Should People Still Trust the Media in 2025?

25:18It's an interesting question because I think that the challenge in 16 and 24, first of all, 24, I think the coverage throughout 24 was that it was a pretty close race, which it ended up being. I think in 16, it was much different. It was a one and a half point national election, but it was a decisive electoral college victory for Donald Trump. It was. But if you looked at even the polling or the coverage, he was up in those battleground states. But the Times polling at the end was pretty close. Thank you. In 16, the polls were way off. And I do think that the media coverage in that election followed the polls.

25:54I think if you had replayed 2016 and the polls were accurate and from the time that Donald Trump was nominee and Hillary Clinton was nominee, you started seeing a close race in all the battleground states, I believe the media coverage would have been much different. I think there is a critique of legacy media following the polls too much in their coverage and political coverage for sure. But also, to your point about Trump's complaint about this, he won. He won both of those elections. And so clearly the public, whatever the media was doing, the public got the information they needed to make a decision about both of the candidates in each of those elections.

26:35Also, the largest legacy media organization on television that has the biggest audience is Fox News. And so, like, plenty of people were hearing Donald Trump's version of reality. And by the time you get to 2024, millions and millions of people were hearing Donald Trump's version of reality through Ben's podcast, through a whole bunch of other right-wing media. So I don't think I think you could make a case a couple decades ago that the traditional media, which is liberal leaning, was the dominant source of information for people in the country. I don't think you can make that case today because I now think that there is just a diversity of voices, especially on the right, but across the political spectrum that people can tune into.

27:16So I don't necessarily think that's a challenge. I think that's a really great point. We can't complain about the impact of legacy media while at the same time saying it's dead. Right? Like it's one or the other. And now, are people turning to other forms of media because they don't trust it, because they're more entertaining? Who knows? Because they're more easily accessible. Who knows? But that is a great point. It's not like there was underrepresentation for the people that wanted Trump to win. There was representation. And yeah, that's a good point. Well, I mean, I think that there is truth to the idea that the right wing, when they say that legacy media are dead, that's obviously an exaggeration.

27:56It's very much not true. And the reality is that there are kind of two types of media. There's a well-funded legacy media that does an enormous amount of reportage. And my show relies on a lot of that reportage. And so to not acknowledge that reality would be foolish, obviously. With that said, I think that if you were going to steelman the right wing critique of legacy media, the examples I would use would not be the 2016 election. It would be Russiagate. It would be the coverage of COVID in 2020. It would be the coverage of Joe Biden's obvious to everyone with redness and a frontal cortex decline in 2024.

28:29Do you mind if I ask you to do COVID? OK, so the narrative on the right about COVID is that, yes, it was true that COVID was, at least in the initial phase, a very, very scary thing. And then universally, the media coverage focused in on the idea that if you were in close proximity to anyone, including outside, that it was going to kill you, that schools should be shut down, that the entire society should be shut down. But also, if you were outside in the street protesting for Black Lives Matter, it was totally fine for you to be outside spitting on one another for the proper cause. And that COVID suddenly discriminated on the basis of politics.

29:01And the questions about vaccines were a massive exaggeration of reality and that anyone who questioned vaccines in any way was part of the problem. And listen, I was one of the people who was pretty credulous about the vaccines in the early going. I told people to take the vaccine in the early part of 2021 specifically because the reportage from the Trump administration was that it was going to prevent transmission, which, of course, turned out later not to be. No, prevent it. Especially for the elderly and people with preexisting conditions. if you were 30 years old and healthy, the idea that you radically needed a COVID vaccine to save yourself from a condition is really not.

29:37But is that a fault of the media or the science, right? Like they did believe when the vaccines came out that they would prevent transmission. Then once we got into, I can't believe I'm going back to COVID now. But once we got into Delta and then Omicron, then it was clear that the vaccines would not prevent transmission anymore, that they would just be protective of severe illness. So the facts of the science changed. And then I'm pretty sure, because I followed it way too closely for covering it, because I'm a bit of a hypochondriac, that the science changed, and then there was a new mutation.

30:06And that's it. It was a once-in-a-lifetime pandemic, and we were covering it real time. I mean, so was I, and I was looking at the same data that you guys were looking at, and that's fine. But I think the idea that that was not tied to a broader narrative about the public health establishment or about politics when it came to Black Lives Matter and the protests and the riots or about the public policy decisions that are being made variously by Andrew Cuomo, hero of the pandemic early on versus Ron DeSantis, great villain of the pandemic early on. Again, I think that when we look at members of the legacy media who covered this sort of stuff, they can point to their granular level coverage.

30:39The way that people actually consume media is via gestalt. It's just the way that people consume everything. The kind of general overall sense. And one of the reasons Ron DeSantis did such a good job with COVID is because he was adamant about getting those vaccines to his state, to elderly communities. I mean, Governor DeSantis, by the way, was like very deep in the data from very, very early. I remember talking to him about it during the summer of 2020. But, you know, again, if we're talking about the critique of the media, the basic idea here is not that the media don't do reporting. It's what they choose to report on and how they report it.

31:08An emphasis. Can I push back on one thing? Because I think we're kind of speaking in broad terms about something that was quite, frankly, when you look back on it now, like a very worrying moment in American history. because it showed that when you seed enough doubt in the traditional deliverers of information, even the scientists and the experts upon whom we as a country and a nation and society have relied to get us where we are and alive and healthy today, that it can cause real damage. I mean, over a million Americans died in that pandemic. And what we saw from the beginning, to Stephanie's point, was journalists following the science and the experts.

31:43If there was a bias in media, legacy media at the time, it was that we do rely on experts. We do tend to go with what the scientists tell us because that's where the evidence is. That's where the facts are. Does anyone at the table have a regret when it comes to COVID? I'll offer one. I think it took me too long to question shutdowns. I think that's right. But I think we're - And whether they were working. We're talking about a lot of things all at once very quickly. And I just want to make one point. It is, to me, arguable at once that the New York Times is the most sustained and best news gathering organization in this country.

32:19That's why I'm moderating the panel. At the other hand, I would say that the New York Times, you know, also has on its history, as other news organizations do, Walter Durante, who suppressed the artificial famine in Ukraine. It failed to cover something called the Holocaust and has made any number of really serious errors as every serious news organization has historically. Now, does that mean that that is because of the liberal media that the flaws in the history of The New York Times, which I still think despite all its flaws is I don't know. I can't think of what news organization I come from The Washington Post.

32:59This is very painful for me to admit. surpasses the New York Times? Is it for ideological reasons? Is it because of a group of people get together and conspire to hide one thing and to reveal another? No. I think we have to admit that these collectives, these organizations are made up of human beings. And that what we're talking about in the press is a first rough draft of history. And what you're discussing is totally legitimate, totally legitimate about where the coverage of COVID went wrong. Yes. And some of it has to do with flaws in coverage. Some of it has to do the fact that was happening in real time and what we're being told by credible scientists as opposed to others or Robert F.

33:45Kennedy Jr. or whomever whose credibility is perhaps lower than Anthony Fauci's even to this very day. So we talked about a lot of things at once. We are. And it's worthwhile to kind of slow down and say, you know, some of these organizations are both superb and flawed, including my own. But the question is, I think, and I think this is why you've seen the rise of what, you know, partisan media like my company or John's company is because if all the errors tend toward one direction, then you start to question the underlying bias of the newsroom, right? There are very few errors in favor of Donald Trump in the New York Times.

