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00:30Welcome, welcome, welcome to Last Week Tonight.
00:33I'm John Oliver. Thank you so much for joining us.
00:35It has been a busy week.
00:37Trump back down on his China tariffs.
00:39RFK swam in a creek flowing with sewage and bacteria.
00:43And the Eurovision Song Contest took place.
00:45And as ever, there were controversies from protesters
00:47trying to disrupt Israel's dress rehearsal
00:49to the times Estonia's singer drew on a series of Italian stereotypes
00:52in his song, Espresso Macchiato.
00:55Which, to be honest, not no.
00:58To my personal favourite, Malta's song having a keyword censored
01:02reportedly after the BBC complained.
01:04And its performer actually went on the BBC to defend herself.
01:07It's a Maltese word that holds a lot of meaning to us
01:11and we never intended to offend anyone.
01:13You must have known that at some level,
01:16some people might find, you know, aversion or hearing of that word
01:22or that phrase, you know, difficult to deal with on a family show.
01:27I'll put it like that.
01:29OK, he's doing a lot to not say the word in question there.
01:34And if you're thinking, how bad could it possibly be?
01:37Well, this bad.
01:39I do it all the time, yeah, I do it all the time.
01:43Serving cunt.
01:49Don't rent me buses, I'm serving cunt.
01:52Yeah. Serving cunt.
01:55K-A-N-T.
01:57It's apparently the Maltese word for singing,
02:00so what she's doing there is she's serving singing
02:03or serving cunt or arguably serving both.
02:07Look, I could talk about Eurovision all night,
02:10but we're actually going to start with our main story tonight,
02:13which concerns Trump's relationship with the press.
02:15It's always been antagonistic.
02:17And this week, we got yet another reminder
02:19when he was asked a perfectly reasonable question
02:22about reports that he planned to accept a luxury jet from Qatar.
02:25What do you say to people who view that luxury jet
02:28as a personal gift to you? Why not leave it behind?
02:31You're ABC fake news, right?
02:33Only ABC, well, a few of you would.
02:36I would say you should be embarrassed to ask him that question.
02:40They're giving us a free jet.
02:42It's not a gift to me, it's a gift to the Department of Defence.
02:46And you should know better, because you've been embarrassed enough
02:49and so has your network. Your network is a disaster.
02:51ABC is a disaster.
02:53That is pretty hostile, though I actually agree
02:56that ABC should be embarrassed.
02:58Just not for that entirely legitimate question,
03:00but for the fact that as of taping,
03:02they still haven't renewed Doctor Odyssey for season two.
03:05What the fuck are you doing, ABC?
03:07It's sexy ER on a boat.
03:09It's the pit with sharks.
03:11It's got, and I'm not even going to try and beat their tagline on this,
03:14big deck energy.
03:16In its pilot episode alone, it featured a water slide injury,
03:20someone overdosing on shrimp, and this.
03:23What happened?
03:25It broke.
03:27He's in shock.
03:29What broke, Mr Arrington? Is it a bone?
03:36He malfunctioned.
03:38Are you not entertained?
03:41How is ABC renewing shows called The Rookie and Will Trent,
03:45whose premise is apparently just, despite being dyslexic,
03:48he's become a special agent in the Georgia Bureau of Investigation?
03:54What?
03:56But they haven't renewed the only show brave enough to answer the question,
03:59what if Sick but Boat?
04:01I shouldn't complain about the other shows.
04:03I shouldn't care that a show called and about a rookie
04:05is returning for its premise-defying eighth season,
04:08and I don't begrudge any audience members for sticking around
04:11to find out if their favorite characters will or won't Trent.
04:14All I'm saying is, ABC's The View has been on since 1997,
04:18and Dr. Hot Boat is still in limbo.
04:20You're a disgrace, ABC.
04:22Your network is a disaster.
04:25The problem is, Trump clearly only likes when people are nice to him
04:29in the press by covering the things he says and does
04:31and the way he says and does them is, in his opinion, being mean.
04:35Back in his first campaign, he attacked journalists constantly,
04:38calling Jake Tapper, Fake Tapper, Maggie Haberman, Maggot Hagerman,
04:43and Katie Turr, Little Katie,
04:45which compared to the others is just lazy.
04:47Little Katie sounds like a doll from the 1970s
04:49that was discontinued for giving children lead poisoning.
