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Monday, June 03, 2024

Shari Redstone faces the ultimate decision on Paramount Global, The WaPo reels after the sudden exit of top editor Sally Buzbee, a judge weighs whether to grant a motion from Sandy Hook families to liquidate Alex Jones' conspiracy empire, Pat McAfee draws backlash after referring to Caitlin Clark in disparaging terms, Elon Musk's X changes rules to allow for pornography, and more. Plus, why "Godzilla Minus One" launched on Netflix without any pre-promotion. But first, the A1.

THE A1

The Hunter Hypocrisy

CNN Photo Illustration/Matt Slocum/AP

America's judicial system is, apparently, not so rigged, after all.

After spending the last three days raging against the courts over Donald Trump's 34 felony convictions, the right-wing media machine jumped at the opportunity to hype the felony charges being brought against Hunter Biden in a trial that got underway Monday.

Outlets like Fox News — where figures such as Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Jesse Watters, and a parade of others have spent weeks bashing the legal system, even going as far as to portray the unanimous jury verdict to be part of a deep-state conspiracy against the disgraced former president — were more than happy to place a bright spotlight on the case facing President Joe Biden's son.

The cognitive dissonance is remarkable to behold. The same media outlets and figures who have told their audiences that there is a "two-tiered justice system" in America, are now prominently covering a trial in which Biden's own Justice Department prosecutes his son. If Biden is rigging the justice system, he is doing a lousy job.

The trial offers a timely distraction from the uncomfortable reality of Trump's felony convictions and marks the culmination of years of right-wing attacks and obsession of the president's son, offering a regular serving of red meat for Fox News' prime time audience over claims of wrongdoing and innuendo surrounding the purported "Biden Crime Family."

To be clear, the unprecedented nature of a president's own son going on trial for felony charges warrants significant coverage. However, while Trump's trial was treated as an illegitimate "sham" by the MAGA Media machine, the Hunter Biden trial is being portrayed in a markedly different light. Oddly, the charges brought against President Biden's son don't represent "election interference." Apparently, that's only a one way street.

While there is not a "two-tiered justice system" in the country, there certainly is a two-tiered set of standards that outlets like Fox News apply to the Democratic Party versus the Republican Party.

Not only are the charges against Hunter Biden being taken very seriously by the same outlets which have spilled untold amounts of ink blasting the courts, but these same outlets are also dishonestly attempting to tie President Biden to the alleged crimes of his son, despite the fact that the GOP has been unable to uncover any evidence establishing such a link. And, suffice to say, it is not like the Republican Party has not tried.

Regardless of what happens in the Hunter Biden trial, however, Trump's media allies will still undoubtedly claim that the justice system is rigged. If Hunter Biden is acquitted or the jury is hung, the right-wing media machine will use it to further their dishonest narrative that the judicial system is corrupt and only working to target Republicans. But, even if Hunter Biden is found guilty, audiences will be told that he got off easy and should have been hit with more severe charges.

It's a win-win for MAGA Media, because the space is dominated by outlets and figures who are at their core dishonest, choosing to instead peddle certain narratives for profit and power.

——— BELOW THE FOLD ———

CNN Photo Illustration/Mike Blake/Reuters

It's All Up To Shari: The future of Paramount Global is in the hands of Shari Redstone. After Skydance Media sweetened its offer for the mountain of entertainment, the David Ellison-led company's deal was recommended for approval by the special Paramount board M&A committee. The deal was then kicked up to Redstone's National Amusements over the weekend. A spokesperson for NAI said Monday that it is "reviewing" the proposal, but declined to comment further. There had been significant speculation that a deal would be announced imminently, given Paramount's annual shareholder meeting is set for Tuesday. But don't hold your breath. I'm reliably told that Redstone isn't set to announce a deal within the next 24 hours. And there's always a chance Redstone could opt out at the last moment, given that greenlighting a deal would end her family's control over the media empire. A source told my colleague Hadas Gold that Redstone has "become surprisingly engaged with the direction of the gang of the three," made up of Brian Robbins, Chris McCarthy, and George Cheeks. Per that source, the triumvirate of leaders are "making a forceful case" for the future of Paramount. Presumably, unless the state of affairs suddenly changes, we'll see them do that Tuesday at the shareholder meeting as well, followed by a Wednesday town hall with staffers.