34:21There are very few errors in favor of the Republican Party in the New York Times. Most corrections are happening in the opposite direction. And so you have to start wondering about - Literal corrections or course corrections over time? Both. But I think that, and that's why, you know, the recommendation that I've made for news consumers, and I say this literally on my show frequently, is that if you actually want a good way of determining what is opinion versus what is fact, what you should do is listen to both my show and John's show. And any place where we agree, that's the basis of fact. And then every place where we disagree, that's the opinion.

34:50But you mean it from earlier. What you do is very different. What you do is very different. You know, you guys are informed each in your own way, but I don't know that you're spending all your days dug in and reporting on one issue, talking to sources and producing that kind of journalism. That's what I read in New York before. But you said it a moment ago, without that original reporting from news organizations, that's the basis for much of what you cover. And I would just argue that every single day, thousands of stories are reported on. But it's the fringiest, most incendiary things that the algorithm picks up and churns out and churns out and pumps up and pumps up and pumps up.

35:32And it's the algorithm. For a moment, if we consider that what's going viral is making us sick, and we can make a choice to consume what's going viral or just take a minute, lower the temperature, and have open minds. Stephanie, I do want to focus on something we do have a little bit more control over than the virality of the algorithm. and that for me means returning to the question of 2024 coverage. I suspect that President Trump, just to go back to his perspective, would say that MSNBC embodies, in his mind, what he's going after here, having a particularly liberal worldview, and he would argue failing to convey certain realities to people.

36:13Let's take immigration. where the network, I would argue that the MSNBC's coverage of immigration tends to be pretty sympathetic to migrants. I don't know if you would disagree with that. How are you thinking about an issue like that post-election given how crucial immigration was to Trump's victory? Do you feel like MSNBC conveyed the reality of the immigration story to America? I absolutely believe that I did. And I know that I specifically asked Kamala Harris about it. Use Springfield, Ohio as an example. No one was eating cats and dogs in Springfield, Ohio. However, Springfield, Ohio changed dramatically.

36:54And if we don't hold space and interview people and speak to people who say, my community is different, my town is different, resources are constrained, the schools are overcrowded, the hospitals are overcrowded, and immediately not call those people who are feeling those issues. If we're immediate to say, well, they're xenophobic, They're racist. That's the issue that many of us are dealing with, that the United States is changing dramatically. Right. It's it's easy to say that we're a nation of immigrants and we have to welcome everyone. Immigration is complicated. I can't speak for my entire organization.

37:29I can say that we accurately cover the news. And I know every night on my show, our goal is to help people get better and smarter. Now, do I think immigration is covered in a dramatic fashion on the other side? Sure. Right. My mother is a devoted Fox News watcher. And you can tell my mother that a violent caravan of criminals is making their way up from Venezuela. And she'll believe you because she's in Park Ridge, New Jersey. But when the right wing tells my mother that there's no inflation, she knows that they're lying because she buys London Royal from ShopRite every Friday and she knows the price of it.

38:03That's real Jersey. So sure is. So at the end of the day, you have to tell your audience the truth. The challenge is, if your audience has a particular bias and they don't like what you have to say, you have to be a strong enough journalist that they're going to stay with you. So for me, I regularly say that President Trump is a brilliant politician. I actually think that's almost irrefutable that he is. Now, lots of my audience doesn't like to hear that because they don't like him, but they haven't left. So I think the challenge for good journalists is, how do you tell people a truth that they might not love, but that they accept?

38:38You just tell them the truth. And that's why, you know, Ben kept using the word heiress. And I don't think that these newsrooms are making heiress. I think they have agendas. And I think that, you know, the thing that a lot of these newsrooms don't understand now is they don't control... What do you mean these newsrooms? MSNBC, CNN, Fox News, y 'all have agendas. Tell me what's happening. You know how I know y 'all have agendas? MSNBC, based off all the points that you just said, I conveyed those same points and MSNBC said I was spreading MAGA messaging. You may not have done that stuff, but MSNBC as a whole, we talked about this.

39:06So they have agendas. They have a set of programming that they want to push to a group of people. And when they see all of these different things happening on social media or on podcasts, they're realizing, oh man, the people aren't buying into our programming. So instead of actually listening to the people, they continue to try to push their programming. And that's why people don't trust the media. You're saying for business reasons. But this idea that people don't trust the media. I don't know what the media is, though. People are consuming media today than ever have. Not by choice. What do you mean not by choice?

39:32That's where we should get into algorithmic discussion. No, I think they're choosing to, but they also don't trust what they're hearing. Especially from - How old are your children? 17, 10, 74. Is your 17-year-old more engaged in the news than you were when you were 17? I don't think so. Mine definitely are. And so there's more news outlets than there ever have been before. and the business of news is going through transformation and in crisis. But I would argue that people are more engaged and more informed than I've ever seen in my life. Why is that? Because democracy is at risk. No. That's not it.

40:05What is it? Because they're carrying that thing in their pocket. Yeah. It's just filling their head. We no longer live in monoculture. Monoculture is dead. That's why Leonardo DiCaprio can be in a movie with a superstar director and it loses$200 million. Yeah. Because people don't even know the movie's out. That's right. We do not share the same information. We live in a thousand different realities. And we're even having this discussion right now, which is kind of almost two years late, because we're having like, how have podcasts disrupted media? It's like, that was two to four years ago. That's right.

40:32We've already been disrupted again. We should be talking about how AI is going to disrupt media. We're having an antiquated discussion about media on traditional media. That's right. That's right. This is a sell part of the show. The additional media. On one of the most listened to podcasts on the planet. Well, what I would say about that specifically. Not after what Andrew said. No, no, no, no, no. No, what I would say about that specifically is that you guys, part of your success is obviously your wife. Hi, Lisa. Hi, Lisa. Nice to meet you again. And you guys are very talented, but you also met the moment, right?

41:05Like going in and breaking away from maybe traditional media. And I think there is a little part of this discussion, which is like we all value traditional media, at least people over 35. Because we've been taught that. We've learned behavior. Maybe the young people don't, but we still hear New York Times. It means something to us. I saw my dad like unfold it every morning and it was something special. Okay. But right now we live in a thousand different realities because we went from fan clubs, which is like Instagram, right? To TikTok. TikTok drives culture, whether you like it or not. And TikTok is pure algorithm, right?

41:34What they did is they realized people actually don't want to follow their friends. They want us to feed them the most interesting thing. And interesting can be low hanging fruit. It can be chaos, clickable, right? Once that happened, it divided us into a thousand different silos, those silos that you're now in are getting less views, right? So people start going, oh, shoot, my views are going away. Well, what do I do to get more views? Ratchet up the dialogue, ratchet up the rhetoric. And now you're saying the most insane stuff because only the most insane stuff crosses over completely. A porn star - Is this a bit autobiographical here?

42:08No. I would say the opposite. I would say the fact that I'm not leaning into one vertical means I get hate from every single group, right? And it's like, that's a choice I'm making. The easiest way to make money is just to run with one fucking side and then just keep on spouting what people want to believe. But Andrew is also really insane. So that's a difference. Yeah, fair enough. You don't have to say insane things. It's really insane. But it's like, to me, it's important to talk to all different people, right? It's important to have these conversations. Like I'm positioned in a certain way.

42:34Obviously we had Trump on the podcast. I've had like five Democratic politicians on the podcast. I've had one Republican, but I'm viewed in this certain way because it's the easiest way to get clicks and my name is clickability and whatever. I'm not, I don't know, like, sorry for me, but I guess what I'm trying to say is when the rhetoric has to be so extreme to cross over, right? Because you need to hop out of your silo to get the views you used to do. Other people see it and they're like, okay, now my rhetoric needs to be extreme. There's a porn star that had sex with a thousand guys in a day.