04:52But in his second term,
04:54Trump's administration's escalated those attacks on the press,
04:57from making it easier to subpoena journalist records
04:59to detaining a Tufts University student
05:01after she co-authored an op-ed on Gaza,
05:03to Trump calling for Republicans to defund NPR and PBS,
05:06calling them radical left monsters that so badly hurt our country.
05:10And in March, he even went to the DOJ
05:13to issue this chilling announcement.
05:15I believe that CNN and MSDNC,
05:18who literally write 97.6% bad about me
05:23are political arms of the Democrat Party,
05:26and in my opinion, they're really corrupt and they're illegal.
05:30What they do is illegal, and it has to stop.
05:33It has to be illegal.
05:35Okay, what the press does has to be illegal.
05:38It's obviously extremely bad,
05:40but I also want to talk about that 97.6% real quick,
05:44because I'm genuinely surprised that he knew
05:46that made-up number would sound more authentic
05:48if he added a decimal point.
05:50A decimal just feels more like a real number, even if it isn't.
05:54If I tell you 20% of Taco Bell ground beef is actually horse,
05:58you're like, no way, number's too round.
06:00But if I say 21.6% is horse,
06:03you'd be like, mm, he wouldn't make up a number that specific.
06:07Now, to be clear, I wouldn't say either of those numbers, though,
06:10because we all know that the real number is significantly higher,
06:13but apparently, legally, I can't say that, so I won't.
06:17And unfortunately, even as Trump's aggression has gone up,
06:21the owners of press outlets have gotten more submissive.
06:24During Trump's first term, a lot of outlets positioned themselves
06:27as fierce watchdogs for truth.
06:29The Washington Post, for instance, adopted the slogan,
06:32Democracy Dies in Darkness,
06:34but this time, even before the election,
06:36they seemed noticeably gentler.
06:38The Post's owner, Jeff Bezos,
06:40killed the paper's endorsement of Kamala Harris.
06:42He also ordered that its op-ed page focus purely
06:44on the importance of personal liberties and free markets.
06:47Bezos has seemingly gone out of his way to cozy up to Trump
06:51with his company paying $40 million
06:54to license a documentary on Melania,
06:56the most Amazon has ever spent on a documentary,
06:59and even standing behind Trump at his inauguration.
07:02And come on, that's not just bending the knee,
07:05that's bending both knees, arching your back and relaxing your holes.
07:08And Bezos isn't the only media owner making notable concessions.
07:14The billionaire owner of the Los Angeles Times
07:17has reportedly asked the paper's editorial board
07:20to, quote, take a break from writing about
07:23president-elect Donald Trump.
07:25Patrick Soon-Shiong has reportedly required editors
07:28to send him the text of every editorial
07:31and the name of its writer before publishing.
07:34That is pretty chilly.
07:35And as for taking a break from writing about Trump,
07:38to be clear, I also don't want to hear about him all the time.
07:41I don't love that I'm talking about him right now,
07:44especially when I could be talking about the recent headline,
07:47Ohio Police Find Raccoon Holding Meth Pipe During Traffic Stop,
07:51which was already good enough until they made it even better,
07:54pointing out when an officer took the pipe away,
07:56the raccoon pulled out another.
07:58Pulled out another? From where?
08:02You don't think I want to talk about this raccoon
08:05with multiple meth pipes for the next 25 solid minutes?
08:09Of course I do, but I can't, because...
08:12Even as threats to the free press seem to be on the rise,
08:15resistance to them seems to be waning,
08:17and in some corners, to a worrying extent.
08:19So given that, tonight, let's talk about Trump and the press,
08:22how he's tried to reshape his coverage,
08:24the levers of power he's using to threaten them,
08:26and how we should be responding.
08:28Let's start with, if not the most important,
08:30the most visible sign that things have changed,
08:32the White House press corps.
08:34Back in February, the White House picked a high-profile fight
08:37with the Associated Press for the dumbest imaginable reason.
08:40You may remember, after taking office,
08:42Trump announced that he'd renamed the Gulf of Mexico
08:45the Gulf of America, and while some outlets
08:47started using the new name, the AP didn't,
08:49which led to them being banned from the Oval Office,
08:52something Press Secretary Caroline Levitt justified like this.
08:56If we feel that there are lies being pushed by outlets in this room,
09:00we are going to hold those lies accountable,
09:03and it is a fact that the body of water
09:05off the coast of Louisiana is called the Gulf of America,
09:08and I'm not sure why news outlets don't want to call it that,
09:11but that is what it is.
