Trump threatens TV networks over unpatriotic Iran coverage

0:00This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK.

0:30business needs in one place, saving you time, headaches, and serious money. Stop paying for missing pieces. Go to odoo.com. That's O-D-O-O dot com to learn more. With the new Schwab Teen Investor Account, teens can gain hands-on investing experience and build positive money habits. It's an account co-owned by you and your teen, so you can monitor and engage with the account while your teen learns how to invest and manage money. Learn more at schwab.com. Donald Trump has spent the last week raging against coverage of the Iran war. He's gone so far as to claim that the fake news media wants the US to lose the war.

1:10The Washington Post is even reporting that photographers have been banned from press briefings for publishing unflattering pictures of the Defence Secretary, he calls himself the War Secretary, Pete Hegseth. And now the man in charge of US broadcast licences has issued what seems to be a bit of a threat. change your tone on the war with Iran or risk having your licence to operate revoked. So is the war being covered fairly? And if the Trump administration doesn't like the coverage, how far can they go in changing it? Welcome to AmeriCast. AmeriCast. AmeriCast from BBC News. You hear that sound?

1:49Oh, I think when I hear that sound, it reminds me of money. We didn't start this war, but under President Trump, we are finishing it. This is a big cover-up, and this administration is engaged in it. This guy has Trump arrangement syndrome. I have four words for you. Turn the volume up!

2:12Hello, it's Justin in the worldwide headquarters of AmeriCast in London, England. And it's Anthony in the American headquarters of AmeriCast in Washington, D.C. And let us kick off with the story that seems to be the thing that first kicked off in Donald Trump's mind, and got us going or got the White House going on the press, the broadcasters in particular, and the way they treat the war. And it actually wasn't a broadcaster, was it? It was the Wall Street Journal saying that there were refueling tankers. So these are planes that got stuck during an Iranian missile strike on an air base in Saudi Arabia, and he didn't like it.

2:53Yeah, on Saturday, Trump called this report from the Wall Street Journal intentionally misleading. He has an axe to grind with the journal. He's actually sued them because of their Jeffrey Epstein coverage. So it's not surprising that he would lash out again. But he posted on his social media site, Truth.Social, that it was yet again an intentionally misleading headline by the fake news media about the five tanker planes that were supposedly struck down at an airport in Saudi Arabia and of no further use. In actuality, the base was hit a few days ago, but the planes were not struck or destroyed.

3:31Four, the five had virtually no damage and are already back in service. One had slightly more damage, but will be in the air shortly. None were destroyed or close to it, as the fakes news said in the headlines. And he goes on to attack the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, calling their reporting terrible and saying that the people who are doing it are sick and demented and are causing damage to the United States of America. And ends it with the people of our country understand what is happening far better than the fake news media. And signs it, President Donald J. Trump. And that very much backed up by Pete Hegseth, the Secretary for War, as he styles himself at the press conference that he had last Friday.

4:14People look up at the TV and they see banners, they see headlines. I used to be in that business. And I know that everything is written intentionally. For example, a banner or a headline, Mideast war intensifies, splashing on the screen the last couple of days alongside visuals of civilian or energy targets that Iran has hit because that's what they do. What should the banner read instead? How about Iran increasingly desperate? Because they are. They know it, and so do you, if it can be admitted. Or more fake news from CNN. Reports that the Trump administration underestimated the Iran war's impact on the Strait of Hormuz.

4:57Patently ridiculous, of course. For decades, Iran has threatened shipping in the Strait of Hormuz. This is always what they do, hold the straight hostage. CNN doesn't think we thought of that. It's a fundamentally unserious report. The sooner David Ellison takes over that network, the better. Another example of a fake headline that I saw yesterday, war widening. Here's a real headline for you for an actual patriotic press. How about Iran shrinking, going underground? You see, Iran's leaders are hiding in bunkers and moving into civilian areas. The only thing that is widening is our advantage. Well, Anthony, it's a view.

