TGIF! Stephen Colbert, merger casualty? Rupert Murdoch, journalistic champion? David Rhodes, CBS News savior? Here's our attempt to make sense of all the major media stories that are unfolding right now. Plus, the latest on PBS, NPR, Jesse Watters, Dave Portnoy, Netflix, "Smurfs," and much more... |
At a time when other media outlets are hesitating and capitulating, Rupert Murdoch and the Wall Street Journal just stood up to President Trump and scooped one of the biggest political stories of the summer. The print headline on Page One today reads "Trump's Bawdy Letter to Epstein Was in 50th Birthday Album." It is, of course, the most-read article on the Journal's website.
And yet... Murdoch's Fox News has not mentioned the story once. So let me take a stab at answering all the questions I'm getting about the media mogul and his role.
Murdoch, age 94, wants to have it both ways. He wants to be a newsman (that's how he sees himself) but also needs to be a businessman. He wants a muscular Journal breaking big stories but he also needs Fox News to keep printing money for his family and other shareholders.
It's been readily apparent for years that Fox succeeds when it is The Trump Show. So Fox does what it does, ignores what it ignores. But Murdoch, who has always cared most of all about old-fashioned newspapers, derives satisfaction and a sense of power from the Journal.
We wrote all about the operatic relationship between Murdoch and Trump in this CNN.com story overnight. I think this quote is quite telling: "Rupert loves to poke the president in the eye once in a while," an executive who has worked with him closely told me.
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Trump: I'm going to 'sue his ass off' |
Trump is, of course, taking this very personally. "I told Rupert Murdoch it was a Scam, that he shouldn’t print this Fake Story. But he did, and now I’m going to sue his ass off, and that of his third rate newspaper," he wrote on Truth Social.
Trump's post confirmed rumors that had been swirling in political and media circles for two days: namely, that the White House was trying to kill a damaging WSJ story. Trump said he personally spoke with both Murdoch and WSJ editor Emma Tucker.
As for a lawsuit, well... we'll see, but no suit will take this story off the internet. The timeline is worth revisiting here. The WSJ approached Trump for comment on Tuesday. Trump derided the Epstein scandal as a "hoax" on Wednesday.
As I said on "The Source with Kaitlan Collins" last night, his well-trodden "hoax" talking point was a direct response to his concern about the looming WSJ report. Trump uses the word "hoax" to shut down conversation and discourage critical thinking; to tell his supporters to just ignore something altogether. TBD on whether it'll work this time.
>> Inside Dow Jones HQ: After the story landed, Journal staffers expressed pride in their colleagues and in the publication for running the report despite the president's attempt to squash it. There's a real sense that publishing was an act of bravery...
>> BTW, WSJ has no comment on the lawsuit threat. Trump seems empowered by his settlements with Paramount and other media companies...
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Andrew Kirell writes: Halfway through her 7 p.m. hour last night, Fox's Laura Ingraham seemed poised to cover the bombshell reporting from a fellow Murdoch-owned outlet. "We have new news coming on about this as well from the Wall Street Journal. A new report tonight, next," she said. But that "new report" never came. Ingraham did not mention the Journal story at all during the rest of her hour; neither did the rest of the Fox primetime lineup.
>> Newsmax ignored the WSJ story, too. Its approach is best summed up by the opening line of 9 p.m. fill-in host Lidia Curanaj's monologue: "Are you as sick of this Epstein story as I am?"
>> One theory making the rounds this morning: The WSJ fallout will actually help the president because, as Politico's Rachael Bade wrote, "nothing unites Republicans more than complaints about the media!"
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CBS pulls the plug on Colbert |
Few media stories in recent memory have provoked as much surprise as this one. Sure, there had been recent speculation about Colbert's future at CBS, given the Trump-friendly leanings of Paramount's future owners, and Colbert even joked about it on air, but there wasn't any indication that CBS was going to cancel "The Late Show" altogether.
But that's what this is — the cancellation of the #1 show in late night, a cornerstone of the CBS lineup for decades, for what the network calls "financial" motivations, amidst a politically charged backdrop and a pending merger that needs Trump admin approval.
When I read the press release, my first thought was that Larry and David Ellison would be pleased. My second thought was that the late-night financial pressures are real. I reported in 2023 that James Corden's "Late Late Show" wrapped partly because it was unprofitable for CBS. And now, according to a source close to the network, Colbert's show is bleeding red ink too.
But still. Let's be frank. We have all seen this merger movie before: The incoming owner wants a big change made, but doesn't want the blame, so the outgoing owner does the dirty work. Execs say that's not the case here, but...
>> Now Democratic senators like Rep. Adam Schiff (Colbert's guest last night) and Sen. Elizabeth Warren are raising hell about the move, ensuring that this is a political hot potato that isn't going to cool down anytime soon. "America deserves to know if his show was canceled for political reasons," Warren said in a statement...
>> BTW: Don't miss Philip Bump's final piece for WaPo. The column is titled "When institutions crumble, strongmen step in."
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When the Colbert news broke, we immediately reached out to Stewart's reps, wondering if there will be any change to his status as "The Daily Show." Stewart hasn't commented on his friend (and producing partner) Colbert's exit, but on a new episode of his podcast, Stewart said that "unfortunately" he hasn't had contact with David Ellison or Skydance brass. His attitude: "I've been kicked out of shittier establishments than that. We'll land on our feet." Deadline's Peter White has more here...
