Good Night and Good Luck
By: Monika Bauerlein (Mother Jones)
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
"Lying." "Disgusting." "Scum." "Slime." "Corrupt." "Enemy of the people." Donald Trump has made clear what he thinks of journalists and what should happen to us: Thrown in jail and raped, "sued like never before," investigated for treason, "taken off the air." Once he reassuringly noted that "I would never kill them, but I do hate them," but since then he's clarified that he "wouldn't mind so much" if someone shot the "fake news."
Ten years ago, some were inclined to shrug this off as hyperbole. Now it is crystal clear that Trump intends to do everything he can to stop journalists from reporting things he doesn't like, which is most things that are true. If there was any doubt, he said it again shortly after his inauguration, in a speech at (tellingly) the Justice Department: "But these networks and these newspapers are really no different than a highly paid political operative and it has to stop. It has to be illegal."
Trump has banned reporters from press briefings (while inviting sycophants and propagandists). He has taken government data offline. He has fantasized about journalists being raped in prison. He has threatened to pull licenses of television stations, signed an executive order to kill funding for public radio and television, had news organizations investigated (and claimed that they are paid agents of the government) and threatened journalists simply for asking him questions.
For these and other reasons, the United States is slipping on the Reporters Without Borders press freedom index; this year we sit in 57th place among 180 countries, right behind Sierra Leone. (The five countries directly ahead of us: Romania, Liberia, Ghana, Mauritius, and Mauritania.)
But the president doesn't have to do all the dirty work of suppressing inconvenient truths himself. He can also outsource the job to corporate media owners. In the past six months we've seen that when faced with a choice between standing up for journalism and protecting their profits, leaders of our most powerful media corporations will often look out for the bottom line first. They may even convince themselves that accommodation is the moral choice—because it's a way to "heal partisan divides," "combat wokeness," or simply "be objective." But in the end, it's just about the money.
These settlements established the going rate for media companies to pay off Trump.
Consider, most recently, Paramount, which owns CBS. Last year, CBS's 60 Minutes had a sit-down interview with Kamala Harris, as it has with each major party candidate for decades. (Trump bailed on his 60 Minutes interview at the last minute; his spokesman said it was because the show insisted on fact-checking.)
Harris gave a long answer to a question about the Middle East, and CBS aired shortened versions of that answer on 60 Minutes and Face the Nation. The edits didn't change the meaning of what Harris said—you can check for yourself in the transcripts. But Trump went ballistic, calling the interview a "Giant Fake News Scam" and promising to "TAKE AWAY THE CBS LICENSE." On Halloween, his lawyers filed suit in the Northern District of Texas—the district where cases automatically get assigned to a Trump-appointed, ultraconservative judge named Matthew Kacsmaryk.
The complaint is quite something. It alleges (with evidence such as numerous Breitbart citations) that CBS's editing violated Texas consumer protection laws by making Harris' answer appear more concise than it was, an "unconscionable" action "because it amounts to a brazen attempt to interfere in the 2024 U.S. Presidential Election."
CBS, and virtually every First Amendment expert, called the case "baseless." But Paramount chairwoman Shari Redstone (the daughter of company founder Sumner Redstone) desperately wants to sell the company to Skydance Media (which, because we live in a nepo-baby world, happens to be owned by the son of Oracle founder and Trump pal Larry Ellison).
That sale needs approval from the federal government, and two days after Trump's inauguration, the Federal Communications Commission opened its own investigation of the Kamala interview…and explicitly linked it to its review of the Paramount merger. Just in case anyone missed the point, shortly afterward, Trump doubled the size of his claim against CBS, demanding $20 billion (yes, with a "b"). Nice merger you got there. Be a shame if something happened to it.
The media newsletter Puck News reported that Redstone asked CBS leaders to delay negative stories about Trump until after the Skydance deal was closed. In May, Bill Owens, the legendary executive producer of 60 Minutes, resigned, saying he had "lost independence from corporate." His boss, CBS vice president for news Wendy McMahon, quickly followed. And on July 2, Paramount did settle the case with a payment of $16 million.