5:40Just to unpack one of the things he was saying, he was talking about David Ellison. So his point there being that David Ellison is the guy who's put up the money for the takeover that is happening with Warner Brothers, and Warner Brothers has CNN in its orbit. So CNN is effectively going to be controlled by David Ellison. David Ellison is a big fan of Barry Weiss. He's brought in to control CBS News. She has taken it, she would say, into the centre ground. Other people might say towards the right. And the crucial point is that David Ellison has actually said to CNN people, he said this the other day.

6:18In fact, I think we reported, didn't we, on the pod, that he says CNN isn't going to change. So that won't be too good for Pete Hegseth. The wider points that he made, I don't know, So as I was listening to him, Anthony, I'm so old, I was thinking of the Falklands War that Britain fought many, many years ago and all the effort that Margaret Thatcher, then Prime Minister of Britain, made to try to get the BBC to report things differently. And there was a whole inquiry afterwards about whether or not the BBC had been patriotic, etc, etc. So there is an element of this that is normal, I suppose, is what I'm saying.

6:53It's not just the Trump administration that gets crossed with broadcasters. Right. It is normal for a government to want the press to cover a war in a way that's favorable to them. Certainly the Bush administration during the Gulf War and the Iran War, the two Bush administrations, they tried to shape coverage. They didn't do it in quite so adversarial a way. The way they did it was embedding reporters into military units, and that tended to influence the coverage. if you're sitting there serving alongside combat units in dangerous situations, I think the reporting naturally might be more sympathetic, a different tone covering than if you were doing it from a distance.

7:37Here, though, I mean, he's picking apart the strap lines on CNN coverage, saying Iranians are desperate, which I think you'll agree that that is imputing motivations behind or emotions behind the Iranians that just war intensifies a little more playing it straight. I think there was something that Hagseth said there that is telling, and he talks about an actual patriotic press. And I think that shows you how he views the press, the role of the press, being patriotic, being on America's side, promoting the United States' efforts. Whereas I think the more traditional modern view of the press is not that it should be patriotic or not.

8:18It should just report the news and report the facts. But we saw that actually in some of the stuff Bari Weiss was writing in CBS. She said that CBS needs to be more patriotic. So I think you can see a kind of a through line between that and this latest comment by Hegseth. Yeah, it is difficult, isn't it? When people from your nation are in harm's way, it seems to me that governments have a right, and And actually, broadcasting organisations have a duty, in a sense, to think through the balance between reporting it from the point of view of the people who pay the bills ultimately for you, but also the people who are trusting you to do the right thing.

9:02You think of the Second World War. I mean, you know, the BBC and other, well, there weren't really other broadcasts in those days, but the BBC and other media outlets in Britain, there wouldn't have been much of a thought. well, we ought to be impartial, and there may be some Brits who don't think this war ought to be fought, etc., etc., because it was the Second World War. We live in more complex times. And I suppose the real issue for American broadcasters now is not just that they've got the Trump administration breathing down their necks, but also they know perfectly well that a very large swathe of the American population are, to put it mildly, quite skeptical about this war.

9:37Right, right. And you could see the way media coverage changed over the years. You are quite right in saying that the media coverage of World War II was essentially propagandized. It was touting the American line. If you remember the newsreels that they would show before movies and movie houses, they were always like, you know, go get them American troops out there fighting, defending life, liberty and the American way. But then maybe in the 1960s with the Vietnam War, the coverage became more critical because there was a growing perception among the American public that the administration wasn't telling them the truth, that the purpose of the war was not one that was advancing American interests.

10:20And most notably, when Walter Cronkite, who was the voice of CBS, the anchor, the most trusted man in American news, started to go critical. To say that we are mired in stalemate seems the only realistic, if unsatisfactory, conclusion. On the off chance, the military and political analysts are right. In the next few months, we must test the enemy's intentions in case this is indeed his last big gasp before negotiations. But it is increasingly clear to this reporter that the only rational way out then will be to negotiate, not as victims, but as an honorable people who lived up to their pledge to defend democracy and did the best they could.