THE INDUSTRY

CNN Photo Illustration/Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP

Sally's Silence: Nearly 24 hours has elapsed since The WaPo abruptly announced it had parted ways with its top editor, Sally Buzbee — and she has yet to say a word about the matter. Suffice to say, the fact that Buzbee did not even bid farewell to the newsroom that she had led for three years is highly unusual and underscores the less-than-ideal conditions in which she exited the newspaper. While The WaPo said in its Sunday night press release that Buzbee had stepped down, it is quite evident that new publisher and chief executive Will Lewis had effectively showed her the door. In fact, The WaPo's Sarah Ellison, Elahe Izadi, and Jeremy Barr reported Monday that Lewis had "made inquiries to potential candidates to succeed Buzbee." Per the trio, Lewis offered Buzbee oversight of the new "service and social media" division he plans to launch — obviously a huge step down from the position she enjoyed as executive editor. It's no surprise that she would balk at the offer. Read The WaPo's story here.

📰 Inside the Newsroom: Matt Murray, the former top editor at The WSJ who will lead The WaPo's newsroom until The Telegraph's Robert Winnett takes the helm post-election, addressed apprehensive staffers with Lewis on Monday afternoon. I'm told that the meeting was quite "combative," with staffers grilling leadership about the nature of Buzbee's departure. The WaPo Guild later released a statement saying it was "troubled by the sudden departure" of Buzbee and "concerned about the lack of diversity at the top levels of the organization." Indeed, Lewis was pressed during the Monday meeting about his installation of two White males atop the organization. Lewis, I'm told, acknowledged he needs to do better on that front, an answer that didn't quite quell staff concerns. And Lewis indicated that he regretted the sudden nature of Buzbee's exit, but explained he had to "scramble" as the news "began to leak out." As one staffer told me after the meeting, summarizing the mood of the newsroom, "Everyone's pretty pissy and raw, mostly deservedly."

WORRIES AT WAPO

"What the hell is going on?": Matt Fuller and Tara Golshan go inside The WaPo amid the sudden change of the guard. (NOTUS)
"Gone was the soothing, smooth presence during Lewis' first meeting with colleagues last fall after his own appointment became public," David Folkenflik reported of Monday's contentious meeting. (NPR)
Charlotte Klein noted that in the days leading to Buzbee's shocking ouster, it had "looked like business as usual," with the now-former editor even attending the White House News Photographer Association gala on Saturday night. (Vanity Fair)
Where is Jeff Bezos in all of this? A spokesperson for The WaPo declined to tell Benjamin Mullin and Katie Robertson whether the Amazon billionaire had approved the changes at his paper ahead of time. (NYT)
Paul Farhi to David Bauder: "It definitely kind of blindsided people. But it shows you that Will Lewis is working out of a sense of crisis and urgency. He's only been there five months and he's making gigantic changes to the newsroom." (AP)
Peter Kafka, confused as we all are by this third social media-focused newsroom, wondered: "Does The Washington Post want to be BuzzFeed?" (Business Insider)
Jay Rosen: "Unlike just about everyone who has commented on it, I don't think this 'third newsroom' has to be limp, dumb and derivative. But without more explanation and a vision for it from the editors, that will be its reception." (Threads)

THE FOURTH ESTATE

Readers who purchased a lifetime subscription from Rolling Stone feel "wronged" by the magazine's decision to stop sending them print editions, Scott Nover reported. (Slate)
A spokesperson for Jay Penske's media company, which owns Rolling Stone, didn't respond to Nover's request for comment. A representative for the company also ignored our request last month. Not a good look, Jay!
Moving on: "Staff at the Intercept are imploring the nonprofit's board to fire its CEO and chief strategy officer," Max Tani reported. (Semafor)
MSNBC launched a premium podcast subscription with Apple, Natalie Korach reports. The progressive news network also announced that Rachel Maddow will debut season two of "Ultra" on June 10. (The Wrap/Variety)
"Independent media in India are banding together to counter eroding press freedom," Pavni Mittal reported. (NPR)

THE BIZ

Spotify raised subscription costs for the second time in a year. Will other music streamers follow its lead? (CNN)