43:02You didn't need to do that back in the day, but that's what you need to do to cross over. So what does that mean for media? What does that mean for any political discussion? right now the only thing that is monoculture is news which is what you're saying right it's the only thing that really crosses over trump is such a magnetic force liable or hate him the only way you can get people to talk about you every single day or watch your videos every single day answer what are you saying you're saying a lot of things all at once but what are you saying that's prescriptive what does that mean prescriptive like what should be what can you recommend oh you want me to tell you what should be done i think it's like in your view well there's multiple things.

43:35Now that this is number one, we didn't know that food was bad for us when we were growing up like McDonald's. Like when I was a kid, like McDonald's was food, right? It wasn't bad food. It was just food. And what I assume will happen in the next like two to five years is we'll start realizing that the internet also needs nutrition facts. So when I open my phone and a video from an account I don't even follow is put onto my screen and it's saying some crazy salacious hot take, my immediate reaction should be Big Mac, fries, milkshake. Don't take this as truth. Don't take this as 100 % reality. Understand that this is fast food meant to keep me engaged.

44:17But what's happening right now is - It's still going to need a gatekeeper though. Now we're bringing the gatekeepers back. We got rid of them, now we need to bring them. Well, the gatekeeper, I guess, could be ourselves. It could be to have that distrust of media, To have that distress of content that we don't even subscribe to. But if the gatekeeper is telling the truth, well, we don't want to believe the gatekeeper, we won't believe the truth that the gatekeeper... That is another problem. And there are so many people that are going to echo the sentiments that we already feel. But that goes back to Trump.

44:41You know, he's not the first person to do this, but he's the most brilliant person to do this in the position of power. He has done more than anybody to eradicate the notion that some things are true and some things are false. eradicate the notion that some things are true and some things are false we don't live in a world where we have a common set of facts he's not the first precedence a lot we live in different realities i actually think that we're looking for solutions in many of the wrong places meaning that the more it's true media consumption is as stephanie is saying at an all-time high are we happier is the country doing better because media consumption is at an all-time that's a different question no i think it's the only important question is our politics better because media consumption is at an all-time high or are we actually more atomized and are things worse?

45:26So I'm going to say something that's in none of our interest, which is that everybody should turn off their fucking phone and that we should all start spending time with each other in person and touch some grass. And this will drop out. Okay. That is about decency. And when you go back to politics, 30 years ago, lawmakers moved to Washington with their families. Okay. They lived there. So while they disagreed on the Hill all day, when they left, they would go to the same Little League games as somebody on the other side of the aisle or the grocery store. Is the Halal Day something Mamdani is putting in New York City?

45:56Now they do not live in Washington. All they do is speak in silos, and then they have no incentive to actually work together. The fact that our government was just shut down for eight weeks is so awful that our lawmakers think that they can operate that way. You can't operate that way, private business. So what you're asking for in politics or media is the same thing, decency. And that's what we need a return for. But I'm also asking for people to break what is pretty clearly an addiction, and that includes politicians who are using the algorithm as a substitute for actual public opinion. Which is why we're seeing on both sides, by the way.

46:34Again, I'm on both sides of this thing because it's actually true. You're seeing extremes on both sides who are programming toward the algorithm. And it is our opinion that that's actually reflective of where the American people are. And then the American people are dissatisfied with the options they're being offered. And so we keep ping-ponging side to side wildly between a harder right-right and a further left-left. And what most Americans want is actually something pretty staid and in the middle. But when you do that, you're a fence sitter. How dare you sit there?

47:02We have some of the most powerful media personalities around this table right here. And I guess the question is, we all live in this world fighting for the same attention economy, right? Whether you're putting out straightforward journalism or partisan takes or celebrity news or whatever it is, we're all fighting for the same eyeballs out there, right? There's a reason that rage bait was the word of the year from the Oxford University Press this year. And it's because people like to go to places where they are emotionally triggered into feeling something. And it becomes addictive. Last year it was brain rot.

47:34This year it's rage bait. This is a vicious cycle that we're stuck in. Things are unwell, to your point. How do you, to get back to David's question, how do you fix it? What are you recommending? I feel like Ben's recommending. Ben said, Ben said, we should all take a blood oath to stop doing our jobs tomorrow, move to Montana together with our kids. Well, he didn't say all that. He just said, turn your phone off every now and then and go actually talk to people. If you would have actually spoken to people two years ago, you would have known how they felt about it. Right. I'm not even going to make a political pitch.

48:03There are good sources of information out. Y 'all should keep Sabbath, right? Everyone, seriously. God had a reason for this. Friday night to Saturday night, turn off your phone, go spend some time with your family and your community, you'll be better. There's something to that. But looking at that meeting with Mamdani and Trump went, right? Both of their core bases were spinning. Correct. Because both expected the other to drop kick them, you know, and tell them to go F themselves. And the media wasn't honest about that meeting? How so? None of it. None of the legacy media because my brain was, my brain was, I'm going to tell you why, I'm going to tell you why my brain was scrambled.

48:33I'm going to tell you why my brain was scrambled. I watched that meeting and I watched, you know, Mondani, who has called Donald Trump a fascist, right? Acknowledge that he's a fascist. Then even in interviews afterwards say, yes, he's a fascist, but I can work with him. Is that not normalizing fascism to the highest degree by saying that? That's a great point. And everybody just sat around and was like, yeah, I'm glad that they were smiling and giggling. That is exactly how fascism gets normalized in countries. Well, I actually thought what Trump said in the meeting was interesting when he goes, you know, when you get into office, you change.

49:05I've changed. And I thought it was a very real moment where it's like before you are an elected official, you have all these great, grandiose ideas about you're going to change things. And then reality hits. That's right. And you realize what you can or can't do. You know, we've talked a lot about critiquing Trump, and I think a lot of those critiques are fair. But one thing that we should say about President Trump is actually he is not very online. Like in his actual governance, aside from, you know, his sort of revenge-minded tactics that he used against him, which, again, we've talked about.

49:32But his actual governance is actually fairly kind of down the right side of the middle of the road in a lot of his actual policy picks. And what that means is that he is not a person. I mean, if you actually watch his media consumption, the president's media, he reads the New York Times, he reads the New York Post. It's physically printed out for him. Like, really. And so he actually is not responding to the algorithm in the ways that even many members of his own cabinet are responding to the algorithm. But he's watching a lot of Fox. I think the interesting thing about the Trump-Mamdani meeting is we talked about how, you know, it's the extreme people, the algorithm sort of gives us those people.

50:09But it's also people's most extreme moments. And I think that politicians are victim to this, too, because they consume the same information we do as well. And I think that Trump probably heard from his people and from all the media he consumed that Mamdani is this crazy communist, dangerous, whatever. And he sits down with them. He's like, hey, this is charming and nice. And Mabdani is smart and talks about affordability. And I'm sure that in that meeting, Trump is probably like, oh, this isn't as bad as I thought it was. Trump's a people person. I mean, he really is. He's never spending time with President Trump.

50:40He's an absolute people person. Well, he put almost anyone in the room with him up to and including the current leader of Syria who was a terrorist five minutes ago. Right. He would be totally nice to have. And so I think that, like, that is an example, too, of the— He just messed up to him. He gave him the cologne. Exactly. Okay. But, like, to your point about, like, what we should all be doing, right? Like, yes, it's turn off our phone. But some of the media that we all produce, too, is like watching clips of you on social media, you get a much different impression of you than listening to your whole podcast.