09:13Okay, to you, maybe, but not to everyone.
09:17As the AP pointed out, it has clients all over the world,
09:20and lots of them still use the term the Gulf of Mexico,
09:23so it's not as simple as you're making out there,
09:26especially because it can take time
09:28for people to adjust to a stupid name change,
09:30sometimes hypothetically,
09:32before we can even get used to one dumb name.
09:34Some genius comes along and only makes it dumber,
09:37then somehow it gets dumber still,
09:39and then against all the odds, somehow it becomes even worse,
09:42before inexplicably going back to the stupid thing it was before.
09:46Incidentally, only this week,
09:48my parent company apparently said
09:50they cannot wait for my hot take on this whole rebrand,
09:54believing that whatever I say about this change
09:56was going to be pretty hot,
09:58so please look me in the eyes when I say this.
10:01Fuck, you don't tell me what to do.
10:03I'm not going to do it if you want to, unless, wait, hold on,
10:06maybe you thought baiting me like that
10:08would be a good way to stop me from doing it,
10:10but on the other hand, how could a company be that smart
10:13when they're the same people that came up
10:15with so many stupid fucking names?
10:17Now, after a legal battle,
10:20the White House began allowing the AP back into the Oval Office,
10:23and as you just saw with that ABC reporter,
10:26other traditional outlets are still allowed access
10:28to the president, primarily, so that he can shit on them,
10:31but increasingly, he is managing
10:34to get the sycophantic questions he'd prefer,
10:36and even if you haven't noticed that, he definitely has.
10:40What has made you and your team so effective
10:43in finding, locating, apprehending,
10:46and deporting these violent, illegal migrants?
10:48I love this guy.
10:50I wish more people would ask questions like that.
10:53Do you think it shows just how out of touch they are
10:56with the American people, especially given that 79%,
11:00according to a CBS poll, approved of your...
11:03I love this guy.
11:05How come when these Democrat elites want tariffs,
11:07everything's hunky-dory, but when President Trump
11:09wants tariffs, all hell breaks loose?
11:11Do you see this double standard?
11:12I love this guy, whoever the hell that is.
11:14That's really nice. I appreciate that question.
11:18That is pretty humiliating, and not just because
11:20I love this guy, whoever the hell that is.
11:23It's almost definitely how Donald Trump
11:25opened a toast at Eric's wedding.
11:27But it's not a coincidence
11:29that Trump's been getting more flattering questions
11:31because the White House has increasingly let
11:33far-right news outlets and influencers
11:35into press events.
11:36A recent review of briefings found that
11:38four of the five reporters Levitt called on most
11:41were from right-wing outlets.
11:42She's also added a seat for new media,
11:44and the person in that seat is always called on first,
11:47meaning the press room now features figures
11:49like Cara Castronova, who works for Lindell TV,
11:52an internet news network bankrolled
11:54by the MyPillow guy, who asks questions like this.
11:58Will you guys also consider releasing
12:01the president's fitness plan?
12:02He actually looks healthier than ever before.
12:04He's healthier than he did eight years ago,
12:06and I'm sure everybody in this room could agree.
12:08Is he working out with Bobby Kennedy,
12:10and is he eating less McDonald's?
12:12That is an actual question a White House reporter asked,
12:16and everything about that is unsettling,
12:18from the fact she was essentially asking,
12:20the president's looking hotter than ever, right,
12:22to the absolutely cursed smile of that ghostly twink presence
12:26of the business Malfoy hovering behind her.
12:29You can all see him too, right?
12:31Please tell me you can see him.
12:34And when she was asked to spell out her approach to journalism,
12:38it didn't go great.
12:40You are a Trump fan, right?
12:41Yes, I'm definitely a supporter of President Trump.
12:44So will you be able to hold him to account?
12:47I will be able to hold 100% him to account.
12:50You know, there's, I'm sure, things that will happen
12:53that I disagree with, and I have said plenty of times
12:55on the record when I've disagreed with his decision.
12:58Is there anything so far in this administration
13:00you've disagreed with?
13:02I'm not going to...
13:03Let me put some thought into that for a second.
13:06I'm just overwhelmed, like, just overwhelmed
13:10with how well I perceive things to be going.
13:13LAUGHTER
13:15What?!
13:17I'm just overwhelmed with how well I perceive things to be going?