SUMMER OF LOVE

CNN Photo Illustration/News Corp/PA Wire

Rupert Murdoch tied the knot at 93, marrying retired biologist Elena Zhukova, 63, over the weekend at his Bel Air vineyard estate. (CNN)
By all accounts, the right-wing media mogul's ceremony was quite small, though some notable names were present. Mitchell Goodbar and Nic White reported that Robert Kraft and Robert Thompson were in attendance. (Daily Mail)

MEDIA MOVES

ByteDance named John Rogovin, the former Warner Bros. Discovery executive, its new global general counsel. (Bloomberg)
Sports Business Journal hired Rachel Axon as a staff writer. (TBN)

THE INFO WARS

CNN Photo Illustration/Matt York/AP

Jones in Jeopardy: The fate of Infowars is in a judge's hands. The families of Sandy Hook victims filed a motion over the weekend asking a bankruptcy court to liquidate the assets of Alex Jones after the right-wing extremist sought a reorganization of his conspiracy media empire. Judge Christopher Lopez on Monday ruled that, for now, Jones can continue operating Infowars. But that is only until Lopez can determine how to rule on the matter. A hearing has now been set for June 14. The AP's Dave Collins has details.

🔎 Zooming in: The drama in court played out over a weekend in which Jones launched his trademark "emergency broadcasts" and declared that the federal government was going to shut down Infowars. In the broadcasts, Jones grew highly emotional and appeared to even cry at some points. On Monday, he insisted it was not a "publicity stunt" and said the potential shutdown is being taken very seriously. "The art was taken off the walls, employees took their stuff home, there were tears," Jones said of what transpired over the weekend. The Daily Beast's Amanda Yen has more here.

IN THE BATTLEFIELD

Pat McAfee keeps causing headaches at ESPN. The freewheeling sports personality, who drew controversy for hosting Aaron Rodgers as he descended into anti-vaccine rants, called WNBA star Caitlin Clark a "White bitch" during a broadcast on Monday — a comment that prompted immediate backlash, including from ESPN staffers. McAfee later apologized. Hadas Gold has more. (CNN)
Tucker Carlson continues to sanitize the violence that occurred on January 6, saying in a chit-chat with Donald Trump Jr. that the rioters were simply "pure hearted" Americans. (Mediaite)
Before becoming a BuzzFeed activist investor, Vivek Ramaswamy sat down with Peter Thiel and Elon Musk in 2020 to discuss creating a tech giant to support controversial speech, Ben Smith reports. (Semafor)
👀 The chief financial officer of the right-wing Epoch Times was indicted Monday for allegedly participating in a scheme to launder at least $67 million. (Mediaite)
Over on the left, Michael Grynbaum and John Koblin report about how Rachel Maddow and Jon Stewart have made Monday nights a cable-fest. (NYT)
First in Reliable | Donald Trump's legal woes propelled the progressive HuffPost to traffic highs. The website generated nearly 100 million page views between Monday, 5/27, and Sunday, 6/2. And it was HuffPost's best week ever on Apple News, with 43 million page views.
George Conway told Greg Sargent that, under previous CNN chief Chris Licht, network bookers stopped calling him after he called Trump a "narcissistic psychopath." (New Republic)
"The news media are underplaying the fact that they themselves are MAGA targets," Mark Jacob argues. "Maybe they don't want to be part of the story. Maybe they don't take the threat seriously. But for whatever reason, they're not doing enough to stick up for themselves, their profession, and the public's right to know." (Stop the Presses)
"Welcome to the hellhole of programmatic advertising": In an adaption from his new book, Steven Brill writes about how "the internet is a cesspool of misinformation, and the biggest blue-chip brands and their ad agencies are the ones funding it—by stuffing money into a Rube Goldberg machine no one really understands." (WIRED)
GameStop trading is back?! Shares in the company closed up 21%, and jumped as high as 75% during trading Monday, after "Roaring Kitty" revealed a $116 million bet in a Reddit post. (Bloomberg)

THE VALLEY

CNN Photo Illustration/Jae C. Hong/AP

X Marks the Porn: Elon Musk's X said over the weekend that it had amended its rules to formally allow for the posting of pornographic content. "We believe that users should be able to create, distribute, and consume material related to sexual themes as long as it is consensually produced and distributed," the company explained. Of course, pornographic content, much of it spam, has drenched X since Musk's chaotic takeover and firing of many of the employees who enforced trust and safety on the platform. The only surprise is that it took more than a year for this change to be implemented on the platform. Musk, himself a troll, has also posted racy content and memes. TechCrunch's Ivan Mehta has more here.