51:11You're speaking to Ben right now. That's fair. It's the algorithm. But I think that's true for all of us. So it's not just the most extreme figures are being heard more. It's the most extreme parts of everyone who's in public life. And the reaction to those things. So it's like you say one sentence on your podcast, some guy on TikTok reacts to it. Flips it out. Yes. Yep, that's right. You know, smirches your good name. And now all of a sudden, his following believes this out of context sentence that you said one time on your podcast. Yes. And I think that a really troubling thing for legacy media, and now we're seeing even more so with what do we call this new media, is facts can be corrected.

51:54Narratives, it is almost impossible. And your point earlier, I think, is such a great point, which is that we're actually fighting a battle from two years ago when we're talking about the podcast revolution. One of the things about podcasting that was really wonderful and charming at the beginning was the idea that you were having actual long form, multi-hour conversations. And then TikTok and YouTube Shorts and all the rest of these programs took over. And it actually destroyed that. And so you're watching a clip of Joe Rogan for a minute 30 or a clip of your show or my show or John's show. I'm not sure your point about narratives is true with respect.

52:22I think narratives, here was a narrative. You were talking about COVID. there was a certain narrative. That has gotten certainly complicated over time. There are narratives about going to war that get complicated, not just by the results of that war, but by the uncovering, by reporting. What we're overlooking a lot in this conversation is the essential need for hard reporting. It is absolutely great to have criticism and press criticism and commentary on all of that. But if we lose sight of the importance of really hardcore reporting, reporters or teams of reporters being set loose on a story and not just for a half an hour, but for weeks and months, then I think - Can I just say one thing on that?

53:10Because I agree with you, David. And that's expensive. But no, I agree with you, David. And it's bad business. What I meant more, and that is a great point also, it is bad business. But like what I meant more was the time it takes to correct a narrative might be a decade. It might be five years. The time it takes to correct facts is immediate. And oftentimes the correction of facts does not even go close to as viral as the initial video. When David's last word on this, then I'm going to jump. OK, when David, because I agree with you when you talked about, you know, Donald Trump's authoritarian strategy, you know, towards the media.

53:44Right. But is that a fact or a narrative? And the reason I say it's a fact or a narrative because when he gets into... He announces it out loud? I know. No, I think it's a fact. But when he gets in the White House with Zoran Mondani, a guy who called him a fascist, CNN will run an article that just says... I saw that difference. CNN will run an article that says Zoran Mondani charmed America's unruly uncle. Bullshit. So he's just an unruly uncle now? No, I think what I saw in that, and you guys disagree, I saw two politicians who wanted something from each other. But that's a difference between...

54:17Political disagreements are a difference. That's a difference than calling somebody a fascist. They were both performing something. Trump was having a really lousy political week and coming off unhinged even more than usual. And then he had this hinged moment with Mamdani, who he discovered was not a monster. Because Mamdani normalized him. In the media, normalized him. Yes, y 'all did. Hang on, let me finish my point. And Mamdani needs something from Trump. Of course he loathes Trump. Of course he does. How do you know that? We don't know that, and the general public does not know that. I don't know.

54:47You're giving the general public way too much credit. I've interviewed him. I've done the reporting. Sometimes you know something. Sometimes you've heard from the horse's mouth. And so repeat it. So what he needs from the president of the United States is all kinds of—he doesn't want even more ICE officers coming in. He wants to be able to run the city free of the opposition and the power of the White House. So he wanted to bring the temperature down there. I don't think they're going out on a date. That's good politics. But you can do that if you're having a political disagreement, but you can't do that if you're dealing with fascism.

55:23You understand why these words matter? Clearly these words don't matter. No, no, I get what you're saying. And I understand because what we also have to hold people accountable for is how they rile up their audience. Yes. So, for example, if you... And I don't think it'll last, by the way. I think that was a good moment in time. But just to get this point out, which is like, and I think that what Charlamagne is speaking to, It's like I'm sure his base was really riled up and this guy's a fascist and they're out there tweeting it. They're out there making videos. They're championing these ideas with let's not go hate but vitriol for these people.

55:54And then they see this guy do the right political thing, which is what you spoke to before when congressmen would go and they'd meet at these restaurants in D.C. and they'd have brunch with each other and they maybe really disagreed. Maybe they didn't even like each other, but they knew it was the right thing for the country and their constituents to find a way to broker a deal. So we saw this, what I thought was like great display of humanity between two people that really disagree. I loved it. It made me really proud. I was like, why don't we all go do that? Maybe everybody should make a person, but.

56:19That's a very optimistic view. Fair, fair. But what I don't like is the idea of riling up your base to the point where they're making like hate videos and they're really dehumanizing the opposition. And then you see this beautiful display of humanity. And that's probably confusing because online the discourse is, fuck you, fuck you, how dare you, communist, fascist. And then you see them in the room together and they're like, ah, my boy. I would love that if it was normal political times. But y 'all are telling me this isn't normal political times. But even if it wasn't a beautiful display of humanity, it was smart media and politics in that every story that week for Trump was about Epstein until that meeting.

56:59He called for the death of Democrat opposition the day before the meeting. literally the day before. And then y 'all just go, I'm like... You're saying Donald Trump is inconsistent in his self-respect? I'm saying the media is just as inconsistent because instead of staying on your message about his authoritarian strategy, you move the way he moves. So wherever he goes, y 'all go with it. Oh, now he's charming and we're done. We're covering the news. One of the things you're getting at... I think there's a difference between keeping a narrative and just covering the news. I'll just make this one quick, which is to say we can't talk about things that didn't happen.

57:28We have to cover the news as it happened. So we saw what happened in the meeting. We covered the meeting. as reporters by laying out what both sides said, by adding our own analysis and our reporting. But you should still keep your narrative instead of reacting to the narrative that he creates. Can I ask you what you all suspect is the actual power of some of the media organizations we're talking about to do some of the things it seems, Charlotte, I mean, you're suggesting. I want to fast forward. Can I ask you one question? Real quick, real quick, please. Yeah. Oh my God. It's just real quick.

57:55You said a great point. You said a great thing about performance, right? Yeah. And what I would posit to you is when is the performance truly beginning? Is the performance in the room with you? If he could perform for Trump, why would he not perform for you? I don't think it's a great revelation to discover that politicians are performing. But you truly believed it. You just said right here, I've sat with him, I heard it from the horse's mouth. No, no, no. When in reality, he could be charming you in the exact same way. He could leave the room like, ah, this dumb idiot. He believes I actually hit this guy and I'm going to go over here.

58:26Okay, fair enough. So my point is - Hang on. Do you want me to answer that question? Well, let me just get the point out. My performance is the performance online to rile up the bass, right? Or is the performance in the room with each other? or is it all part of the performance? And either way, the audience, we are the victims of it. That's right. And that is my concern. That's right. What I would say is that you have to watch these people over time in what they say and what they do, what they enact. And do I think that performance that the two of the meeting is going to last forever? I would guess not.

59:05I would guess not because politics is going to thrust them into conflict over one thing or another, and I don't think that'll last. Okay, I want to move into our second interruption. Trump was a long interruption. Yeah. I want to interrupt the Trump interruption by making sure we cover what Andrew Schultz would say is a two-year-old story of the emergence of personalities, journalists as brands. Andrew, John, Charlamagne, Ben, you are the embodiment of that, at least at this table. And Charlamagne, you raise a really provocative question. What is the power of any single organization or journalist, even journalists as big as your brands at this table, to rein in anything, to influence anything?