CBS isn't the only target of Trump's legal ire. In just the past year, the president has pursued litigation against many other targets, including the Des Moines Register, a pollster, Simon & Schuster, and CNN, with additional threats against the New York Times, the Pulitzer Prize board, and people who write books about him.
One of the most prominent cases was against another television network, ABC: Trump complained that host George Stephanopoulos had defamed the president by saying he had been "found liable for rape" in the E. Jean Carroll case. (The jury found Trump liable for sexual assault—but the judge pointed out that under any definition except the very strict one of the New York penal code, Trump "raped her.")
Like CBS, ABC initially pushed back hard. But weeks after the election, the network turned tail and paid $15 million to make the lawsuit go away. And that amount reportedly ended up setting the baseline for what Paramount paid in the CBS case: Had it shelled out a lot more, it might have opened itself up to shareholder lawsuits for bribery.
In other words, these settlements established the going rate for media companies to pay off Trump.
It doesn't take a lawsuit to make a media tycoon come to heel. Sometimes they do it all on their own—witness how last fall the billionaire owners of the Los Angeles Times and the Washington Postpulled their papers' already written endorsements of Harris. Jeff Bezos has also decreed that the Post's opinion section will henceforth endorse "personal liberties and free markets" and not publish articles opposing those ideas, while Patrick Soon-Shiong went on Tucker Carlson's show to criticize his own paper. The LA Times owner was rewarded with a spot on Trump's Middle East trip, where he posted videos of himself chatting with Trump and Saudi crown prince (and journalist killer) Mohammed bin Salman.
And don't sleep on Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who has been going out of his way to butter up Trump, including by killing Facebook's fact-checking program because it had become "too politically biased." Surely nothing to do with a Justice Department lawsuit against Meta that Zuckerberg really, really wants to go away.
It's depressing to see media owners roll over like that, but it probably shouldn't be surprising. Billionaires like innovation and disruption when they're on their way up. But once they're on top, they love the status quo, and they support the politicians who will protect it.
A recent bookby New York Times reporter David Enrich investigates the way in which litigation has been used to silence the press—including the lawsuit by a dark-money billionaire, Frank VanderSloot, against Mother Jones. Enrich interviewed me and summarized the dilemma we were in when we were battling that lawsuit. The case was filed with a monetary demand of just under $75,000 (the limit beyond which it would have gone from Idaho state court to federal court). We could have paid to make the case go away—but we would have had to essentially plead guilty, putting an asterisk on our reporting forever after.
Their strategy was to put us in a position where the safest thing for us to do was disavow our reporting," she explained. But caving to billionaires wasn't in her DNA, any more than it had been in the New York Times' genes when a different bully, L. B. Sullivan, had sued over the Martin Luther King ad. Mother Jones would fight.
Finally, after more than two years of legal maneuvering, a state judge threw out the lawsuit: VanderSloot was a public figure, and there was no evidence that the magazine had deliberately or recklessly manipulated the facts. Regardless, the damage was done. Mother Jones had to shell out more than $600,000 to cover its legal bills, which it paid for out of a fund earmarked for new journalism projects. When it came time for Mother Jones to renew its libel insurance, the magazine's broker approached forty-two different insurers. Forty refused to even offer a quote. Ultimately, the magazine found an insurer, but its annual premiums more than doubled to $75,000, even as the amount of coverage dropped by a third. Its deductible soared to $150,000.
Enrich's book is truly worth a read. It chronicles how a combination of aggressive plaintiffs and a clique of lawyers driven by ideology and profits have made the cost of publishing controversial stories terrifyingly high. "Dozens of lawyers, many with decades of experience, told me that the popularity of these menacing legal tactics has recently surged to unprecedented heights," he writes. "In such an environment, the safest course often seemed to be to avoid writing about anyone or anything that smacked of controversy—or at least anyone with the inclination and wherewithal to retain aggressive counsel. It was a form of quiet censorship all but inaudible to the American public."
