Sep 29
2025
MAGA’s media takeover
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Donald Trump’s efforts to suppress First Amendment rights — Jimmy Kimmel being the most obvious example — are only part of the picture. Perhaps even more ominous are efforts by Trump-aligned billionaires to buy media outlets.
It’s already started with the purchase of CBS’ parent company by a conglomerate controlled by the son of Larry Ellison, the 81-year-old tech oligarch who is a generous campaign contributor and advocate of the type of Big Brother surveillance society imposed by the Chinese government on its people.
Reports Oligarch Watch on Larry Ellison:
“Citizens will be on their best behavior because we’re constantly recording and reporting everything that is going on,” he said during a question-and-answer session with Oracle investors last year.
CBS, under new management, is installing right-wingers in several key positions with the apparent intention of turning the network’s news operation into Fox News Light.
But Ellison’s designs don’t stop there.
In a deal engineered by Trump, he, along with other investors who include the Murdochs, are positioned to purchase TikTok. There are also reports that Ellison is preparing a bid to purchase Warner Brothers Discovery, which includes CNN.
In short, Ellison is positioning himself to be a media mogul like no other.
One media historian told The New York Times:
“What makes these deals different is that they are across multiple platforms. To have the opportunity to establish an editorial line across TikTok, CBS News and CNN — that’s a new world.”
So that’s Ellison. Add to it Elon Musk controlling Twitter, the Murdoch’s sprawling empire and Mark Zuckerberg’s cozying up to Trump and you’ve got the prospect of one-party media. Or, as The Atlantic put it: The MAGA Media Takeover.
But wait, there’s more.
Nexstar and Sinclair are two of the largest owners of local television stations in the country. They both pulled Kimmel’s show off the air before relenting late last week. Nexstar’s willingness to play ball with Trump and Sinclair’s right-wing sympathies are evident. As Will Bunch of The Philadelphia Inquirer said, that’s what happens when corporate chains take over.
There’s a lot of good independent media taking root, but they don’t command the large audiences of what the right is in the process of cornering. There’s The Bulwark, for example. Substack hosts many others, including Oligarch Watch and American Crisis.
The best among legacy media include The Guardian, The Atlantic and The New York Times. The aforementioned Will Bunch of The Philadelphia Inquirer is my favorite national columnist.
Not to be overlooked are the growing ranks of nonprofit news outlets like Investigative Post. There are now over 500, led by ProPublica and The Marshall Project.
For social media, Bluesky is an alternative to Twitter.
I realize I’ve thrown a lot of links at you, but there’s a lot to be learned if you invest a bit of time.
As Scott Pelley of 60 Minutes said recently, “You cannot have democracy without journalism.” And what’s happening right before our eyes is a full frontal assault on journalism, the First Amendment — and democracy.
The Columbia Journalism Review wrote last week about the Trump administration’s stonewalling of Freedom of Information requests related to immigration enforcement. The story led off with the experience of our J. Dale Shoemaker, who has filed 17 FOI requests with ICE and Customs and Border Patrol since late last year and went on to say:
CJR spoke to nearly two dozen reporters, editors, and other people at news organizations and open-records watchdog groups across the country who have filed FOIA requests with the agencies, and who say that ICE and CBP officials routinely deny or ignore those requests. The agencies have never been particularly open with the press, but many reporters believe that their experience is part of an enhanced effort by the Trump administration to conceal immigration agency operations, even in possible violation of federal law. Some also described the agencies’ press offices as functionally useless, with media officials providing few, if any, answers to even their most basic of inquiries.
An Israeli attack on a newspaper office in Yemen killed 31 journalists and other staff. Four other people, including a child, were killed in the attack and 131 wounded.
We reported a couple of weeks ago on Doug Jemal’s financial difficulties. Further proof came last week with news of his sale of the Boulevard Mall site to Benderson Development.
The state Commission of Correction seems as indifferent to the many problems festering in state prisons as the Common Council’s Police Oversight Committee is to trouble in Buffalo’s police department, New York Focus reports.
John Oliver has advice for those capitulating to Trump. He sums it up in four words.
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