59:48And I want to put that question to the test. Ben, you recently encountered something within your own party, in your own conservative movement. You found the testable, which is the anti-Semitism of Nick Fuentes. and you on your show said this is a problem for the Republican Party and the conservative movement, it is a dangerous road, it is the radicalization of our party, you compared it to what you see as the radicalization of the left, and on your watch you don't want it to happen. When you do something like that and you try to draw a red line, does it matter? And who's the message for? So the message is, I think, obviously directed at my audience, which is large, But I think that it's also directed at many of the political actors who are listening and who recognize that they have a lot of constituents who listen to my show or who take my opinion seriously on this.

1:00:42And I will point out that I did make a full speech about Nick Fuentes in 2018 at Stanford University. So this has been a concern for me. It's popped back up because of Tucker Carlson, the Heritage Foundation. Correct. This has been a significant concern for me for a very long time. And it isn't just about the anti-Semitism. I think that that is, you know, the anti-Semitism, I think, is in many cases the final outgrowth of an anti-meritocracy standpoint that has taken root in the Republican Party and to which I seriously object on a broader level. The point of doing what I did is to make clear to the conservative audience that there ought to still be conservative principles.

1:01:17When you form political coalitions, there are enormous numbers of people of a wide variety of different viewpoints inside that coalition. But there have to be some contours other than just opposition to the other side. That tends to be papered over in the middle of an election cycle, where it's you pick one or you pick the other. But you see this happen a lot within parties, where after an election happens and you win or after an election you lose, you have to now redefine what exactly the coalition ought to be and what ought to be the tip of the spear in terms of what is acceptable and what is not acceptable.

1:01:43And so for me, looking at the sort of state of play inside the Republican Party, which, again, is sort of roiling under the surface of Trump. Trump is this gigantic figure who sits on top and can kind of – he's sui generis. He can sort of fit everything within him. And the same way that Barack Obama was for the Democratic Party, he could bring so many of these strands together and they could live comfortably. But post-Trump, that's not going to be the case. And so the question is going to be what ideas and what attitudes and what belief systems define the conservative movement going forward. And so the point that I was making is a conspiratorial belief system that is unrooted in traditional conservatism is not something that I've been fighting for my entire career.

1:02:18Because when I got into this, I was 17 years old and I was not looking to make money from it. Thank God I've made a lot of money from it. But that was not the goal. You're going to be a lawyer. Correct. And if you go back and you read my stuff, and I've been writing a syndicated column for something like 25 years at this point, then what you will see is that I am almost perfectly consistent in my belief systems from the time that I was 17 until now. There are probably issues on which I shifted. I've tried to explain why I've shifted on those issues. But I got into this because I care about the ideas, not because I care predominantly about the money.

1:02:47And so if you care about the things that you're talking about, then you have to be honest with your audience when you see those things being under threat. That's a really interesting take that Trump is such a magnetic force that the effects of Fuentes are for the next election and the future. I never saw it that way. I thought that there was this breakup of the Republican Party now, but you think it can be held together. Well, Trump's in power, right? So, I mean, he's going to define—so, for example, the coalition was very fratious about the Iran attack. But more than being in power, you think that his just strength, he has that Obama-esque quality to hold together the coalition.

1:03:21This is for sure true. Where J.D. might not have it. That's correct, because J.D. is not a media figure. I mean, J.D.'s a politician, right? I mean, J.D.'s a very talented politician. But if you look at President – and I think, by the way, Tucker, who very much opposes everything that I'm saying, Tucker Carlson, he would say the same, I think. He would say that this is much more about the next election and the future of the Republican Party and where it goes. And so President Trump, just a perfect example, when he authorized the B-2 mission against Fordow, there were a lot of people – The Iran nuclear reactor.

1:03:47The Iran nuclear reactor. When that happened, there were a lot of figures, these figures that I'm talking about, who were extremely critical of Trump doing that, saying it was going to lead to World War III, which I thought was absurd on its face just from a geopolitical standpoint. They were making that case. And this was supposed to be roiling the Republican Party. President Trump does that. And his approval rating actually increases inside the Republican Party. So the narrative online, this is, again, one of those areas where the algorithm and the narrative just don't match the reality. The narrative online, particularly on X, which I think is a cesspool, the narrative is that the Republican Party is totally fraying at the seams that's coming apart.

1:04:19The truth is, on that issue, the Republican Party was not because of Trump. Can I ask you that issue? But it's not just a question. I think we have somebody at the table. So this is the dynamic. And I think this is important. The dynamic right now is that the online, it starts off online. It is algorithmically projected. People take it. It bleeds into real life. And once that happens, it fragments the body politic. So I think we have at the table someone who would know a lot about this. There came a time in the Obama's political self-regard was built around not only being able to win Chicago and its suburbs, but also lots of votes in southern Illinois and Indiana and Ohio and the rest.

1:04:55that there was a bridging quality to him. But there came a time that we all know about that he had to give a speech on race. And the trigger for that was remarks by his own pastor, Jeremiah Wright. And that was a controversial speech in some areas. Certainly Cornel West didn't like it all that much. But it was an important moment that gave assurance to a lot of people about what the Democratic Party could include and what it needs to be wary of. I don't know that either Donald Trump or J.D. Vance is capable of or interested in making any such gesture. I'd love to hear from John and Ben on this in particular.

1:05:37Yeah, I do think the equivalent of that would be for the next Republican candidate in 2028 to give a speech like that about Quintus. Like Ben's talking about. About white nationalism. White supremacy, about anti-Semitism. There's also a political calculation. I mean, I know you covered that, I think it was a Manhattan Institute poll that they did. Thanks for listening to the show. I appreciate it. So, you know, like about 30 percent of the coalition are these like new new Republican voters who are basically tied to Trump. There is more anti-Semitism, racism in that section. And those voters, crucially, are not certain to vote for Republican in 26 and 28.

1:06:18And so I do think you have an issue where a J.D. Vance or someone else who's running in 2028 is going to think to themselves, OK, well, maybe this maybe the right thing to do would be to give a speech sort of pushing away the Fuentes and rejecting the Fuentes view of the of the world. And not saying there are good people on both sides. But also you have to assemble a winning coalition. And I think that is just a valuable data point to know for all of us that when the Republican primary happens, that there is a part of that coalition that may not vote and thus cost Republicans the election that like Nick Fuentes.

1:06:55I think one of the mistakes that politicians tend to make, and this, again, is true for Democrats and Republicans, is true for Hillary Clinton. I think it's going to be true for J.D. Vance as well, is just a belief that you naturally inherit the coalition of your predecessor. And it is not true. It is not true at all. Hillary Clinton thought that everybody who voted for Barack Obama was going to show up to vote for Hillary Clinton. And it turns out Hillary Clinton ain't Barack Obama. And J.D. Vance is not Donald Trump. And one of the problems that I see for J.D. Vance is how does he build a different coalition than the current Trump coalition?

1:07:22because it's hard for me to see just statistically how he retains every aspect of the Trump coalition without reducing it. I think fewer Latinos vote for J.D. Vance. I think fewer black Americans vote for J.D. Vance than they did for Donald Trump. I think fewer Jewish Americans vote for J.D. Vance than they do for Donald Trump. I think it's possible he does worse among married women, for example, than Donald Trump did. And so he's gonna have to, if he wants to win, form his own coalition in the same way that Hillary Clinton should have tried to in 2016. And if J.D. Vance or any other politician tries to hold on to the predecessor's coalition without the predecessor's qualities, it's not going to work beyond the morality of it.

1:07:57And again, I've made very clear what I think on the morality of this, which is that morality does not change based on political consideration. Okay, then is it naive to ask, how about no politicians dabble in anti-Semitism or racism because they're trying to win some small coalition and actually realize that the majority of people vote on what affects them, not offends them. And the person who has a winning economy behind them is the person that a lion's share of the American people vote for. And if you actually focus on, I'm not saying kitchen table issues, but when you talk about Hillary Clinton not being Barack Obama, she wasn't Barack Obama because there was that August that she went to the Hamptons and she didn't go to Wisconsin and she didn't go to Michigan and she didn't go to Western Pennsylvania.