Trump and his allies have seen this kind of quiet self-censorship—and they love it. Who needs the state to bring the hammer down, when you can simply make publishers fret about the consequences of their reporting? In addition to lawsuits (from Trump or his minions), these consequences can include being hauled in front of a congressional committee, like NPR CEO Katherine Maher was, or being investigated by the Federal Communications Commission (also happening to NPR, as well as ABC, CBS, and NBC). Or the government could secretly dig through reporters' phone and email records: Attorney General Pam Bondi recently revoked rules that kept the Justice Department from spying on journalists it suspects of working with whistleblowers.
"When citizens must think twice about criticizing or opposing the government because they could credibly face government retribution, they no longer live in a full democracy," authoritarianism scholar Stephen Levitsky wrote recently. "The Trump administration's weaponization of government agencies and flurry of punitive actions against critics has raised the cost of opposition for a wide range of Americans."
What makes this especially dangerous is that we won't know the quiet censorship is happening—because it's quiet. How will we know which opinion columns Jeff Bezos' Washington Post (now "unapologetically patriotic") is not commissioning or publishing? Who's to say which stories ABC or CBS will consider worth paying the next $16 million settlement for?
But let's not end on that grim note—because the truth is, independence has always had a cost. Our newsroom is living proof of that: In the 1980s, the Reagan IRS came after us. We fought and won. In the 1990s, we were sued by a Republican consultant. We fought and won. Ten years ago, in that lawsuit by dark-money megadonor VanderSloot, we fought and won. Six years ago, our sister radio show, Reveal, was sued by a taxpayer-funded charity connected to an alleged cult. They fought and won.
Yes, all these cases involved bullies who were strong, rich, and confident. Yes, there was a cost to standing up to them, and that cost is higher today than it was 10 or 30 years ago. Yes, it's depressing that the billionaires who could afford to pay that price…won't.
But that just means that this is one of those times when people and institutions, including news organizations, show you who they really are. And once they do, you have a choice. If they accommodate, normalize, soft-pedal, or cozy up, do they deserve your attention and your money?
Here's what's comforting for us, in this organization that has just about one-tenth of 1 percent of Paramount's annual revenue: We get to wake up every morning knowing that we're not accountable to any bully or billionaire. We answer only to you, our audience—and that means fighting back and standing up is in our DNA. Because it is in yours.
Trolling, taunting, spamming, and off topic comments may be removed at the discretion of group mods. NT members that vote up their own comments, repeat comments, or continue to disrupt the conversation risk having all of their comments deleted. Please remember to quote the person(s) to whom you are replying to preserve continuity of this seed. Any use of the phrase "Trump Derangement Syndrome" or the TDS acronym in a comment will be deleted. Any use of the term "Brandon", "Traitor Joe", or any variations thereof, when referring to President Biden, will be deleted. Right wing trolls can expect to have their irrelevant questions and comments deleted.
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For the life of me I cant understand why our media is letting him get away with all this.
Money. And the fact that they are cowards. Chicken shit cowards
anybody that fucks with the 1st deserves to be a victim of the 2nd ...
That's why we have the 2nd...to protect the 1st
... just waiting for the green light.
Trump talks to reporters from left wing outlets all the time. Compare his access to Biden.
Left wing media like cbs continues to push anti trump narrative all the time.
what cbs did to try and help Harris with their edits is indefensible.
Is what Fox does on behalf of Trump, for over ten years now, defensible?
Trump had no case, legally, but for various reasons media companies are willing to bow down to him. Its all about money.
His behavior toward the media has always been completely atrocious, as dozens of quotes from him will show. Do you defend Trumps attacks on the free press ?
If your argument is 60 Minutes is the just the same partisan hackery as Sean Hannity, but for left wingers, than I think my points made.
Of course it is! It's trmp and Fox! They never do nuttin' wrong!
I don't recall any leftwing outlets being sued for lying and defamation and losing almost a billion dollars and having to admit they were intentionally lying on air and should only be considered entertainment and not news.
It really is hilarious watching rightwing conservative pretend they're the side of honesty and righteousness and that even though they're LYING their asses off, they should get a pass because some random "leftists" they heard once told a lie. I guess they likely apply the same logic to other things they believe the "leftists" do, like running child sex rings in pizza parlor basements. Perhaps that's why there are so many rightwing religious conservatives who have been caught raping kids. They rationalize it by falsely claiming leftists did it first.