11:09That represented a real breaking point, I think, in how the media perceived its responsibility in telling the American public the truth. And if things weren't going well, that the American public needed to know it because they have an influence on war policy and they could have a role in stopping a war or changing the conduct of a war that is a lost cause or is actually harming American interests. Yeah. And it's also worth saying, isn't it, that among the people who have questioned whether they had really thought through the threat to shipping in the Strait of Hormuz, that thing that really upset Hegseth, saying, obviously, we thought it through.

11:48I mean, John Bolton, who's kind of, I mean, nobody has been closer down the years to plans to attack Iran than John Bolton. And John Bolton has actually said, hasn't he, in the last few days, I don't think they really thought through what would happen in the Strait of Hormuz. So to bring it up as an issue is absolutely not an unfair, unjust, fake thing to do. Right, totally valid. And based on the administration's actions since the start of the war, it doesn't look like they had plans for a spike in energy prices. It doesn't look like they truly thought through what would happen if Iran started attacking tankers, attacking their neighbors and the oil facilities among their neighbors.

12:31I'll say on that tanker story, too, because that's what started all this off. I mean, the Wall Street Journal reported that there was a strike on a Saudi base, that tankers were damaged. Trump, in his true social post, says, well, all but one are mostly fine. They're back in the air. One was damaged. So there was an element of truth to that reporting. There was a strike on a Saudi base. The planes were damaged in some way. One still isn't flying. So to say that this is entirely fake news, I mean, the reality is this is war coverage and there's a fog of war that goes along with it. You're not going to get everything right when you're reporting.

13:06You can report what you're hearing. You can report what sources are telling you. And then over time, you know, you can you can refine that reporting to reflect the information that you have coming in at that point and to get hit over the head by by the president for for that first take on a story, I think, is is unfair. Hit over the head and worst, because you can say anything you like in America. You've got the First Amendment. You regularly use it, Anthony, on this podcast. I mean, is there something seriously that the administration can do? You know, Justin, there's one thing that Pete Hegseth and the Defense Department have already done, which is influence the type of people who are coming into the Pentagon to attend these briefings.

13:50They booted a huge swath of the more mainstream media outlets out of the press room at the Pentagon because they were trying to make them sign a pledge to not rely on unnamed sources, to get pre-approval for any kind of classified stories that they might be writing about the Pentagon. And then Hegseth just recently kicked out some photographers from these press briefings because he didn't like the photographs that were being taken of him and said they were unflattering, according to reports. So, you know, one way they're trying to control this is control who has the front row seats, who has the direct line of information from the administration to the press.

14:32And the other way, of course, is through the FCC. So the body that licenses, well, what do they license, Anthony? And how is it that they might be able to actually have some teeth and do something to people who they don't think are towing the line? Well, the biggest way the FCC has power over American media is by licensing broadcast stations. That's not the big networks, but the big networks own all of these affiliates all over the country. Some are independent, but some are owned by the big networks. the biggest markets, the ones that generate the most revenue. And they have to get approval from the FCC to be able to broadcast over the air.

15:12And we saw Brandon Carr, the head of the FCC, in a post on X this weekend, explicitly threaten license renewals if major news outlets didn't shape up their coverage of the administration. He said in this X post, Broadcasters that are running hoaxes and news distortions, also known as the fake news, have a chance now to correct course before their license renewals come up. The law is clear. Broadcasters must operate in the public interest and they will lose their licenses if they do not. So in a very real way, that's something that the government has that they could, independent of the First Amendment, use to to influence not cable news, not the stuff that isn't over the air.

15:55but the big network, CBS, ABC, Fox, and NBC. But if you, I mean, in the future, that won't matter, will it? So CBS, for instance, and I know this because I've said on the pod before, I've talked directly to Barry Weiss about their plans at CBS. And one of the things they're very keen on is having this portal, which will involve Warner Brothers films and all the other things that they've bought recently. And you'll go to the portal online. So assuming that is the business model and the kind of tech model that everyone's following in the longer term future, that means that Brendan Carr or any future FCC chair isn't going to be able to do anything, are they?