1:08:38So we're spending all this time and we're watching political candidates not denounce racism, not denounce sexism. Instead, actually focus on how do you help people be financially secure, socially free and physically safe? Because that's what matters to the majority of the American people, most of whom don't give a hoot about politics. Don't you need both, though? Don't you need a healthy balance of both? I think you should subscribe to healthy balance of both. But I'm saying it's crazy to me that we have politicians that are saying, well, I don't want to denounce, you know, this group. I don't want to denounce the Proud Boys because I want their votes.

1:09:17How about spend less time figuring out how do I keep the Proud Boys? You should openly denounce their behavior and focus on how do you help the lion's share of the American people. I think one of the things that's taken home in politics, and again, I will say this to Steel Man, the right side, aside with which I disagree, is that they look at the left. and they say there are a bunch of toxic personalities inside the left who promote truly terrible things, and the left has not denounced them or moved away from them. In fact, treated them with kid gloves. And the amount of anti-Semitism that has emerged inside the Democratic Party is extraordinary.

1:09:47And pretending that away, again, so I'm friendly with Ezra Klein a bit on Ezra's show. Ezra had on somebody to talk about the breaks inside the Republican Party. But one of the things that this person was basically saying is that there is no such problem inside the Democratic Party. That is clearly untrue. It is clearly untrue. I just don't know which Democratic... This is now a whole argument about politics. And I know... We have long since left the journalism... Oh, that's what we were here for? We can bring it back to journalism because I do think it's important how we position certain things.

1:10:20Like, is Miss Rachel an anti-Semite? I think that she has put on her Instagram feed people who are extremely warm toward Palestinian terrorism. Is she the number two anti-Semite? I don't run the stop anti-Semitism. I'm just saying, I think that type of reporting, like I have a daughter and she's only going to have breakfast if Miss Rachel is saying, I'm so happy. Again, I don't want to get into a long conversation about how to fight anti-Semitism. No, no, no. I guess what I'm trying to say is - I just think our host might want to talk about you. Real quick. I do want to bring it back. When there's this label that's used, I think that for things, including like Miss Rachel here, I think what happens is you actually muddy the water of fighting a very real thing, which is anti-Seminin people that actually hate fucking Jews.

1:11:10And you see it all the time. It's literally the boy who cried wolf. Exactly. And then what that does is it actually inflates and gives value to those voices that you would describe that are true anti-Seminin. I've actually recommended it. And by the way, on my show. You understand what I'm saying, why we have to be careful with just labeling everything. In fact, I've suggested that people stop talking about anti-Semitism as its own phenomenon and simply talk about things that are bad or untrue. I think the label has lost such unbelievable value. And I think the moral anger at even the phenomenon of anti-Semitism has lost such play that there is actually no purpose.

1:11:47Fuentes wasn't even on that list of top ten. Miss Rachel was there. Again, I'm not going to answer for it. Oh, okay. He's already in. No, but what Ben is saying is so true, and it goes back to what I was saying about fascism and what you're talking about. You're trying to ring the alarm about authoritarian strategy in the media. Who's going to really believe that if we make light of things like fascism, if we act like fascism is just a normal thing that can happen in this country and we can work with it? One thing I've tried to do is explain Trump's actions as authoritarian, like the action as authoritarian or the policy.

1:12:16Because I do think, like, you know, it's not an on and off switch. You don't wake up one day and it's an authoritarian country and then it's not the other day, right? And so I do think, like I take your point about just throwing the word fascist or Nazi around or whatever else. I think that's unhelpful. I think it's not a good, like to Ben's point, I just don't think the purpose of it is helpful. I do think if he is taking actions that are like actions that authoritarians in other countries have taken, it is worthwhile to let people know that there are parallels in history that we have seen without going over the edge.

1:12:49By the way, I think that this is actually, to get it back to the journalism point, I think this actually might be a good way of us looking at journalism as an act rather than as an outlet. What if we were warning an act rather than an outlet? Andrew, can I ask you? What does that mean as an act rather than an outlet? So people declare themselves journalists, okay, and now they have a special preserve. Okay, and now we're supposed to believe that everything that comes out of their mouth is true as opposed to is each story credible? And if that story is credible, you have now committed an act of journalism.

1:13:18And I think one of the things that we've done that's quite wrong is kind of grant blanket credibility to a particular outlet or particular figure as opposed to this story is true. OK, let me just separate two things. I really agree with you on the fact that journalism is a practice, that no one should be granted blanket trust or blanket immunity from the skepticism of our audience. And we have to earn that every single day. But I'll also say that we are facing unprecedented attacks on that credibility. And that doesn't it doesn't help. And I'm going to separate it. I apologize for nothing. Heather Cox Richardson's substack, which is one of the most read substacks in the world, is focused on authoritarianism.

1:13:53It's what she does. It's what she writes about every day. Now, here's journalists who are practicing journalism that are this week. Right. The Washington Post, while everybody was kicked out of the Pentagon and the Pentagon journalists don't even now just have influencers in there. The Washington Post aggressively and accurately are covering every single thing that is happening with Pete Hegseth and Venezuela. So they are covering the news and covering news stories saying this is the behavior that is happening here. They are practicing journalism, showing the American people what is happening and that it's potentially undemocratic.

1:14:27So they are doing their jobs. But it is not their job to ring a bell and say this is a pathway to authoritarianism. Yes, it is. They are covering the news day in and day out and covering those stories and doing it right and doing it while they have been kicked out of the Pentagon. I will note that the New York Times sort of provided the Washington Post story. There's a different emphasis on similar facts. But the reason I think it is the media, they have to do that, is because we keep talking about things in extremes, right? We keep talking about, you know, we say things like fascism, authoritarianism, but it starts somewhere.

1:15:03So I think to your point, David, and to your point, Anna, we're getting to those points. So you have to tell people every step of the way, this is what happened here. Like, you know, in Russia, this is what happened in Germany. And this is why it matters. And we could get to that here based off what we're seeing. Andrew, you're going to maybe think I'm picking on you. But to bring this back to journalism and to these new faces. 18 seconds. Well, we're going to go a little long. Throw another 75 on me. In these new faces, shut them down. There's a question of what are the responsibilities of people with an audience as big as yours.

1:15:35Sure, sure, yeah. And maybe you know where I'm going here. You sit down with Donald Trump. Yes. And you've been basically a truthful person. And you do, and you interview him. And I just want to preface this question by saying I've consumed every interview where you've talked about what it means for you to interview someone. It's very clear about something. You're not asking dutiful questions. You're not asking something because you think you're supposed to. You're asking a question because you're following your curiosity. Yes. And Charlamagne, I hear you talking powerfully here about how important it is to call things what they are.

1:16:06Andrew, when you sit down. I think that's my duty, but yeah. When you sat down with Donald Trump a couple weeks before the 2024 election. you had a long conversation with him. And I went back and I listened to it. And I do want to push you on what you see as your responsibilities with an interview like that. There's a section of the interview, and maybe you would have thought this was dutiful in the moment, I'm not so sure I'd agree, where the president is describing the entire federal investigation into Russia as a hoax, made up by Hillary Clinton, made up by Nancy Pelosi. That's Factual, that's not accurate.