Heck, even their chosen leader is a known adulterer, admitted sexual predator and accused child rapist. That is who represents the Republican party and rightwing conservatives today, which pretty much makes sense now that I think about it, they truly deserve each other.
He's the one arguing 60 minutes is the same as Sean Hannity. Considering they just settled a libel lawsuit, "it's not as much" might be the most laughable defense yet.
should get a pass because some random "leftists" they heard once told a lie
Is that what you think is happening? Wow. Might be the mother of all strawmen.
en their chosen leader is a known adulterer, admitted sexual predator and accused child rapist.
The CLinton/Biden/Harris party plays the morality card. Nice.
Clinton Adulterer, Biden Pedophile, Harris just prostituted herself out for political advancement.
Hilarious. Yes, Clinton was an adulterer, just like Donald Trump, though there is no record of Bill Clinton trying to use hundreds of thousands in campaign money to keep his whores quiet like the current President.
As for your Biden claim, please do try and provide where ANYONE accused Joe Biden of pedophilia. His daughter's diary was illegally published which talked about a time when as a child she took a shower with her dad and years later felt it was a little inappropriate. How the FUCK does that equate to pedophilia? Oh, I forgot, you're having to actually defend against accusations of a woman who went as far as taking it to court twice claiming Trump and Epstein raped her when she was 13, an accusation she made before he ran for President and is FAR more believable than any spurious claims of being "inappropriate" by Biden.
The only reason the rape case was rejected by the court was first that it was filed in NY when it should have been CA and when she filed in CA the judge felt she didn't have enough physical evidence to proceed with the case. In my opinion, based on Trumps character that he has displayed, the things he's said about his friend Epstein, the things he's said about wanting to date his daughter, the over two dozen accusations of sexual assault and his losing in court to the stewardess he raped, all add up to being confident that Trump was definitely capable, morally compromised and delinquent enough to have raped that 13 year old along with Epstein and frankly I believe pedophiles should be put to death.
If you rape a child, I believe it should be a capital offense worthy of the death penalty. That's how I feel about our current Pedophile-in-chief and those who support him and empower him are no different than Epstein's sidekick Ghislaine Maxwell.
I do, too. But I don't think it should be a quick death. Rape does not happen quickly if you are the victim.
I'll probably get deleted if I say how the death should be carried out
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How much did the CLinton's spend to secure the NDA's from the bimbos (Clinton's words) from erupting? That was Hillary's job in 92. She visited the "bimbos" and got them to sign NDA's. Of course, Trump using campaign money to keep his "whores"( your words) quiet was perfectly legal. Ask the FEC.
As as aside, I notice not a single progressive objects to you calling women who sleep with married men "whores." So much for the Kamala Harris standard, huh?
rs later felt it was a little inappropriate.
Lol. she didn't use the word "little". That's all you minimizing your hero's actions.
in NY when it should have been CA and when she filed in CA the judge felt she didn't have enough physical evidence to proceed with the case.
In reality: Subsequent news reports raised doubts about who filed the suit... U .S. District Court Judge Dolly Gee dismissed that case in May, ruling that Johnson’s complaint didn’t raise valid claims under federal law.
The woman, if she was actually a woman, filed an unverified complaint, which protected her from perjury charges and does not count as a sworn allegation. Anyone can file an unverified complaint about anything.
y. That's how I feel about our current Pedophile-in-chief
Sure. Sure. When Clinton or Biden are accused of rape, it's all a right wing conspiracy.
You should study reading comprehension.
"I don't recall any leftwing outlets being sued for lying and defamation and losing almost a billion dollars and having to admit they were intentionally lying on air and should only be considered entertainment and not news."
Your links show a defamation case against where they had to pay $5M because they used the term “black market” to describe a Navy veterans work evacuating people in Afghanistan. Not a lie, a poorly used term.
The wiki link was the Nunes defamation case against CNN that was thrown out of court.
Both the WAPO and NPR link are even funnier because it's a case that Trump brought against the WAPO for defamation and HE LOST.
So far, you're batting 0.