13:21That sounds less like what a White House correspondent
13:24should be saying to a reporter,
13:25more like something you say to an acquaintance at coffee
13:27before crying in your car for an hour.
13:30And look, stalking the press room with suck-ups
13:33would be bad enough, but that's just one of the ways
13:35the White House has found to thumb the scale of its coverage.
13:38Another has been attempting to weaponize the FCC.
13:41Historically, it's at least pretended to be
13:44an independent commission, but that is now changing fast
13:46under its new chair, Brendan Carr.
13:48Trump elevated him to run the commission
13:50almost immediately after the election,
13:52and Carr made no secret of what he was going to do.
13:55I want to start by expressing my thanks and appreciation again
13:58to President Trump and to congratulate him again
14:01on his historic election victory.
14:03For me, as I go forward, the first thing is to get together
14:06with the president's team and make sure that I 100%
14:10understand his agenda.
14:11After all, it's going to be his administration
14:13and it's going to be his agenda that people should be pushing.
14:16OK, but that's not what your job is supposed to be.
14:20You never want to hear something as obsequious as that
14:23coming from someone in a role that's supposed to be independent
14:26for the same reason you don't want to see an NBA ref
14:28wearing one of the team's uniforms
14:30or a Supreme Court justice flying an insurrection flag
14:33outside of his house.
14:34Hypothetically, of course, you understand.
14:36And Carr does seem deep in the tank for the president.
14:40Trump supporters have celebrated this image of him
14:42wearing a gold Trump pin.
14:44And after The Hollywood Reporter published an article titled
14:47Trump's media pitbull is off the leash
14:49that included this horrifying picture of Carr as a pitbull,
14:52he tweeted it saying,
14:56One past FCC commissioner said,
15:06And he's wasted no time pursuing Trump's agenda.
15:08His FCC is now investigating all the major broadcast outlets
15:12except for Fox.
15:14And Carr's stewardship of the FCC has also been part of a new squeeze
15:17Trump's been putting on the networks
15:19with the FCC on one side and lawsuits on the other.
15:22Here is how it works.
15:24The FCC has the ability to regulate the broadcast licenses
15:28of local TV and radio stations.
15:30The big networks each own a bunch of those.
15:32CBS, for instance, owns all of these.
15:35And while the FCC revoking a license is incredibly hard,
15:39what it can do is make it very hard
15:41for networks to sell those stations.
15:43Which, given the frequency of media mergers and acquisitions,
15:46can be a real problem.
15:48So networks now have that threat hanging over them
15:51while at the same time Trump is applying legal pressure
15:54by filing lawsuits to put them on the defensive.
15:57It is pretty flagrant.
15:59Trump files a lawsuit demanding money
16:01at the same time his FCC starts making noises
16:04about plans to make that company's life unpleasant.
16:06So the networks settle in the hopes it'll keep Trump happy
16:09and get everyone off their back.
16:11Maybe they think twice about the tone of their coverage in the future.
16:14Right now, CBS is caught in this exact squeeze,
16:18largely arising from a 60-minute segment
16:20that aired just before the election
16:22featuring an interview with Kamala Harris,
16:24which Trump maintains was misleadingly edited.
16:27He has sued the network in a lawsuit
16:29First Amendment lawyers have called
16:31frivolous and dangerous and ridiculous junk.
16:34And to understand just how true that is,
16:37it's worth looking at the specifics here.
16:39Basically, it involves Harris' answer to a question about Gaza.
16:42And here is Trump's version of what happened.
16:45They took Kamala's answer,
16:47which was a crazy answer, a horrible answer,
16:50and they took the whole answer out
16:53and they replaced it with something else she said
16:55later on in the interview,
16:57which wasn't a great answer, but it wasn't like the first one.
17:00The first was grossly incompetent.
17:02It was weird.
17:04And that was fraud and election interference.
17:06And election interference by their news magazine,
17:09a big part of CBS News.
17:11Okay, so Trump's theory is that CBS
17:14secretly replaced Harris' answer to a question
17:16to get her to win the presidency.
17:18And straightaway, complaining about that,
17:20it's a bit like accusing me of hiding the secrets
17:22of my skincare routine.
17:24One, I don't have one, and two, even if I did,
17:26it doesn't matter, because it's not like it worked, did it?
17:30But it's worth knowing the only reason
17:32he's aware of that weird answer
17:34is because it was aired in a promo
17:36for that 60 Minutes interview on Face the Nation.
