You knew this was coming today, right? This busy media news cycle calls for a special Saturday edition. Here's the latest on Rupert Murdoch, Bob Woodward, Radio Free Europe, GBH, Brooke Singman, David Ellison, Joe Rogan, Jimmy Kimmel, and more... |
President Trump's libel lawsuit against the Wall Street Journal reads like a message to other news outlets: Don't follow the Journal's lead.
Journalists in other newsrooms have been pursuing further reporting about Trump's long-ago friendship with Jeffrey Epstein. His lawsuit is a warning to those news outlets; his $20 billion damages claim is a notice that "I will try to ruin you."
It's also an extraordinary escalation of Trump's ongoing legal campaign against media companies he views as opponents. (More on that in a moment.)
But truth is the best defense, as journalists learn in media law 101. While Trump has denied that he wrote the birthday letter in question, a rep for the WSJ's parent Dow Jones says "we have full confidence" in the contested story "and will vigorously defend against any lawsuit."
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Here's why this lawsuit is unique
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Up until now, Trump has never sued a news outlet while in office. All of his past lawsuits against media and tech companies were filed before he became president again. Thus, his defamation suit against the WSJ is unprecedented.
I asked a bunch of legal experts yesterday, and none of them could recall any past instances of any sitting president suing a news outlet over a story.
"As far as I can tell, no sitting president has ever sued a reporter or media outlet or media executive for allegedly defaming him," First Amendment attorney Ted Boutrous told me. "When you have the presidential bully pulpit, you simply don’t need to sue to get to the truth."
>> Something else to keep in mind: It will likely take months or years to know the outcome of this case.
>> Recommended reading: Aaron Blake's "5 big questions about Trump’s ties to Epstein"
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Making media 'more cautious' |
University of Richmond law professor Carl Tobias said that Trump's challenge to the Journal goes hand in hand with Paramount's recent settlement and the defunding of public broadcasting.
In each case, "his attacks on the media undermine the First Amendment by making the media and others more cautious in covering Trump, his administration and other federal and state politicians," Tobias said.
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'Streisand Effect' all over again? |
In addition to the WSJ, Trump is suing Rupert Murdoch and Dow Jones CEO Robert Thomson individually, as well as the two reporters on the story, Khadeeja Safdar and Joe Palazzolo. I joked on air that this battle between Trump and Murdoch is like Godzilla vs. King Kong. As Yashar Ali pointed out, Murdoch "loves to fight. He fights his own kids." In court, no less! Last year he lost a lengthy legal fight over the family trust.
Other Murdoch outlets continue to ignore the Journal scoop. (Fox News mentioned Trump's lawsuit one time yesterday.) It was intriguing that Trump posted on social media promoting Sean Hannity – "Everybody should watch Sean Hannity tonight. He really gets it!" – since the Fox host has previously been an intermediary and peacemaker between Trump and Murdoch.
Alex Isenstadt's book "Revenge" had an account of one such peacekeeping mission in 2023, when Hannity told Trump, "Please do not hit Fox, do not hit the Murdoch family. Just please, for the love of God, please don't do it."
Last night on CNN's "NewsNight," New York Post editor at large Kelly Jane Torrance said the new WSJ lawsuit might be a "bad idea for Donald Trump."
"It's the Streisand Effect all over again," she said. "Donald Trump is bringing so much more attention to this story than if he had just ignored it."
Her Murdoch-owned publication, for one, continues to be in ignore mode...
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One Democratic senator's view |
This morning Trump touted his move to release Epstein grand jury testimony and said he recognizes that "nothing will be good enough for the troublemakers and radical left lunatics making the request."
"There is a certain irony in the fact that the conspiracy theories Trump world helped amplify are now consuming him," Sen. Adam Schiff wrote, "and that the media empire that helped create Trump will now face the same extortionary pressure that enabled him to extract millions from ABC and CBS."
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Trump's two-and-a-half-year-old copyright lawsuit against Bob Woodward and Simon & Schuster over "The Trump Tapes" was dismissed by a federal judge yesterday. US District Judge Paul Gardephe said he would give Trump's legal team a month to file another amended complaint. But he dismissed the current iteration: It "appears unlikely" that Trump "can adequately plead a plausible copyright interest."
"We're very pleased the Court agreed with us and dismissed the case," S&S said in a statement.
Now, speaking of judges ruling against Trump...
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A win for Radio Free Europe |
Federal judge Royce Lamberth ordered the Trump-controlled US Agency for Global Media to cough up the money that it has been withholding from Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. "In a stern ruling, the judge rebuked the Trump administration for refusing to disburse funding that Congress had already approved," the NYT's Minho Kim reports here.
>> RFE/RL CEO Steve Capus said the victory "provides our journalists with the momentum necessary to continue reaching the nearly 47 million people each week who rely on our journalism for the facts and to counter malicious propaganda from authoritarian governments. Now more than ever, we cannot cede the information space to tyrants."
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Processing the loss for NPR/PBS |
"REPUBLICANS HAVE TRIED DOING THIS FOR 40 YEARS, AND FAILED….BUT NO MORE," Trump said on Friday as he praised Republican lawmakers for clawing back the Corporation for Public Broadcasting's funding.
"THIS IS BIG!!!" he said, and indeed it is. Publicly funded TV and radio evolved in ways that President Lyndon Johnson couldn't have imagined when he signed the Public Broadcasting Act into law in 1967. Programs like "Sesame Street" and "All Things Considered" "helped foster a sense there was something for everyone," NPR media correspondent David Folkenflik writes. But "that seeming consensus, under sustained attack, was shattered this week."