TOO MANY TABS

The Google leak has revealed "thousands of privacy incidents," including the technology titan having collected child voice data, Joseph Cox reported. (404 Media)
Should users trust Google's A.I. answers on health issues? The company told Talya Minsberg that it has implemented additional guardrails for such queries, but declined to elaborate further. (NYT)
Oh no! Meta confirmed to Sarah Perez that it is testing unskippable advertisements on Instagram. (TechCrunch)
Threads started to roll out a side-swiping shortcut to like posts. (SMT)

CURTAIN CALL

CNN Photo Illustration/Toho International

Godzilla Minus Press: Without any advance notice, at 3am ET Saturday morning, the Oscar-winning "Godzilla Minus One" abruptly landed on Netflix and VoD. The film quickly shot up the charts, claiming the top spot on Apple and Netflix's top 10 list — a nod to how highly anticipated the film's digital release had been in the U.S. But, despite all the buzz around the Japanese monster drama, the Toho film did not receive a smidgen of press ahead of time. Instead, it just suddenly appeared in Netflix's catalog under the cover of darkness, with the streamer only announcing it had been added via tweet. As IndieWire's Tom Brueggemann noted, "This sort of acquisition usually comes with significant media coverage ahead of play."

So what happened? I'm told that Netflix had quietly secured the rights to the film earlier this year. But, per people close to the matter, the deal came with contractual obligations that prevented the streamer from promoting the movie ahead of time. Those contractual obligations almost certainly had to do with the fact that Legendary Entertainment, which fully controls the Monsterverse franchise, released its latest film, "Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire," in theaters on March 29. In other words, if "Godzilla Minus One," which was not expected to become a worldwide phenomenon, had been released via streaming before then, the Toho film might have cannibalized Legendary's much more expensive installment, with its reported $135 million budget. But with Legendary's Godzilla now having exited theaters, the release of "Minus One" poses little threat.

🔎 Zooming in: The success of "Godzilla Minus One" speaks to the globalization of entertainment, which has been supercharged by Netflix and the streamer's ability to take foreign films and send them viral across the world. Not too long ago, "Minus One" would have never posed any real threat to Legendary's "Godzilla x Kong." But times have changed, with foreign films finding success with U.S. audiences on streaming platforms.

OFF STAGE

"The Garfield Movie," "IF," and "Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga" sat atop a quiet domestic box office weekend, with the orange feline pulling in $14 million and the latter two films making $10.8 million. (AP)
Footage from a forthcoming Alec Baldwin "Rust" documentary will not be required to be turned over to prosecutors. (Variety)
The Academy told Sharon Waxman that it is moving "quickly and thoughtfully" to address complaints from Jewish creatives that a new museum perpetrates "antisemitic tropes." (The Wrap)
The time are a-changin': The 2024 Tribeca Film Festival will allow short films created using OpenAI's text-to-video platform, Sora. (IndieWire)
How many more A-listers could possibly join this star-studded cast?! Josh Brolin hopped aboard Netflix's new "Knives Out" film. (THR)
HBO's "House of Dragon" will feature five new dragons. (The Wrap)
Sony Pictures dropped the official trailer for "Venom: The Last Dance," starring Tom Hardy. (YouTube)
Elle Fanning is set to star in a standalone "Predator" film. (Deadline)
Taylor Swift dominated the Billboard 200 for the sixth week in a row, buoyed by team Reliable Sources playing "The Tortured Poets Department" on repeat while working on the newsletter. (Billboard)
Jennifer Lopez canceled her "This Is Me … Live Tour." (CNN)
Miley Cyrus, appearing on the cover of W, told Alex Hawgood she wasn't "actually being taken seriously at the Grammys" until this year. (W)

Thank you for reading! This newsletter was edited by Jon Passantino and produced with the assistance of Liam Reilly. Have feedback? Send us an email. You can follow us on Instagram, Threads, and LinkedIn. We will see you back in your inbox tomorrow.

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