17:39So CBS aired it.
17:41They weren't trying to hide anything.
17:43And if you're curious, here are the two versions.
17:45Here is what aired on Face the Nation.
17:47It seems that Prime Minister Netanyahu
17:50is not listening.
17:52Well, Bill...
17:54the work that we have done
17:56has resulted in a number of...
18:00movements in that region by Israel
18:03very much prompted by
18:06or a result of many things,
18:09including our advocacy
18:11for what needs to happen in the region.
18:13That is a pretty shitty answer.
18:15It's like she's trying to express her thoughts in English
18:17but with French grammar.
18:19It sounds like someone just shook her awake
18:21and yelled, Israel, at her.
18:23So Trump is not wrong. That was bad.
18:25But here's the supposedly much better answer
18:27that 60 Minutes aired that night.
18:30It seems that Prime Minister Netanyahu
18:32is not listening.
18:34We are not going to stop pursuing
18:36what is necessary for the United States
18:38to be clear about where we stand on the need
18:40for this war to end.
18:42I mean, I guess that sounds
18:44slightly more coherent,
18:46but they are both fundamentally
18:48celebrations of prepositional phrases
18:50and the passive voice.
18:52In both, she is talking like a high schooler
18:54trying to hit the word count.
18:56The Letter of Scarlet, worn by Hester Prynne
18:58in the novel The Scarlet Letter,
19:00by Nathaniel Hawthorne, published in 1850,
19:02symbolizes shame and punishment symbolically.
19:06And the underlying fact is
19:08the two answers seem to be broadly saying
19:10the same amount of absolute nothing
19:12about the same topic,
19:14which isn't surprising because
19:16under pressure from the FCC, CBS actually
19:18released the full transcript of the interview.
19:20And it turns out this is her full answer
19:22to the question she was asked about Israel.
19:24This is what aired on Face the Nation.
19:26And this is what aired on 60 Minutes.
19:28And this is what aired on 60 Minutes.
19:30So the network didn't take her whole answer out
19:32and replace it with something from later in the interview,
19:34as Trump claimed.
19:36They basically aired both halves of a single answer.
19:38And that sort of editing decision
19:40for time or clarity happens on TV
19:42all the time.
19:44As Semaphore pointed out, earlier last year,
19:46Fox actually massaged a Trump interview
19:48because in the version that they initially aired,
19:50this was the exchange.
19:52Would you declassify the Epstein files?
19:54Yeah. Yeah, I would.
19:56Okay, then.
19:58That is a firm, unequivocal answer.
20:00And at that point,
20:02they cut away to the next question.
20:04But when they later aired a longer clip
20:06from that interview, it became clear that his full answer
20:08played out a little differently.
20:10Would you declassify the Epstein files?
20:12Yeah. Yeah, I would.
20:14All right.
20:16I guess I would. I think that less so
20:18because, you know, you don't know.
20:20You don't want to affect people's lives
20:22if it's phony stuff in there
20:25Yeah, in one version,
20:27Trump's answer was edited down,
20:29and people who saw that missed out on the fuller context
20:31of watching his thought process go in real time
20:33from, of course, we should absolutely release the files,
20:35people deserve to know the truth,
20:37to, oh, wait, you mean that Epstein?
20:39To, oh, yeah, you know, you can't believe
20:41everything that you read about people.
20:43The point is,
20:45CBS engaged in a pretty standard practice
20:47of editing an interview for length and clarity.
20:49Nevertheless, Trump sued them for fraud,
20:52demanding $20 billion
20:54in damages.
20:56And CBS initially fought back,
20:58calling the claims completely without merit
21:00and saying that they intended to vigorously defend
21:02against the lawsuit, which makes sense,
21:04as legal experts have called it baseless
21:06and an easy victory for CBS.
21:08But here's the thing.
21:10While that lawsuit was going on,
21:12the FCC began investigating
21:14the network over claims
21:16it engaged in news distortion
21:18with the interview, and that
21:20is a big problem for CBS,
21:22especially as its parent company,
21:24Paramount, is currently in the middle
21:26of a massive merger with Skydance Media.
21:28And as I mentioned earlier, transferring
21:30its broadcast licenses will require
21:32FCC approval, and it can sit
21:34on that approval indefinitely.
21:36That may well be why
21:38Shari Redstone, Paramount's controlling shareholder,
21:40has said she favors settling the case.