Please do try harder to find any "leftist" media companies who have been sued and LOST like Fox News did which cost them, as I said, "almost a billion dollars and having to admit they were intentionally lying on air".
Sometimes the unmitigated stupidity of the MAGAites that try to defend the indefensible is astounding.
Right.... which is why his attorney who made the deal on his behalf went to jail.
First, Biden is not my hero, he's just a politician who happens to be a billion times more palatable than the current Rapist-in-chief.
Here's how the person who wrote the diary felt about scum bag conservatives trying to use her personal diary which does not accuse her father of actually doing anything to her, "Stealing personal belongings of a candidate's family member, and selling them to an organization to exploit them for political gain, was wrong and illegal no matter the political agenda.".
I really don't give a fuck about Joe Biden, this is not some sort of 'tit for tat', 'showered with young daughter' vs 'raped a 13-year-old along with another guy', CLEARLY the claims against Trump are WAY more egregious, in fact there are no claims of sexual impropriety against Biden, just that he took a shower with his young daughter which is gross depending on her age, anything over 4 or 5 is just icky, but it's certainly not RAPING A 13 YEAR OLD!
It really is sick that some folk are so beholden to the scum bag in the white house that they would defend child rape because that is exactly what they are doing when they try and minimize the accusations against their Dear Leader while lying and blowing out of proportion accusations against their opponents. But that's on the folk who clearly have no conscience and no morals, so I guess it's par for the course. Perhaps Trumps supporters are just hoping and praying he lowers the age of consent to 13 for them too.
OH, you don't understand what happened. Cohen was dead to rights on income tax evasion and cooperated to avoid more jail time. People do that all the time. There was never any adversarial litigation by Cohen on the election fraud charge and the actual agency that investigates election fraud found no violation.
ro, he's just a politician who happens to be a billion times more palatable than the current Rapist-in-chief.
Yet you lied about what his daughter wrote to minimize it.
but it's certainly not RAPING A 13 YEAR OLD!
Of course, but there's zero evidence it happened other than a campaign stunt. But that's all you need. You just glom onto whatever batshit crazy allegation is out there in the ether and assume it's a fact if it helps your political team. Go Biden!
perhaps Trumps supporters are just hoping and praying he lowers the age of consent to 13 for them too.
Now apply that logic to your minimization of Biden showering with his daughter...
Seriously, how low can you go? You insinuate that anyone who doesn't accept as unquestionably prove fact an allegation of rape from someone who won't even verify the allegation wants to have sex with 13 year olds? What kind of messed up person does that?
I'm surprised she's still breathing ...
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[✘] Trump's a Republican so he's guilty to over every internet rumored crime.[✘]
If he had sex with anyone under the legal age of consent like I believe Trump did and was accused of by the victim, then yes, absolutely. Frankly I find it disgusting that you're even suggesting this might somehow be a partisan issue. I guess for some, if you're a conservative Republican and you rape kids but you apologize for it or deny, deny, deny like Trump then it's okay, you can still be part of the party.
Republican Sexual Predators, Abusers, and Enablers Pt. 55
My comprehension is fine. Your willful ignorance is something else.
that's where their fake faith and devotion enters the picture and gets them off the hook ...
I look at left wing media all the time and I dont recall Trump speaking to any of them.
Who's calling? A reporter, and it's often President Donald Trump answering
In an almost unfathomable level of access, reporters who call President Donald Trump on his personal cell phone often get an answer — and an interview — from the leader of the free world on the spot. There’s evidence that this is happening more frequently.
I dont see any leftists on that list. I'm not sure you know what a leftist is.
I don't see anything at all. I couldn't access the article
The article claims that writers and reporters for ABC , CNN, and The Atlantic, among others, are leftists, at least according to Sean.
It requires a subscription so as far as I'm concerned he really doesn't have a proper source
here is the text of what Sean posted
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For reporters, it’s hardly unusual to call sources on the phone to learn details or get quotes that will enliven their stories. Sometimes people will talk, sometimes they won’t.
But the president of the United States?
In an almost unfathomable level of access, reporters who call President Donald Trump on his personal cell phone often get an answer — and an interview — from the leader of the free world on the spot. There’s evidence that this is happening more frequently.
