When last we checked with CBS/Paramount, company executives had just paid Trump $16 million in bribe money to settle a completely baseless lawsuit, effectively purchasing regulatory approval of their $8 billion merger with Skydance. It was arguably one of the biggest acts of corporate cowardice in recent memory, resulting in many CBS journalists and executives fleeing for the exits.
So we’re clear what happened here: Larry Ellison, a billionaire Trump ally, used his own money to buy CBS and install his son as the boss. There are hints they’re then going to merge what’s left of CBS with Bari Weiss’ Free Press, which will effectively turn CBS into another right wing, Trump-friendly propaganda mill much like Fox News. Trump gets $16 million in bribe money simply for being king.
The only question now is whether anybody involved in this bribery scheme faces any accountability for it. California lawmakers have made some noise about investigating the settlement for possibly violating state bribery laws, but I’ve not seen any meaningful traction on that.
Elsewhere, Dem Senators Chuck Schumer and Ed Markey are trying to leverage the Epstein scandal to “pressure” Trump’s FCC into dropping its “investigation” into CBS.
Quick refresher: Trump had FCC boss Brendan Carr open an “investigation” into CBS that (falsely) claimed that mundane 60 Minutes edits of an election season Kamala Harris interview violated the FCC’s “Broadcast News Distortion” policy. That policy, rarely enforced anymore, says violations must involve clear distortion of “a significant event and not merely a minor or incidental aspect of the news report.”
Now that Trumps and Ellisons got what they wanted, this fake FCC investigation would have been closed before long anyway. Its only function appears to be to try and create additional pressure on CBS to sell the company to his billionaire friends, extort some additional cash for the king, and create a false narrative in the media that existing CBS journalism was being unfair to Republicans (to set the stage for what comes next: turning the channel into yet another right wing propaganda network).
Schumer and Markey in their statement zeroed in on the fact that Fox News routinely does actually misleading edits to make the president look good — including past comments he’s made about Jeffrey Epstein. They join a long list of bipartisan folks (including Republican former FCC Commissioners) who have been urging Carr to stop being a weird, First Amendment trampling zealot:
“The FCC should stop its partisan investigations into the news media and cease interfering with independent journalism altogether. To be clear, the FCC should not investigate or pressure either CBS or Fox. Editorial discretion lies at the heart of press freedom and should not be subject to government interference..”
So they’re right here, of course. The CBS edits really were minor. Fox News routinely engages in edits to mislead its audience on a daily basis (because it’s a propaganda outlet, not a news channel). The FCC investigation of CBS was a sham, and Trump Republicans are hypocrites who are leveraging government to attack journalism and the First Amendment. That’s all true.
That said, Schumer and Markey certainly know the FCC investigation was already likely to end regardless. They don’t really think Brendan Carr cares what they think, or is worried about real congressional backlash. They just wanted to find another public avenue to leverage the Epstein scandal to erode public Trump support. Which again, is fine; it’s a Trump weak spot right now Dem messaging should exploit.
The problem is that they didn’t use the opportunity to meaningfully highlight what the broader goal of Republicans was here: which is to genuinely destroy what’s left of shaky U.S. corporate journalism (and informed consensus) and replace it with wall to wall right wing-friendly infotainment and propaganda.
Yes, they’re extorting private companies and weaponizing government, but why do you think that is? If you’re a powerful Dem Senator, shouldn’t you maybe mention this?
I don’t really think most older Dems really understand the modern media and information environment they operate in. I’ve yet to see any Democrats capable of messaging on media policy. There’s a lot of empty Dem lip service given to journalism and the First Amendment, but the party has no coherent media reform proposals, outside of rubber stamping mergers and dreaming of a “Joe Rogan for the left.”
There’s a lot the Dem leadership could do, including relentlessly supporting public media (which again this week took another devastating blow from Republican policy), finding creative new ways to help fund real independent journalism, relentlessly advocating for greater media literacy in education standards to combat propaganda (see: Finland), and fighting to reforge media consolidation limits.
But rich Americans of every partisan ideology don’t really want a press that routinely critiques wealth and power; it’s the burr at the heart of geriatric Dem dysfunction and inaction on media reform.
Republicans meanwhile are busy buying up companies and converting them into giant bullhorns for right wing ideology. All the money in media right now involves telling young, angry right wing white men what they want to hear (just ask Matt Taibbi and Bari Weiss). From AM radio to broadcast TV (Sinclair) to cable news (Fox) to the internet, Republicans have effectively won the modern information war.
It’s an effort built on the back of a generation of false claims of U.S. media “liberal bias,” (and more recently “censorship of Conservatives“). It’s the ultimate culmination in the right wing’s war on reality-based informed consensus. It’s deadly. It’s been incredibly effective. And Dems that value a functioning republic, hopeful for a path out of authoritarianism, need to get their heads out of their collective ass.