16:38I mean, at some point it will be irrelevant because the old fashioned way of getting television with an antenna on top of your house is not going to be the way people get it. And really, most people, I think at this point, don't get their television broadcasts that way. It's kind of antiquated. But it is the one tool that the federal government currently has to use to influence how these networks shape their news coverage. I wonder if we should sort of widen the focus for a minute, because we're in danger of getting bogged down on this particular fight, because it's fair to say, isn't it, Anthony, that the fight is a symptom of a bigger thing, which is the Trump administration feels under pressure domestically when it comes to the war.

17:25And it's something we've talked about and whether there are rifts in MAGA and they say, no, MAGA is still behind Donald Trump. And there is some evidence of that, isn't there? That actually the great majority of people who voted for Trump last time around probably will stick with him on the wall. But it's also fair to say, isn't it? And this is not just the extremes who we've talked about before, the Tucker Carlson's, etc. That there are some sort of more mainstream Trump associated people who are getting cold feet. I think that's true. And if you look at the polling, this war was not popular when it began.

17:59A majority of the Americans wanted more diplomatic efforts. A majority of Americans were skeptical of the goals, were worried about this becoming a quagmire. And not just reflecting the polls. I mean, when I was in Texas talking to voters there, Republican voters there, they expressed similar concerns. And I think the administration in the run up to this war didn't really prepare the American public for an extended conflict, which it now appears likely this is going to be. And so what you're seeing, I think, from the administration is a certain level of frustration that the media is reflecting this skepticism and, in a way, feeding it with information about the expansion of this war, the potential pitfalls of escalating the American involvement in this war, and the apparent lack of clear off-ramps at this point.

18:55the inability to topple the Iranian government, the inability to apparently totally disable their nuclear program. All of these things feed into, I think, a frustration that this president has, this administration has, and a desire to lash out at the media and blame the media for causing the public's discontent. Yeah, and it's worth listening to Joe Rogan on this. So Joe Rogan is a massively influential podcaster. he's not necessarily a Trump guy all the time but he was very very important wasn't he in Trump coming to power the second time round and well let's listen to the interview he's just done he's talking to the journalist Michael Schellenberger here's a bit of it.

19:40What just seems so insane based on what he ran on I mean this is why a lot of people feel betrayed right and he ran on no more wars and these stupid senseless wars and then we have one that we can't even really clearly defined why we did it. Well, but he said he's against endless wars. Well, they're all endless. Listen, man, they're all endless. Did you ever hear Rumsfeld talk about Iraq when it first happened? Tell me. They were talking about like six weeks. Six weeks. Oh, yeah. Six weeks. Yeah, and that's Rogan making the point, making the case there, and Schellenberger trying to push back a little bit, but actually not really managing to.

20:20And that, Anthony, when you hear someone like Joe Rogan, And it does really cut through, doesn't it? Because he's not making a particularly anti-Israel point, which a lot of the kind of further right podcasters don't like Israel. In fact, many Jews would say don't like Jews. And that's a sort of separate box, as it were. This is just much more mainstream, just saying, hey, guys, we were told we weren't going to be doing this kind of thing. Right. And it was central to Donald Trump's brand. And his criticism of the Iraq war when he ran for president in 2015, first time, was one of the ways he differentiated himself from the traditional Republican establishment.

20:59He said he was willing to say that that was a huge mistake and talk about not getting the United States entangled in in Mideast wars. And he stuck with that. And when he was campaigning in 2024, he said, you remember those there were the signs that said Kamala Harris will send your troops to foreign wars. wars or send your children to foreign wars. Trump positioned himself as the peace president. And now to reverse himself on that and to make the same sort of arguments that the Bush administration made in 2003, where they were saying, oh, you know, we've got to stop this foreign country from having nuclear weapons.