Paradoxically, it’s the same president who popularized the term “fake news” and has battled against the press for years on multiple fronts. Two weeks ago, Trump’s lawyers threatened to sue CNN and The New York Times over their reporting on an initial government assessment of damage caused by bombing Iran’s nuclear facilities.
On the day of the June 21 bombing, Trump gave phone interviews to Jonathan Karl of ABC News, Kristen Welker at NBC News, Reuters’ Steve Holland, Axios’ Barak Ravid and both Bret Baier and Sean Hannity of Fox News Channel, according to an independent database of the president’s media appearances.
The next day, Trump spoke with Josh Dawsey of The Wall Street Journal — for all of 38 seconds, Mr. Dawsey noted — enabling the reporter to include a fresh presidential quote in the newspaper’s story about the bombing.
“I find it utterly remarkable,” said Ari Fleischer, former press secretary to President George W. Bush. “It's classic Trump. It defies tradition.”
Who’s calling?
This spring, when he was denied an interview with Trump for an Atlantic magazine cover story, Michael Scherer dialed Trump’s number on a Saturday morning. “Who’s calling?” Trump answered. When the reporter identified himself, Trump berated him for past stories he’d written. But he didn’t hang up.
Mr. Scherer explained the story he was doing. Trump answered his questions, and was gracious about it, he said.
“The president likes speaking,” he said. “He wants to share his story. I think he feels that the more he shares his story, the better off he is. He just has a totally different approach to the press than any president I’ve covered.”
In a subsequent story, Mr. Scherer and colleague Ashley Parker explored how the telephone is like a lifeline to the president. Many other people besides reporters know the number. Trump has kept using it even after being told around Election Day of the likelihood that Chinese spies had the ability to listen in on his conversations, The Atlantic reported.
Dealing with the press — and by extension, the American public — is a significant part of a president’s job. But the interactions are generally much more formal and structured. That was the case with Trump in his first term, too; Mr. Scherer said the times he talked with Trump then, it was mediated by the White House communications office.
That wasn’t the case when they talked this spring, nor when Mr. Scherer called Trump’s phone for an interview the day of the military parade in Washington.
“There have been multiple times that people who work for the president have made clear that they weren’t happy he was talking to me,” Mr. Scherer said. “But they don’t get to make the decisions. It’s his decision.”
The president’s most frequent callers
Asked about the calls, White House communications director Steven Cheung said Trump “is the most transparent president in history, and we celebrate his willingness to fight back against Fake News media outlets who have shown a disgusting proclivity to lie about him and his administration. The American people are better served because President Trump engages with the press on a daily basis, and we are all so thankful for his leadership, which makes our jobs much more rewarding and gratifying.”
The calls almost certainly make the jobs of Trump’s staff harder if they're not on the line, or aren’t given a briefing by the president about what he said, Mr. Fleischer said. Still, he said, “it’s who he is and the staff needs to deal with it.”
Mr. Karl and Ms. Welker are among Trump’s frequent callers. ABC’s Karl spoke with Trump by phone at least three times in June, according to social media and ABC reports. “I called Trump about 10 minutes ago,” Mr. Karl posted on X the night of the Iran bombing. “He didn't talk details or next steps. But he wanted to say this: tremendous success tonight.”
About the calls, Ms. Welker told NBC's Seth Meyers recently that “sometimes you just have to take a chance and it works out.”
The calls tend to be brief, often worth little more than a quote or two, said Brian Stelter, author of CNN’s “Reliable Sources” newsletter. They hark back to Trump’s real estate or “Apprentice” days when he could be depended upon by reporters for a pithy quote, he said.
“At the same time, if you can get the president by phone, by all means you should,” he said.
NBC's Yamiche Alcindor spoke to Trump on June 23, reporting that Trump had said the bombing represented “a great day for America. It’s a great day for the Middle East and I’m very happy to have been able to get the job done.”
That Trump even took Ms. Alcindor’s call is noteworthy in one respect: The two clashed repeatedly at public news conferences during his first term, when she worked for PBS “NewsHour,” with the president once accusing her of asking a racist question. NBC wouldn’t make Ms. Alcindor available for an interview.