Folkenflik's analysis will help you comprehend what happened this week with NPR and PBS. I highly recommend it.
>> While we're at it, check out Jim Rutenberg's NYT media memo about how "the ascendant ideology of the Trump era is the opposite of the one that spawned the modern public broadcasting system."
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'Local. Trusted. Defunded.' |
That's what the big digital sign outside GBH's building in Boston says now. The region's public media powerhouse, like other station groups, is starting a new fund-raising push: "We're not backing down" despite the federal funding loss, "but we can't do it without you. Donate now to keep public media strong and independent..."
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Does the Colbert story add up? |
Reporters are writing obits not just for "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert," but for late-night TV writ large. As the broadcast business crumbles, and the components of a traditional late-night show splinter into a million viral video pieces, insiders are wondering about Jimmy Fallon and Jimmy Kimmel's futures. The math "wasn't adding up for CBS" anymore, Variety's Brian Steinberg writes, pointing out that other networks have been cutting late-night costs too.
"Paramount insists that it was 'purely a financial decision,' and Colbert himself has offered similar assurances to staff and skeptical friends, I'm told," Puck's Dylan Byers reports. Given Paramount's desperation to close the Skydance merger, people are right to be skeptical. ICYMI, here's my CNN.com story about Colbert being a "casualty of the merger."
Last night Jake Tapper quoted a former CBS executive who told him, "The timing seems so obvious and keeping with Paramount's quid pro quo theme. If it were just financial, why announce this now? Why not let RedBird announce it post transaction and FCC blessing? Seems like a further tribute to me. Shameful."
>> The Writers Guild wants the NY A.G. to investigate the possible "bribe..."
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Skydance CEO visits the FCC |
On Friday we learned through a pro forma government filing that Skydance CEO David Ellison was in DC on Tuesday for a meeting with FCC chair Brendan Carr and other FCC officials. Ellison pushed for merger approval; "discussed Skydance's commitment to unbiased journalism and its embrace of diverse viewpoints;" and dispelled some bogus claims about foreign influence over the company.
Of course, the filing made no mention of "The Late Show" cancellation, and CBS sources say the decision was made solely by the current management team, with no input from Skydance, per merger norms. NYT TV critic James Poniewozik assessed the situation using Colbert's famous "truthiness" yardstick here.
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'I hear Jimmy Kimmel is next' |
"Let's face it," veteran late-night reporter Bill Carter told Max Foster yesterday. "Even if CBS says Trump had nothing to do with it, Trump thinks he did! He's already come out and celebrated that Colbert has been 'fired,' because that's what he wanted. It's kind of a dark turn for the country, to think, well, 'We can't have people being satiric about our political leaders because they can basically eliminate them if they put pressure on their corporate owners. It's a bad sign for the country."
>> "I hear Jimmy Kimmel is next," Trump wrote in his Truth Social post. Kimmel's most recent Instagram was a summer vacation pic from Jackson Hole, where he attended a Good Trouble protest with his family. Kimmel held up a sign mocking Trump and declaring, "MAKE AMERICA GOOD AGAIN."
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Fox's Russia counterprogramming |
Liam Reilly writes: Trump may be trying to shift media conversations away from Epstein and back to familiar territory. On Wednesday he twice compared the Epstein saga to the very real scandal about Russian interference in the 2016 election – which he dismissed as a "hoax."
On Friday Fox published an investigation claiming the Obama admin "manufactured" intelligence to support the Russia-helped-Trump "narrative." Brooke Singman's story cited declassified documents from Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard. Come prime time, Gabbard was on with Hannity pushing the story. It had the feel of Epstein counterprogramming...
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>> David Wallace-Wells nails what I've been wanting to write all week: "The Epstein Story Is Both Conspiracy Theory and Genuine Scandal." (NYT)
>> Todd Spangler pens this week's Variety cover story, "Trump's War on Truth," and quotes Robert Reich saying "the worst aspect of all of this is, we don’t know the extent to which the media is being intimidated." (Variety)
>> "Conspiracy theories thwart rebuilding plan after L.A. County wildfires:" Liam Dillon says this is a "total nightmare story about decaying media and public policy," and he's right. It starts with reality show stars using AI to spread misinfo and gets worse from there. (LAT)
>> Ben Fritz's big heave for the weekend: "How YouTube won the battle for TV viewers." (WSJ)
>> This excellent NYT map, "Where Public Media Cuts Will Bite," is featured on Page One of today's paper. (NYT)
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>> Journalists were among those arrested at a protest against ICE actions on Thursday. The confrontation took place on a bridge between Ohio and Kentucky. Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine told WCPO's Morgan Trau that his office is getting involved: "He is concerned and says he never wants to see press arrested." (X)
>> "You need to run for president," Joe Rogan told Democratic Texas state representative James Talarico on the latest episode of Rogan's podcast. (Politico)
>> A federal judge has ruled that authors suing Anthropic "can band together in copyright class action." (Reuters)
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SAVING THE BEST FOR LAST... |
'Superman' spurs increase in pet adoption searches |
Here's something wonderful: "According to data from the dog training app Woofz, Google searches for 'adopt a dog near me' increased 513% after the 'Superman' movie release. Krypto, the 'Superdog' star in the film, was inspired by the director's rescue dog, Ozu." |
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This edition of Reliable Sources was edited by Andrew Kirell and produced with Liam Reilly. Email us your feedback and tips here. Now I'm off to see "Smurfs" with my son. Hope you have a great weekend! |
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