About Gayle King’s space trip
By TyLisa C. Johnson, audience engagement producer
Gayle King is no stranger to asking tough questions. But this week, she faced a few herself after joining a six-woman crew on a space flight on a suborbital rocket made by Blue Origin, Jeff Bezos’ aerospace company.
King, a well-known journalist and “CBS Mornings” co-host, traveled alongside Bezos’s fiancée, journalist Lauren Sánchez; musician Katy Perry; former NASA rocket scientist Aisha Bowe; civil rights activist Amanda Nguyen; and film producer Kerianne Flynn.
In the days since, social media users and some celebrities — including Olivia Munn, Olivia Wilde and Emily Ratajkowski — have loudly criticized the mission, calling the flight a “wasteful,” “performative,” “gluttonous” endeavor prompted by billionaires that was tone-deaf to the current political climate. In other words, space tourism isn’t helping anyone.
“What’s the point? Is it historic that you guys are going on a ride? I think it’s a bit gluttonous,” Munn said. “Space exploration was to further our knowledge and to help mankind. What are they gonna do up there that has made it better for us down here?”
“It just speaks to the fact that we are absolutely living in an oligarchy where there is a small group of people who are interested in going to space for the sake of getting a new lease on life while the rest of the population, most people on planet Earth, are worried about paying rent or having dinner for their kids,” Ratajkowski said.
Much of the online criticism seemed aimed at King, who pushed back, telling reporters that she was “very saddened” and that critics “don’t really understand what is happening here.”
But don’t we?
“There was nothing frivolous about what we do,” King said in response to the criticisms of the flight, People magazine reported. “So, you know, I'm very disappointed and very saddened by (the criticism). And I also say this — what it's doing to inspire other women and young girls? Please don't ignore that. I've had so many women and young girls reach out to me, and men too, by the way. Men, too, that say, ‘Wow, I never thought I could do that, but I see you doing it at this stage of your life.’”
These six women are being poised as pioneers, and maybe they are. But it comes at the same time that other women continue to face erasure, so it stops me in my tracks. It’s hard to enjoy ice cream when your friends are eating dirt.
With the money used to take an 11-minute flight, how many women could have been supported? How many unhoused people could have been given shelter? How many kids could have been fed? How many oceans could have been cleaned?
It’s unfortunate that King seems to be receiving a disproportionate share of the backlash — at least, by name. That’s a microaggression — holding a prominent Black woman more accountable than her white or nonjournalist peers, despite them all having made the same choice. They all deserve equal blame.
At the same time, I do hold King to a higher standard than the other five women — mostly because she’s usually a well-studied, go-to voice for grounded, rational takes.
That’s why I have to ask, because I’m still unclear: Why did she choose to go?
Was she swept up in the excitement and celebrity of the moment; the honor of being brought into the fold to go to space?
It is iconic anytime a Black woman goes to space. But as journalist working in an era where trust is already precarious — hard won and easily lost — we must be careful to weigh if the risk of who or what we align ourselves with is worth the reward.
AP accuses White House of defying court order that restored access
By Amaris Castillo, staff writer
The battle for press freedom continues in the White House. Lawyers for The Associated Press Wednesday accused aides to President Donald Trump of defying a court order restoring its access to press events there.
“In a court filing on Wednesday, lawyers for the AP accused the White House of continuing to exclude its journalists from the small pool of reporters that travels with the president and attends events in the Oval Office in violation of U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden's order lifting those restrictions while a lawsuit moves forward,” Reuters reported. “McFadden found the White House had discriminated against the AP for continuing to refer to the Gulf of Mexico in its coverage rather than the Gulf of America as ordered by Trump. The court said the White House had likely violated free speech protections under the U.S. Constitution.”
Back in February, the AP issued a statement from its executive editor Julie Pace, in which she said the news agency was informed by the White House that “if AP did not align its editorial standards with President Donald Trump’s executive order renaming the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America, AP would be barred from accessing an event in the Oval Office.”
On the afternoon of Feb. 11, the day this statement was released, an AP reporter had been blocked from attending an executive order signing.
“It is alarming that the Trump administration would punish AP for its independent journalism,” Pace said in the statement. “Limiting our access to the Oval Office based on the content of AP’s speech not only severely impedes the public’s access to independent news, it plainly violates the First Amendment.”
The White House briefing room, visualized