1:16:42But then he goes further and he says that the Pulitzer Prize Committee should give the New York Times, should take back the Pulitzer it gave to the New York Times for its aggressive coverage of that investigation. And the Post. And you in the interview, you're nodding along to him, you're verbally agreeing with him. Yeah. And you say, yeah, to have the New York Times keep that Pulitzer is to basically say that the lie is true. Oh, that's what they brought you here for. They brought you here for the future. What's wrong for me? They need to see you paint the paint. The sandbag is different from Grant.

1:17:13This is what you said. This is what you said. Let's go. Put it up on the screen. Let's do it. Donald Trump, because you're actually, by leaving the Pulitzer with the New York Times, you're sort of saying it happened, and it didn't happen, and everybody now, he goes on, and you say, Andrew Schultz, this is the... Oh, he said that part. No, yeah, and you say, you're rewarding the lie, and you're agreeing with him on, yeah, for the hoax. so now are in retrospect yeah maybe you're maybe you think this is the best interview you've ever done but i wonder if in retrospect perhaps you question whether in moments like that you're not fulfilling what your friend and even your co-host charlemagne thinks is pretty essential about the role of journalism in this moment oh wait wait wait that was a big leap right there what was the last what was the last question are you letting the president lie on your show and not bothering so I don't know anything about the Russia hoax.

1:18:04So why interview the president and let him talk about it? And that's why Trump wants to go on his podcast? I didn't ask him about the Russia hoax. No, he brought it up every which way throughout the interview. But I didn't ask him about the Russia hoax. I had three things I wanted to ask him. Turns out there's no hoax. Yeah, well, so here's the thing that I would say. You want to talk about immigration? Michael, as one who's getting sued, and it's a member of the... Can I just respond to it, David? Just hang on one second. Okay. Just to be clarified. The Pulitzer was to the Post and the Times.

1:18:28It wasn't about the Russia hoax. It was about Russian interference in the election. Period. Okay. And it was a collection of terrific reporting. Yeah. So I just wanted to clarify. Thank you. So this is a perfect example of the media class, which is like you guys, you know, everything about the Russia hoax, you know, everything about what it is. Was it actually, was it not? Like if we relitigated every single thing, was it justified, et cetera? And then the rest of us, who I do not consider myself part of the journalist class, they just go, oh, so it didn't end up being real? Oh, I guess it was a hoax.

1:19:07And this is the separation of knowledge. That's your position? Yeah, I just said it. Okay. Yeah. So you guys are really aware of this because it's important to you. It's important if you're reporting on something that if there is truth to it. But what ended up did happen? Did he get indicted? Or did he get proven guilty of it? Like, what did happen with the hoax? Just to be clear. Not the hoax. What did happen with the Russian investigation? David? The Russia investigation is a federal inquiry into a sustained campaign by Russia to influence the 2016 election, according to U.S. intelligence agencies, on behalf of and in favor of Donald Trump.

1:19:41It's not an investigation. It's an investigation that also sought to understand contacts between Russian officials and Trump. And ultimately, there's no evidence. I'm not testing you. I'm just saying, what happened? What do you think? It was a Mueller report. There was no indictment. Okay. So, take this right here. Let's stop right here. There was a Mueller report. No. And there was what? No indictment. No indictment. Okay. What do you think the American people think when they hear there was no indictment? They're not looking into all this research. They're not seeing like, ooh, there are real connections, but maybe not close enough to indict, but there is something real here.

1:20:14What do you think the average American thinks when they hear there was a Mueller report and there was no indictment? What do you think they think? You clearly have an answer. I'm asking you guys. Speak for your audience for a second. What do you think they think when they hear that? David, correct me if I'm wrong. Richard Nixon wasn't indicted in Watergate, but Americans still look back on Watergate and think that was a scandal. You're not answering the question. I am. No, you're answering it with a different one. And I think you're avoiding it because you know the truth. The truth of the matter is - I don't think being willfully ignorant of what happened is a defense of knowing something.

1:20:42I'm sorry. Look, I'm sorry I don't know every single thing before I interview the guy and I see that I'm clearly being like, I don't know, punished. I'm going to come to Andrew's defense. No, no, no, no, no. I think it's a, listen, all criticism is fair. If you don't think that the question was asked in the right way or something like that, that's totally fair. We put things out on the internet. We put things out in the world. These criticisms are completely allowed. I don't think there's anything wrong with that. What I'm trying to tell you is there is definitely a separation between what you guys know and what the American people know.

1:21:11That's true. And when you only talk to other journalists, you guys are all aligned, left or right, about what the facts of these things are. But when you go to, maybe not. I would think Ben and I are not aligned on this. So Andrew, remember earlier when I was talking about the gestalt of the story, this is what I mean. Like the overall sense of the story in Russia is that there was an allegation, okay? And again, the specifics were not quite this clean, but the takeaway for most Americans was that Donald Trump was coordinating with Russia to pervert the 2016 election. That was the takeaway. And it turned out that wasn't true.

1:21:40I think the takeaway was - And so the idea that somebody won a Pulitzer for coverage of subsections of that broader narrative, a narrative which turned out not only not to be true, but that the American people then rejected wholesale in 2024 and reelected the man, president of the United States. That is the reason why when Andrew says, yeah, I kind of get what you're saying, he's not wrong about that. Now, I mean, that's a different thing. I would like to know why Ben believed it wasn't true. I just want to know. Because there is no evidence that Donald Trump directly coordinated with the Russian government in order to pervert the 2016 election.

1:22:10That proves Andrew's point. Which is not the source of the inquiry. The inquiry is about interference. Of course. That's what those pieces were about. And this is the problem with the TikTokification of information. Definitely, you got your head in your hand, but it's true. This is why you have to talk to people. But this is the thing. And I think this is maybe an advantage. You're doubting that I talk to people any less than you do. You definitely talk to them less than us. No, that's just false. David, you're 100 % of five friends. When did the last time you've been in a strip club, David? Come on.

1:22:41Come on. I'm not joking. The actual work of journalists is to go to the people. I'm not insulting the work of journalists. No, but you are insulting David in that way. No, I'm insulting David because I was funny. We can kid around. That's fine. That's fine. But if we're being serious here, those stories were about a specific thing. You can debate till the cows come home whether the Mueller report was interpreted by Barr in the proper way, all the rest. But those stories were solid. Okay, I'm not saying the stories weren't solid. This whole conversation is at least it was started by a distrust in media, right?

1:23:16And a lack of understanding of what's going on. I'm bringing it back to the beginning. Lord Almighty. And I think that like to what you were saying right there the idea of what Americans think happened I agree there was an investigation and then no indictment when I hear there's an investigation and then no indictment It means there's nothing there. You know else we saw that at January 6th January 6th, you know We were waiting for Merrick Garland to go out there and prosecute the case against Donald Trump They were telling us it was a threat to democracy. It never manifested the way it should have been so to me It's like so did it really happen?

1:23:47So then the question is I'm serious. I mean, I know it happened. I know it happened. It's January 6th. Yes, but if you're telling me, I know, I know. But if you're telling me. Accountability. Yes. What we're talking is how narratives can exist and what allows them to exist. And what allows them to exist is he can easily say on my interview, and I'm sure he said on plenty of interviews, it was a hoax. It was nothing here. And the Americans will believe him because, one, they're not going to look at every single article and they're not going to read the entire endowment. and they're not going to read the entire Mueller report, right?

1:24:20Of course. They're not going to read these things. And that's why these narratives can exist. But here's the risk. Yeah. Well, you're saying it's my responsibility to read all those things and be able to push back. No, no, no, no, it's not. But here's the risk. Yeah. Donald Trump should sit down with you. You're a fantastic interviewer. You have a huge audience. But because Donald Trump has access to sit down with you and that huge audience, that means he has no need to sit down with David or Amna and answer very difficult questions to journalists that he doesn't want to answer. No, I'm not saying it's Andrew's fault.