21:37And this is a war to protect the United States from the threat of nuclear destruction. I mean, I think that there's good reason for a lot of people who believe Trump to start to wonder what's going on and start to question the decisions that this administration is making. Yeah, and if that's the kind of middle ground people being skeptical about the war, it's worth reiterating, and we should listen to a clip as well, just those who are at the more extreme end of MAGA, some of them at least have completely lost it and are saying so very, very openly. Among them, this former Trump appointee, actually, Carrie Prigin-Boller, who told Piers Morgan back on Monday that she doesn't recognize the president anymore.

22:22Let's listen to her. I've been a loyal supporter of the president for almost 20 years. This goes back to when I was 21 years old and I was Miss California at the Miss USA pageant. And I've known him. I consider him a dear friend. And I will tell you right now, I do not recognize our president. I think that we are an occupied nation. I think that a foreign country has occupied our government. And we are seeing now that this president of the United States of America is being influenced by a foreign government. And MAGA, let me tell you right now, MAGA is dead. It is deader than dead. And Americans are furious.

22:58We do not recognize President Donald J. Trump anymore. And this, Anthony, is where it gets into Israel and the Jews, because that foreign government she's referring to is the Israeli government. And there's a perfectly legitimate discussion to be had about the extent to which the Israeli government kind of led America into this war. Absolutely. But there is on the far right. And you think of Nick Fuentes, the guy who admires Hitler, who was interviewed recently by Tucker Carlson. There is a very, very nasty white nationalist, anti-Jewish side to the Republican Party, isn't there? Or the Republican movement or to the broader right, I suppose, is the right way to put it.

23:40And that is now beginning to show itself very shamelessly. Yeah. And if you talk about divisions within MAGA, I mean, I think that's where the biggest crack is starting to show up. And actually, one of the top counterterrorism officials in Trump's administration, Joe Kent, resigned just a few days ago, saying that he could not in good conscience continue to work in the Trump administration. I mean, this is what he wrote in his resignation letter. He said he cannot support the ongoing war in Iran. Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation. And it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby.

24:19I mean, there you go. I mean, there's no pretense in a Trump administration official resigning, explicitly saying that Trump is being influenced and his administration is being influenced by Israel. And I think that there is a very real danger that that does create more anti-Semitic sentiment in this country from a part of Donald Trump's base that has always had this strain in it. And Kent himself has ties to Nick Fuentes and some of the other more controversial figures in the far right of Trump's coalition. Yeah, it's quite interesting to see with Kent. So as soon as he makes those criticisms of the Trump administration, certainly on this side of the pond, I've seen people who possibly ought to know better saying, oh, finally, the experts are having their say.

25:08And it's a terrible embarrassment for the administration without knowing what you've just told us, because you do know these things that actually this guy himself has links to these people it made his nomination in the first place as as boss of counter-terrorism it made it pretty controversial don't i remember him i mean he maybe got through with just republican votes but he was always a controversial figure and the fact that he's come out now openly as you say it opens up this this wider thing on the far right but it's not it's not necessarily a kind of sign from the moderate middle ground that they think the Trump administration is doing the wrong thing.

25:44No, it's a peeling off of a portion of Trump's base that is on the right fringe. But it also is a portion of Donald Trump's base that has been with him from the very start. And people like Candace Owens, who used to be a Trump supporter, a podcaster, influencer, is now also very critical, also explicitly critical on the Israel issue. This segment of Trump's base is increasingly up in arms, and that is a danger to Trump's ability to hold his coalition together. And not just Trump, I mean, let's be honest, Donald Trump's not running for president. He may be thinking more about creating a lasting legacy of defeating a longtime American adversary in the Middle East, but the people who are going to pick up the torch from Trump, people like J.D.

26:34Vance, the vice president, who also has very clearly defined positions on no foreign entanglements, avoiding overseas forever wars. I mean, those folks could be in very real trouble if they want to try to recreate Donald Trump's winning coalition from 2016 and 2024. Okay, Anthony, that's it for today. See you later. Bye-bye. Bye, y 'all.