On the surface, Trump is doing these interviews at a time of broad attacks against the media. His administration is seeking to shut down government-run news outlets like Voice of America, and strip NPR and PBS of federal subsidies, both because he thinks their news products are biased against conservatives. He’s involved in settlement talks after suing CBS' “60 Minutes” and settled a lawsuit against ABC News last winter. He has sought to restrict access by the Associated Press to some presidential events.
No records are available for more of Trump’s media hits
His style of dealing with the media is the definition of unique, Mr. Fleischer said.
“Part of Trump’s success is his raw authenticity,” he said. “He’s unscripted. He’s not a typical politician, and it shows every day. So (the phone interviews) fits with who he is. A traditional, typical politician and a traditional, typical White House staff would never do this. He’s not typical. He’s not traditional.”
There are transcripts or video, sometimes both, available for 89% of the interviews that Trump gave during his first term. So far during his second term, roughly half of the interviews have such public records, said Bill Frischling, head of Roll Call Factbase, an organization that keeps track of presidential media appearances.
That drop is entirely due to the increase in phone interviews, Mr. Frischling said. So while Trump has been talking on the phone to more reporters, it also means fewer public records available to check what he said.
Mr. Scherer said he tries to be judicious in how often he uses Trump’s cellphone, and he holds tight to the digits. “It’s not my number to share,” he said. He can see a scenario where the number becomes so widely known that Trump will have to change it.
Until then, expect reporters to keep calling.
First Published: July 6, 2025, 3:00 a.m.
Thanks for posting this.
He loves to hear the sound of his own voice so I'm not surprised that he will take a phone call from anybody.
Writers and reporters for corporate media are not "leftists".
There have however been far right podcasters and conspiracy theorists who have been added to the White House press corps.
You're right, they're not. Corporate media is going to "report" what is "truth" for them. Whether it's actually true or not
If you want to claim the Atlantic isn't left wing, that shows where you are coming from.
Yes, I suppose Trump doesn't give interviews to StalinRules.com or whatever counts as leftwing in your world.
Lol. Sure. They just switch from being "reporters" to literally working for democrats at a drop of the hat but aren't partisan. Who could possibly think someone who goes from being a chief advisor/spokesman for a Democratic President to the chief anchor of a corporate newsroom isn't neutral?
That anyone can watch 60 Minutes and not recognize the bias makes me sad for America. I'd hope you can feel the strings in your back. They aren't subtle.
Your complaints are a variation of that old harry Truman saying
You really believe 60 minutes provides objective reporting even after what they did to protect Harris?
Amazing.
Anyone who isn't wearing Trump's balloon knot like a reverse turtleneck is considered a "leftist" by the MAGAites.
I do. Unlike Fox News, they have a very long history of accurate reporting, I don't stupidly throw all those decades of accurate honest unbiased news out simply because of some interview clip issue during an extremely contentious election year.
But I am curious, do you believe Fox News provides objective reporting even after they admitted in court they knowingly lied to their viewers to push false conservative narratives and conspiracy theories specifically intended to help the Republican candidate win the election?
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The right wing march to destroy our freedoms is out in the open now. No more hiding.
Where's the "tea party" freedom loving patriots? Where does the Libertarian party stand? Where does the Independent Party stand?
MAGA has free speech and a powerful network like FOX and famous right wing pundits and podcasters like Rogan. Then there is Musk who owns X going more extreme right wing daily.
Yet they cry they don't have what they obviously do have in abundance with mainstream outlets jockeying to be like FOX and still right wingers still scream they have no "voice".
Trump forcing outlets to bow down without a fight isn't helping freedom of speech.
Trump has his own Trump media for himself and right wing voices.
Nothing is enough for right wingers, if they can't shut down or shout down all other voices and thoughts they look to " daddy" to step in.
They have no problem losing all rights to actual free speech to "daddy's" authoritarian overreach.
When will Libertarians and Independents start speaking out more forcefully to protect all of our rights joining progressives, liberals and Democrats on this one extremely vital and important issue?
Can you educate us on what rights the right is marching to destroy and what they are doing to destroy those freedoms?