1:24:50I'm not saying it's his fault. I'm just giving, I'm just laying out. The whole point is we're talking about the media landscape. And given what the media landscape is right now, and the huge influential people and the huge audiences that they have, where it impacts journalism over here is the likes of Donald Trump or the likes of Joe Biden. But you're also supposed to be a fact checker. I'm being told that if I don't wrap up this panel, I will have failed to do my job. You can't moderate a podcast.

1:25:22I want to embrace Andrew's question. Is the future here Andrews or is it? I think in this conversation, we are underestimating the intelligence of the people who consume a lot of media. I do not think that anyone who tuned in to Andrew's interview with Donald Trump expected that Andrew was going to sit there and be like, no, you're wrong this. And actually, you said this here. They know what they're getting. I also think that from a politician's, and I'll put my old political hat on, from a politician's point of view, the way the media is now, they're not going to sit down with David or the Times editorial board or the Post.

1:26:06And is that because those structures are flawed? No, that's because they're flawed. That's because of reach, because they do not reach the number of people. And if you're a politician on the front, you want to reach the most audience possible. It's fighting a Southpaw that is incredibly skilled but has no audience. It's like you could lose and you're not going to make any money. Is it about reach or is it they can go to a friendly place, answer exactly how they want to answer, and then all of those words get amplified? So first of all, yes, they can do that, but they also don't have to sit down with anyone.

1:26:36They now have the ability, politicians have the reach, to just do it themselves. But to your earlier point about, I think it's the difference between sitting down with an interviewer and doing the work of journalism, which I think is still incredibly essential. You just made the point that. But both are important. Both are important, but you just made the point that, so Hegseth kicked out all the reporters, right? And everyone's been a horrible thing that he did, right? But they got the job done. But the Post got the story, right? And so the actual work of reporting that journalists need to do is essential.

1:27:03We all depend on it. We all rely on it. But the idea that politicians are going to have to sit down with traditional media outlets to take questions like that. The fact is, even after PBS had our federal funding cut, right? I'm glad we finally brought that up. Even after that, we have Republicans regularly come on the show. Why? Like, according to everything we've said here, that makes absolutely no sense. But the fact is, we actually still have a mixed audience. A third who identify as liberal, a third who identify as conservative, and a third who identify as independent. And those politicians feel like they can reach those people.

1:27:37We still reach millions of people every night. We have five million subscribers on YouTube where the show streams live every day. Like, we actually have the credibility that people still need attached to them in some way. What some people do dodge. We just did a profile of Cash Patel who had no interest in talking to us. People who show up know that they can face the tough questions, right? They know that that journalism still matters. Donald Trump won't come on the show. There's a standing invitation for the president, wherever you are, to come on the show. And he doesn't need to. So I wouldn't say all politicians are the same necessarily, but there is a choice.

1:28:07Well, and it's also not just partisan. I don't expect Andrew to do an interview on our show. I listen to him for lots of different reasons, but it's not for that. I agree with you. I think the thing about, like, for us, right, we're a comedy podcast. So this is really important. And, like, when Donald Trump goes on SNL, we don't sit here and re-litigate every sketch and be like, well, why didn't he address the Mueller probe in this sketch? The expectations I want you to have when anybody comes on our pod, whether it's Mondani, Trump, whether it's Casey Neistat, whether it's a plethora of other guests that we've had on, is the same.

1:28:36Are we hanging, having fun, and are we humanizing our guests? I don't do gotcha journalism. You guys can do that. I think it's important. We don't do that. Regardless about gotcha. I don't bring people on. I bring people on because I have an interest in them, and I want to see the humanity on them, regardless of which side they're on. And I think that that has been true when I had you guys on. Right, so Andrew, actually, remember, we actually got into a bit of a tête -à-tête a few weeks ago. I know, like every two weeks. But this one was, I thought, to what you're saying. Yes. And I think this is actually quite important.

1:29:05We're not all in the same industry. Yes. We are broadly in the same industry, but we are not specifically in the same industry. I shouldn't be here. And my critique was not of you. I shouldn't be. My critique was actually of the audience, which can no longer tell the difference between the Joe Rogan podcast and a sit-down with PBS. Yeah. The audience can tell the difference. No, they can't. No, they can't. I do not think that is true. The New York Times had Andrew and the New York Times, what did they call you? America's World? That was sarcasm. But people don't know that if they see the headline.

1:29:30Right. So I think that this is it. The headline was. We can be in different industries. But what we can all be is decent. I agree with that. But I'm saying that the responsibility when we talk about there's a plethora of sources, which of course is true. And the audience needs to be more discerning than ever, which of course is true. The first step toward discernment is acknowledging that what you are doing and what Andrew is doing, These are two different things and that the hosts themselves acknowledge that these are two different things. And if you're honest with your audience, and I think this is the biggest thing for all of us.

1:29:59I'm honest with my audience. I am a conservative. OK, my principles are there. I'm not lying about who I am. You know that if I'm having on a Republican, I'm likely to ask friendlier questions than if I have on a Democrat because I'm very open in my biases and who I'm more likely to agree with. And the same thing is true of John and his own business with Andrew and Stephanie. I think it's true of you. I think the reason people pick on legacy media is because legacy media tries to be all things to all people by claiming that they do not have a viewpoint, that they stand somehow objectively outside the world and never bring their own viewpoints to bear.

1:30:28A viewpoint is different than what I am. Keep it going, Barney. I'm cooking right now. Don't worry. Push it back 20 minutes. I'm giving on to you the last word. The literal last word. You've got this. The whole thing is about journalists. Okay? Stop being distracted. Don't listen to me. Don't interrupt. Whatever you say, we're all created. If this goes great, you're getting funding. We're bringing the funding back. Are you stepping in? I'm making a call. I'm making a call. They owe me a favor. Was that a pledge? I lied about the Mueller probe for you. Give her her money. That's a verbal contract for a pledge from Andrew.

1:31:02Yeah. Omna. In the journalism of it all, to your point, I think, and you asked this question about personality and brands and the presenters and messengers themselves, and I think the The messengers matter just as much as the message today. That's the media landscape that we're in. Everyone here is terrifically authentic about who they are. We know who we're hearing from when you do an interview. We know who you are in your background. You're a comedian. You're one of the best interviewers in the business. You're straight journalist. People know what they're getting when they tune into it. But the journalism at the heart of it, I don't think journalists are out there saying we're better than everyone.

1:31:36We're neutral. We have some kind of monopoly on the truth. What we're doing is fundamentally different. We have a duty to look at things from different sides. We have a duty to remove whatever our personal biases are, and we all have them from the conversation. We have a duty, if we have a Republican on one day, to have a Democrat on the next. And you don't have those same standards. It's not good or bad, but they're different standards. And so in the practice of our journalism and what we do, we still, all of us at the table, hold ourselves to those standards. And I think that is what sets us apart.

1:32:10DealBook Summit is a production of the New York Times. This episode was produced by Evan Roberts. Mixing by Kelly Piccolo and Katie McMurrin. Original music by Daniel Powell. The rest of the DealBook Events team includes Julie Zahn, Hilary Kuhn, Melissa Tripoli, Beth Weinstein, Angela Austin, Haley Hess, Dana Prukowski, Matt Kaiser, Chantal Rainier, and Yan Wei Liu. Special thanks to Sam Dolnik, Nina Lassam, Christina Josa, and Maddie Maciello.