Good morning from Boston. I was in town to moderate a campaign coverage discussion at Harvard Law School. Scroll down for a few of the notable quotes and notes. Here's the latest on Olivia Nuzzi, Bret Baier, Hallie Jackson, Bret Stephens, Jemele Hill and more... |
Disney's 'succession pro' |
Peter Parks/AFP/Getty Images |
Disney's new board chair announcement tops Page One of this morning's WSJ. So, 24 hours later, what does it mean? The Journal says James Gorman's appointment as chairman is "signaling to investors that the company's succession process is advancing after past turbulence." This second-day story calls Gorman a "CEO-obsessed succession pro" and credits him with "nailing succession at Morgan Stanley."
With Bob Iger's contract concluding at the end of 2026, Disney needed "someone really credible to chaperone the process, who's gone through this before," and Gorman "carries a lot of weight in that sense," Bernstein's Laurent Yoon told the LA Times.
Gorman's statement that a new CEO announcement should come in early 2026 – and not 2025, as many expected – "may be designed to cool the rumor mill" about internal candidates "and refocus Disney employees on their work," the NYT's Brooks Barnes noted. "The Disney board reiterated on Monday that external candidates are also being 'reviewed.'"
The way I see it, this doesn't cool the rumor mill, per se, but changes it...
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Trump intensifying TV threats |
Donald Trump's comments are often covered as one-offs – an outrageous rally remark here, an ALL CAPS Truth Social post there. But on certain issues he is remarkably consistent and repetitive. Immigration comes to mind, of course, but another is... media policy.
Broadcast TV licensing is not ordinarily a hot topic during a presidential election. But Trump's threats are not ordinary, either. Using search tools like Factba.se and Trump's Truth, I reviewed his speeches and social media posts and found that, in the past two years, he has called for every major American TV news network to be punished, usually because a newscast or a journalist has upset him.
As I reported for CNN this morning, Trump has said on at least 15 occasions that certain broadcasting licenses should be revoked. Right now CBS is his target, but last month it was ABC, and before that, it was NBC and CNN.
Trump usually misstates what the FCC actually does. National networks like CBS are not licensed, and neither are cable channels like CNN. But local stations are. That's why a pro-Trump group recently filed a formal complaint about "60 Minutes" not against CBS as a whole, but against WCBS, the company's station in New York.
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The FCC hasn't denied any license renewal in decades. The process "is so time consuming that no license renewal could be denied before the end of a hypothetical second Trump term," public interest lawyer Andrew Jay Schwartzman told me.
Still, there is a conceivable chilling effect. Trump's threats have grown so insistent that some TV industry executives have speculated that they could be vulnerable to some sort of retaliation if Trump returns to power. The National Association of Broadcasters, the trade association for American TV and radio operators, says Trump's rhetoric undermines First Amendment freedoms.
NAB CEO Curtis LeGeyt did not call out the former president by name, however. He told me in a statement, "From our country's beginning, the right of the press to challenge the government, root out corruption and speak freely without fear of recrimination has been central to our democracy," LeGeyt said in a statement. "Times may have changed, but that principle – enshrined in the First Amendment – has not. The threat from any politician to revoke a broadcast license simply because they disagree with the station's content undermines this basic freedom."
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'We can't let this be normal' |
The current FCC chair Jessica Rosenworcel, a Democrat, has repeatedly spoken out against Trump's threats. "We can't let this be normal. If you want to maintain a constitutional democracy, you have to speak up for it," she told David Folkenflik. His NPR segment yesterday concluded with this point: "Her term is up in June; her successor will be appointed by the next president." Read my full story here.
>> The NYT's Michael Grynbaum and David McCabe also have a new story about Trump's TV threats.
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Another piece of the same story... |
Florida's threats against TV stations originated in the governor's office. Top attorneys for Gov. Ron DeSantis "penned the cease-and-desist letters sent by Florida’s health department threatening to criminally prosecute local TV stations over their airing of an abortion rights ad," CNN's Liam Reilly reports, citing a new affidavit.
>> Thought bubble: This story and Trump's license-revoking talk are two parts of the same story. "The most powerful people in the Republican party want to force news outlets to fall in line," a media exec messaged me overnight.
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At the Harvard event I moderated last night, Boston Globe political reporter James Pindell – fresh from a trip talking with voters in Wisconsin – said "there is unanimity in this election. And the unanimity is [voters] are scared. They are fearful. They are fearful of the other side. They are." PBS NewsHour correspondent Lisa Desjardins, joining the event from Georgia, said she has experienced the fear too: A Black woman in Georgia told her, "I don't want to talk on camera because I'm worried that Trump might win and he's saying he will retaliate against his enemies." But fear isn't the only palpable emotion: "I'm also encountering people who are becoming numb" and saying wake-me-when-it's-over, she said. I found myself wondering: What can and should the press do to reduce fears in the coming weeks?
