President Donald Trump’s Destruction of the East Wing of the White House The construction of the ballroom has put some of the media outlets following this story in an awkward position, as contributors to the project include business executives, and their reporters are also actively reporting on the project.
Comcast, which owns NBC News and MSNBC, has faced on-air criticism from some liberal cable channel personalities over donations. Amazon, whose founder Jeff Bezos owns the Washington Post, is also a donor. newspaper Edited favorably A day after critics pointed out the omission, they pointed to Trump’s relationship with Bezos on the project.
It’s not the first time since President Trump returned to office that the interests of journalists at a retail outlet that is just a small part of a giant corporation’s portfolio have come into conflict with its owners. Both walt disney company. and paramount Rather than defend ABC News and CBS News in court, they settled the lawsuit with Trump.
“This is Trump’s Washington,” said former NBC “Meet the Press” host Chuck Todd. “It doesn’t help the reputations of the media outlets that these companies own, because it puts everyone at risk.”
The company did not disclose the amount donated or the reason for the donation.
Regardless of individual or corporation identified as a donor by the White House The $22 million Google donation was disclosed in a court filing, but the amount of the donation has not been disclosed publicly. Comcast did not say why Friday, but some MSNBC commentators tried to fill in the blank.
MSNBC’s Stephanie Ruhl said: “This donation should be concerning to Americans because no company would just write a check for a good cause.”
Rachel Maddow specifically cited Comcast on her show this week, saying, “These publicly traded companies need to know that there is a price to pay in terms of reputation among the American people.” “If they act contrary to American values and the public interest because they want to please Trump, to bribe him, or in some way benefit from Trump’s authoritarian overthrow of democracy, there can be a cost to their interests.”
NBC’s “Nightly News” led a story on the East Wing demolition on its Oct. 22 broadcast, and reporter Gabe Gutierrez said it was paid for by private donors, “among them Comcast, NBC’s parent company.”
That week’s “Nightly News” spent a total of five minutes on the story, half as much time as ABC’s “World News Tonight,” said Andrew Tyndall, head of ADT Research, but NBC preempted Tuesday’s newscast for NBA coverage. There is no evidence that Comcast tried to influence NBC’s reporting in any way. Todd said the company’s executives have no history of doing so. A Comcast spokesperson had no comment.
tod raised my voice Although he has complained to NBC News bosses in the past, he said he suspects Comcast did not do so in this case, in part because Comcast has not disclosed the reason for the donation. Renovating the White House, he said, “allows us to say we’re serving the United States.”
Even more troubling, he said, is the perception that Comcast CEO Brian Roberts had to do it to curry favor with the Trump administration. In a post on Truth Social in April, President Trump criticized Comcast and Roberts, calling them “a disgrace to the integrity of broadcasting!!!” The president cited the company’s ownership of MSNBC and NBC News.
Mr. Roberts may need their help. This week’s story suggested by Comcast may be of interest The deal requires government approval to acquire all or part of Warner Bros. Discovery.
The White House cannot be turned into a ‘museum of the past’
Last weekend’s editorial in the Post was an eye-opener, even for a section that has since taken a conservative turn. Bezos’ direction This means focusing on protecting individual freedom and free markets. The October 25 editorial was unsigned, indicating this was the paper’s official position, and was titled “Defending the White House Ballroom.”
The newspaper said the ballroom was a necessary addition and that Trump is pursuing it “in the most unpleasant way possible” but would not have been able to do it during his term if he had gone through the traditional approval process.
“The White House should not be just a museum of the past,” the Post wrote. “Like America, it must evolve with the times to maintain its greatness. Strong leaders refuse to be calcified. In that sense, Trump’s business is like pointing a bow at NIMBYs everywhere.”
White House press secretary Caroline Leavitt shared a copy of the editorial on social media, writing that this was “the first common sense I’ve seen from legacy media regarding this story.”
In contrast, the New York Times does not take an editorial position for or against the project. The newspaper published several opinion columns, with Ross Douthat arguing that President Trump’s action was necessary given the potential for red tape, while Maureen Dowd said it was an “unsanctioned, ahistorical and abominable destruction of the East Wing.”
In a social media post late Saturday, Columbia University journalism professor Bill Gruskin pointed out that there was no mention of Bezos in the Post’s editorial and said he had written a letter to a Post spokesperson about it. “Stealth editing” Gruskin said it contained no explanation, but the next day a line about private donors, including Amazon, was added. The newspaper reported that “Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is the owner of the Post.”
Olivia Petersen, a spokeswoman for his letter, did not immediately respond to a message from The Associated Press.
In last week’s story, NPR reported The Ballroom editorial, which did not mention Bezos’ personal interests, was one of three The Post has written in the past two weeks about issues in which Bezos has a financial or business interest, the paper said.
in respectability Last December, Bezos acknowledged that he was a “terrible owner” of the Post in terms of the nature of the conflict. “A pure newspaper owner who just owned a newspaper and didn’t do anything else would probably be a much better owner from that perspective,” the Amazon founder said.
Mr. Gruskin said in an interview that Mr. Bezos, as owner, has every right to influence the Post’s editorial policy. But he said it’s important for readers to know they’re involved in the East Wing story. They may reject the editorial for inconsistency, he said, or conclude that “the editorial is so well argued that I have a lot of confidence in what I just read.”
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David Bauder writes about the intersection of media and entertainment for The Associated Press. please follow him http://x.com/dbauder and https://bsky.app/profile/dbauder.bsky.social