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Puck's Matthew Belloni reported early this morning that David Rhodes, "the onetime CBS News head and current executive at Sky in the U.K., is in talks to take over CBS News if/when the Skydance acquisition of Paramount closes, per three sources familiar with the negotiations." Bari Weiss might also be in the picture, as reported last week.
>> Yes, Rhodes has spoken with Ellison, I'm told. For the time being, however, he is happy in London and committed to Sky, a person close to the matter says...
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END OF A PUBLIC MEDIA ERA |
The Corporation for Public Broadcasting, 1967-2025? Congress has formally clawed back all the future funding for public TV and radio, and now the bill is heading to Trump's desk, which means CPB has been defunded out of existence, unless funding is somehow restored in a future budget bill. (Conversations about that have already begun, but let's be realistic.)
>> It's hard to predict exactly what will happen next at the local station level, but the system will certainly be weaker as a whole, as I wrote in this CNN.com piece.
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NPR: 'We will work to rebuild' |
"Tonight, our network's service to the nation suffered a tremendous setback," NPR said when the bill passed the House again a few minutes after midnight. "Together — and with support from listeners and readers in communities around the nation — we will work to rebuild."
Stations and the system will now work to secure other $$ and adjust to new financial circumstances. "This is a perilous moment for public media — but the resolve is stronger than ever," PBS "NewsHour" co-host Geoff Bennett wrote on X. "If you value independent journalism, educational programming, and trusted local coverage, please support your local PBS or NPR station."
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Victory lap for public media critics |
The Media Research Center fought for this outcome for 40+ years. From their perch, Trump achieved what past GOP presidents failed to do. "The American people will no longer be forced to fund politically biased media," Speaker Mike Johnson said overnight, summing up conservative POV on the matter. "Officially now time for PBS and NPR to actually have to compete in the marketplace," Curtis Houck of NewsBusters wrote.
>> Over at The Free Press, Uri Berliner called it NPR's "Independence Day."
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Last night Jesse Watters tried to stave off Gavin Newsom's defamation lawsuit against Fox News by admitting that his program made a mistake while covering Newsom's back-and-forth with Trump in June. Watters even used the words "I'm sorry," though "it was far from a fulsome apology," the LAT's Stephen Battaglio reports. "Asked for a reaction to Watters’ remarks about the matter, Newsom showed no signs of backing down. 'Discovery will be fun,' he said in a statement. 'See you in court, buddy.'"
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Dems call out Fox for Epstein edit |
Rep. Robert Garcia, the top oversight Democrat, sent a letter yesterday to Lachlan Murdoch and Suzanne Scott requesting answers about the network's edits to a 2024 Trump interview concerning the "Epstein files."
The cable news giant will surely refuse the letter's requests. "There was no selective or deceptive editing whatsoever," a Fox rep claimed, despite the video evidence. Two senators raised the matter earlier this week, as well. KFILE's Andrew Kaczynski and yours truly have the full story here...
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>> Eight years after launch, Substack "has raised $100 million in funding from investors," translating to an eye-popping valuation of $1.1 billion. (NYT)
>> CNBC has named David Cho editor-in-chief across TV and digital. Dan Colarusso and Jay Yarow are departing. (Variety)
>> Meta has named Connor Hayes the head of Threads. (Axios)
>> Fox Sports has struck a "wide-ranging" deal with Barstool Sports and Dave Portnoy. (THR)
>> "NBC, Apple and ESPN are the three bidders for the league's 'Sunday Night Baseball' package, which ESPN opted out of earlier this year." (CNBC)
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"Mark Zuckerberg and current and former directors and officers of Meta Platforms agreed on Thursday to settle claims seeking $8 billion for the damage they allegedly caused the company by allowing repeated violations of Facebook users’ privacy, a lawyer for the shareholders told a Delaware judge on Thursday," Tom Hals reports for Reuters.
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…and Bezos dodges a bullet |
"Amazon will not have to face a lawsuit accusing it of misleading Prime subscribers by charging an additional fee to stream movies and TV shows without ads" after a judge dismissed the suit, "finding that the addition of commercials don’t constitute a price increase but rather a modification to the subscription package," Winston Cho reports for THR.
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Netflix reported "total revenues of $11.1 billion, operating income of $3.8 billion and a margin of 34.1 percent, all up double digits from a year ago," THR's Alex Weprin reports.
>> Paul Verna, eMarketer's vice president of content, told Liam Reilly that "Netflix has many levers to pull to keep up the momentum." The stock, however, is down in premarket trading, perhaps not surprisingly since it's already up more than 40% year to date.
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>> Peacock will increase the price tag on its ad-supported and ad-free tiers "by $3 each to $10.99 per month and $16.99 per month," a move that makes Peacock "the most-expensive ad-supported streaming tier on the market," Weprin reports. (THR)
>> Up against "Superman" and "Jurassic World Rebirth," new box office contenders like "Smurfs" will "have a hard time overperforming" this weekend. (Deadline)
>> Meanwhile, "after nearly two months in theaters, Disney's remake of 'Lilo & Stitch' has passed $1 billion at the global box office." (TheWrap)
>> Lin-Manuel Miranda "plans to use the 10th anniversary Broadway performance of his award-winning cultural phenomenon 'Hamilton' as a fundraiser for a coalition of nonprofits providing immigration services." (AP)
>> "After tickets for the opening 70mm Imax screenings of Christopher Nolan's 'The Odyssey' sold out in minutes Wednesday night, exorbitantly expensive resale tickets for the film have started popping up online — and fans are not happy about it." (TheWrap)
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