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Political ad $$ lifts Univision |
This morning TelevisaUnivision "reported a 6% U.S. revenue gain" in the third quarter of the year, with 5% U.S. ad revenue growth "driven by what it described as a third-quarter company record in political ad revenue," THR's George Szalai reports. |
Harris will tape a sit-down interview with NBC's Hallie Jackson. Trump will participate in a roundtable with Latino leaders and in a "Make America Healthy Again" virtual town hall with RFK Jr and Tulsi Gabbard.
>> Sneak peek: Tomorrow a USA Today/Suffolk University poll will show how many people have heard from Trump and Harris on podcasts, and the number is higher than you might think.
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>> Another defamation suit against Trump: Members of the Central Park Five are accusing the former president of repeatedly making "false and defamatory statements" during last month's debate. (Rolling Stone)
>> Natalie Korach interviewed Bret Baier, who said he'd "love to try again" with Harris. (Vanity Fair)
>> "As a target of vicious and persistent online sexual harassment, Harris has a perspective that is unique in presidential politics," Naomi Nix writes. "She also has a long history of promoting new laws and initiatives that aim to make it easier for victims of digital harassment to find justice..." (Wash Post)
>> Bret Stephens, the NYT's most prominent conservative and a longtime Trump critic, told Gail Collins that a Harris win could "drive a stake into the heart of Trumpism." (NYT)
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>> "A Russian-aligned propaganda network notorious for creating deepfake whistleblower videos appears to be behind a coordinated effort to promote wild and baseless claims" against Tim Walz, David Gilbert reports. (WIRED)
>> "Meta is expanding tests of facial recognition as an anti-scam measure," partly to combat "celebrity scam ads," Natasha Lomas writes. (TechCrunch)
>> The NewsGuild says "nearly 750 New York Times journalists and Times Guild members" have signed a pledge pressing NYT management "to bargain and reach a contract deal with the Times Tech Guild by Election Day." (NewsGuild)
>> After Nilay Patel taped a Decoder podcast interview with the CEO of Intuit, the company pushed him to delete an unflattering part of the Q&A. Instead, Patel led the episode with the exchange in question. (The Verge)
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It was inevitable, and now it's done: Olivia Nuzzi has parted ways with New York magazine. Liam Reilly and Hadas Gold have the full story here.
It was "a classy denouement to an otherwise prurient scandal," Puck's Dylan Byers wrote overnight. But "Nuzzi herself is still involved in a contentious and very salacious legal battle with Ryan Lizza, her ex-fiancé." In a new statement yesterday, Lizza accused her of a "coordinated defamation campaign." According to the WSJ, "a judge on Tuesday set a Nov. 19 trial date..."
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Perplexity sued for ‘massive freeriding’ |
Liam Reilly writes: Rupert Murdoch’s Dow Jones, the parent company of the Wall Street Journal, and the New York Post sued Perplexity on Monday, accusing the generative AI company of illegally scraping its reporting and diverting traffic to its own platforms. More on the suit here.
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>> "Cooper Hefner, the son of the late Playboy founder Hugh Hefner, is making a $100 million bid to acquire the intellectual property and brand assets of Playboy Enterprises," Alex Weprin reports. (THR)
>> "G/O Media has agreed to sell Jalopnik, a news and opinion site about car culture, to Static Media as it continues to shed its portfolio," Kerry Flynn reports. (Axios)
>> Chris Dinan is the next executive producer of "World News Tonight with David Muir." (Variety)
>> Jemele Hill "is leading a new program for TNT Sports called 'Above The Fold,' which will 'delve into important stories and topics centered on the connection between sports and culture.'" (THR)
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>> "The Hollywood company behind 'Blade Runner 2049' sued Elon Musk for copyright infringement on Monday, accusing him of illegally using imagery from that film to promote Tesla's new 'robotaxi,'" Brooks Barnes reports. (NYT)
>> “HBO's 'Harry Potter' series will be 'a little bit more in-depth than a two-hour film,' the company's TV boss Channing Dungey has confirmed," Lily Ford writes. (THR)
>> Wall Street fans of HBO's "Industry" are "auditing this past season's plot" and finding the details "aren't quite adding up," Alexander Saeedy writes in this amusing WSJ A-hed. (WSJ)
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Weinstein diagnosed with cancer |
Elizabeth Wagmeister reports: Harvey Weinstein has been diagnosed with bone cancer, a source close to the incarcerated producer tells CNN. Weinstein’s specific diagnosis is chronic myeloid leukemia, a form of cancer of the bone marrow, the source says, adding that he is undergoing treatment at Rikers Island in New York. The diagnosis was first reported by NBC last night.
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