Careless People" has debuted at #1 on the NYT's nonfiction best seller list, in spite of (or maybe thanks to!) Meta's legal action against her. Amy Griffin's "The Tell" debuted at #2; Laurie Woolever's "Care and Feeding" at #8; and Dylan Mulvaney's "Paper Doll" at #10.
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>> The first round of March Madness officially tips off at 12:15 p.m. on CBS. Here is the full list of today's 16 games (!) across TNT, TBS, truTV and CBS. (Bleacher Report)
>> "The NBA is quietly preparing to bring back its iconic show 'NBA Inside Stuff,'" Alex Sherman scoops. (CNBC)
>> Michael McCarthy says Aaron Rodgers is "drawing very little interest from media companies." (FOS)
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>> Hmmm: Ahead of the Australian federal election in May, "Meta promises to fight misinformation in Australia with same strategy it killed in the U.S. to appease Trump," Emanuel Maiberg reports. (404 Media)
>> X's valuation "has soared back to $44 billion, underscoring the sharp turnaround in the company's fortunes" since Musk assumed the role of staunch Trump ally. (FT)
>> Brand new from Ben Thompson: "An interview with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman about building a consumer tech company" (Stratechery)
>> Telegram founder Pavel Durov says "the service now has more than 1 billion active users." (TechCrunch)
>> This is an interesting read by Dan Primack and Sara Fischer about "why TikTok rivals aren't challenging Trump's executive order." (Axios)
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Entertainment odds and ends |
>> "'Coyote vs. Acme,' the film that ignited social media when Warner Bros. canceled it for a tax write-off, may see the light of day after all," Aaron Couch reports, as "indie outfit Ketchup Entertainment is eying the rights to the film." (THR)
>> "A record 51 films will receive tax credits to shoot in California amid a historic downturn in production in the state fueled by an increasingly tit-for-tat incentives race to host Hollywood," Winston Cho reports. (THR)
>> Here's the first trailer "for political drama-thriller Words of War, about the life and murder of Russian-American investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya." The film comes out in the U.S. on May 2. (Deadline)
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Remembering Jeffrey Klein |
"Jeffrey Klein, an investigative journalist who co-founded the muckraking magazine Mother Jones and served as its editor in chief in the 1990s," has died. He was 77.
I appreciated Harrison Smith's obit for Klein in the Washington Post, particularly the detail that Klein was working on a book about the history of investigative journalism up until his death. According to his son Jonah, Klein believed that "in almost every great investigative journalist, they had some trauma in their childhood that had steered them on this course."
Klein "had a lot of inner pain," his son said, "and he wanted to channel it in a positive way by taking down people who were corrupt. That was his quest in life." May his memory be a blessing.
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