In her first official press conference after Donald Trump became president, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt announced that “new media” would be welcome inside the White House briefing room. The White House Correspondents’ Association typically picks the seating arrangement in the briefing room, but the White House said it would take one of its own reserved seats and give it to a variety of news outlets, podcasters, bloggers, influencers and whoever else it felt hadn’t been fairly represented in the covering the president.
On Monday, that seat went to Kellie Meyer, NewsNation’s Washington correspondent.
NewsNation has a seat in the back of the White House briefing room and, in recent weeks, has been part of the expanded White House press pool. The network continues to grow and already features several well-known on-air personalities, including Chris Cuomo, Ashleigh Banfield and Elizabeth Vargas.
But back to this new media seat. The skepticism, naturally, when the White House announced this new arrangement was that it would simply invite those who were nothing more than Trump supporters posing as working media. But Monday’s seat went to a reporter who, on Monday, didn’t lob up softballs for Leavitt.
Meyer asked about recent deportations in the U.S. and said to Leavitt, “What do you say to Americans who want safe streets but are concerned due process is being violated?”
Leavitt gave a long answer, saying in part, “The president is using every lever of his executive authority and his constitutional authority within the bounds of the immigration laws of our country to ensure that our streets are safer for law-abiding American citizens, and this administration is focused on detaining, arresting and deporting illegal, criminal aliens.”
Meyer followed up by asking if Trump could defy a court order, to which Leavitt said, “No, in fact, this administration acted within the confines of the law, again, within the president's constitutional authority and under the authority granted to him under the Alien Enemies Act. We are quite confident in that, and we are wholly confident that we are going to win this case in court.”
OK, so not exactly like asking about the Watergate break-in, and you can decide for yourself about Leavitt’s answers, but they were legitimate questions. And not the first time, either. Meyer previously asked Leavitt about the economy — specifically when the struggling economy would stop being blamed on former President Joe Biden and become Trump’s responsibility.
Crying Wolff
Last week, book author Michael Wolff wrote a column for The Hollywood Reporter saying no cable or network news shows will have him on to talk about his new Donald Trump book — “All or Nothing: How Trump Recaptured America” — because they are afraid of angering Trump.
But Mediaite’s Colby Hall has a new column out saying Wolff hasn’t been banned because networks are afraid of Trump. Hall writes, “Yet there is a more logical reason for his exclusion from broadcast and cable outlets: his reputation as a gossipmonger rather than a reliable reporter. In my reporting for this column, I’ve heard from multiple network executives and on-air talent who have confirmed this to me — Wolff’s loose reporting and baseless insinuations are not worth amplifying. He is not getting booked simply because of his lack of credibility. Wolff is a classic caricature of a New York media type, and his books are anything but dull to read. But he has a well-earned reputation for playing fast and loose with the facts and eschewing airtight reporting for a flashy narrative.”
Hall said Wolff’s books are a fun read, but added, “The thing is, he’s not a journalist; he’s a gossip. … But the reason he’s not getting booked on television shows is not because media outlets fear Trump’s wrath. It’s because he stretches the definition of journalistic standards beyond credulity.”
Taking his shots
This is the time of year for so-called NFL “insiders.” With free agency in full swing and the draft coming up, reporters for networks such as ESPN, the NFL Network and Fox Sports are in overtime mode. They’re trying to get the scoops on the latest free-agent signings as NFL fans constantly hit refresh on their social media feeds.
It’s a big deal in the sports media world. In fact, a couple of “insiders” apparently had a verbal dustup at a Starbucks recently over chasing NFL news.
Anyway, ProFootballTalk’s Mike Florio, who is not really an insider in the traditional sense of the word, wrote a column Monday about the whole business of breaking NFL news: “The ‘insider’ game has changed, dramatically.”
Florio doesn’t hold back. He writes, “The ‘insider’ industry started as an extension of actual journalism. The pioneer was Will McDonough. Chris Mortensen widened the trail that McDonough blazed. Nowadays, however, ‘insiders’ are everywhere. And most of them operate not as journalists but as hand-picked conduits for information that could be given to any, some, or all of them.”
Florio later adds, “The ‘insider’ industry isn’t going anywhere. But it has definitely morphed into its own category of media. ‘Insiders’ aren’t journalists. They’re external P.R. reps, whose packaging as a press release of what otherwise would be hard news boosts the outlets that employ them, while also making each transaction seem like a bigger deal. And, for the agents who drive the ‘insider’ bus (especially during free agency), it’s a way to push embellished (and, at times, fraudulent) numbers into the NFL bloodstream while also getting a free Twitter advertisement that can then be used to recruit more clients.”
These are just a few of Florio’s lines. Check out the whole column, but watch out that you don’t burn yourself with his many hot takes.
Best in show
I love movie lists. And I especially love lists about journalism movies. A few years ago for Poynter, I put together my picks for the best 25 journalism movies of all time.
Now there’s another good journalism movie list out. This one was assembled by Adam L. Penenberg: “The Top 10 Journalism Movies of All Time — Based on the Actual Journalism in the Movie.” Penenberg is the director of the online master’s in journalism program at NYU. But he’s also known for something else. One of the movies on his list — and very high on my list, as well — features Penenberg himself, as played by actor Steve Zahn. Penenberg was the reporter at Forbes who discovered that The New Republic’s Stephen Glass had fabricated a story, which led to the discovery that Glass had made up parts or all of a bunch of stories while at The New Republic. This eventually became the basis of the terrific movie, “Shattered Glass.”
Penenberg’s journalism movie list is a bit different in this way: The movies had to be based on true events, so you won’t find some of the fictional movies that rated high on my list, such as “Broadcast News,” “Network” and “The Paper.”
Penenberg also breaks his list into categories: how journalism actually works, when the journalist becomes the story, and journalism in the face of power and danger.
I highly recommend checking it out.
Media tidbits
- Speaking of movies, Conan O’Brien has been chosen again to host next year’s Academy Awards, just a couple of weeks after hosting the Oscars for the first time. O’Brien earned solid reviews for his hosting duties, and the Oscars on ABC drew its highest TV ratings in five years with 19.7 million viewers. O’Brien said in a statement, “The only reason I’m hosting the Oscars next year is that I want to hear Adrien Brody finish his speech.” (Brody set a record for longest acceptance speech ever — just over five minutes — after winning the Best Actor award.)
- Semafor’s Ben Smith with “How Breitbart became legacy MAGA media.”
- Jewish Insider’s Melissa Weiss reports that Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has postponed an upcoming tour for his book “Antisemitism in America,” which comes out today. A representative for Schumer said in a statement, “Due to security concerns, Senator Schumer’s book events are being rescheduled.” It’s believed Schumer would have received backlash for siding with Republicans on a stopgap spending bill to avoid a government shutdown. Schumer was scheduled to appear in Baltimore, Washington, D.C, New York City, Philadelphia, Los Angeles and San Francisco. Writing for Puck, Leigh Ann Caldwell wrote that Schumer “underestimated the anger and angst within his party, which erupted in the aftermath of the vote and flowed through the weekend.”
- Axios’ Sara Fischer with “Alden newspapers slam OpenAI, Google's AI proposals.”
- Politico’s Michael Schaffer with “A Congresswoman with Dementia Stopped Coming to Work. The DC Press Corps Never Noticed.”
Hot type
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