21:42She and Paramount have also apparently
21:44indicated to 60 Minutes they were very
21:46interested to know the segments the show
21:48will be airing on Trump for the rest of the season,
21:50which feels like a big
21:52overstep. Bill Owens,
21:54the head of 60 Minutes, actually
21:56resigned in the wake of that,
21:58saying it had become clear he would not be allowed
22:00to make independent decisions at the show,
22:02all of which makes it pretty
22:04galling that just a few years ago
22:06Shari Redstone chaired an event for
22:08CPJ, a group that defends press freedom
22:10around the world, and had the nerve
22:12to position herself as
22:14a defender of a free press.
22:16It is truly an honor to be here
22:18representing Paramount Global
22:20and the thousands of hardworking
22:22journalists at CBS News
22:24who fight every day
22:26for the freedom and integrity
22:28of the press. The honorees
22:30in this room are living
22:32embodiments of these values.
22:34They remind us
22:36that press freedom
22:38is never guaranteed,
22:40that it must constantly
22:42be defended, and that
22:44it comes at a significant cost,
22:46both personal
22:48and professional. Wow.
22:50Powerful words there about the need to
22:52defend press freedom at any cost
22:54from someone who seemed to stop doing that
22:56as soon as there was a financial one to
22:58her. And that kind of undercuts
23:00the strength of her statement there.
23:02Imagine FDR saying, the only thing
23:04we have to fear is fear itself,
23:06only to flip the fuck out after he saw a bug.
23:08It undermines
23:10his point.
23:12And maybe Redstone's
23:14calculating that if she just
23:16gives Trump what he wants now, he'll back down.
23:18But I seriously doubt that.
23:20Just look at what happened to ABC.
23:22They settled a defamation lawsuit with Trump
23:24in December over how George Stephanopoulos
23:26characterized the E. Gene Carroll
23:28verdict, paying $15 million
23:30to Trump's private foundation for his
23:32presidential museum, despite
23:34experts saying ABC might well have
23:36won at trial. But
23:38since then, Carr's FCC has pushed
23:40ABC for more concessions, like
23:42threatening its broadcast license over
23:44Disney's DEI practices.
23:46And look, as bad as these examples are,
23:48you at least might already be aware of
23:50them. But there are fights happening at the
23:52local level that aren't getting nearly
23:54the same degree of attention, but
23:56that are just as worrying.
23:58Take a look at what Carr's FCC is doing
24:00to KCBS, a San Francisco
24:02radio station. Very basically,
24:04on the afternoon of January 26th, a
24:06local community group made this post
24:08to Facebook concerning ICE agents
24:10being spotted in the area. A city council member
24:12also posted about the
24:14ICE activities. Around 3.40
24:16p.m., the community group posted that ICE
24:18had left, and around two hours after
24:20that, KCBS
24:22ran a story about it in the classic
24:24sedate tone of every radio news broadcast
24:26ever. San Jose Mayor
24:28Matt Mahan and Council Member
24:30Peter Ortiz confirmed today that
24:32U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement
24:34agents are currently carrying
24:36out an operation on the east side of town.
24:38The county's response
24:40network says agents in San Jose
24:42were in unmarked vehicles,
24:44including a black Dodge Durango,
24:46a gray Nissan Maxima, and
24:48white Nissan truck. ICE agents
24:50were also reported outside a residence
24:52on South White and Tully Roads,
24:54and officers were reportedly at the target
24:56on King and Story
24:58Roads. Okay, first, that is a
25:00remarkably soothing voice
25:02for a news report describing something as
25:04ICE agents in unmarked vehicles.
25:06It's like listening to a YouTube video titled
25:08Lo-Fi Sounds of a Man Getting Balls
25:10by a Tiger to Relax Slash Study
25:12To. But crucially,
25:14that report's also pretty basic.
25:16ICE was in the community,
25:18community groups and government officials were
25:20talking about it, and local news
25:22covered it. That radio station was actually
25:24one of several outlets that covered it around
25:26the same time. Here it is on the
25:286 o'clock news on NBC,
25:30which actually showed images of the cars and agents
25:32being questioned, and here's the same footage
25:34being aired on Telemundo.
25:36But it was the radio report that got the attention
25:38of a right-wing activist who pointed out
25:40that KCBS was owned by George Soros'
25:42investment firm, and claimed that it had
25:44put ICE agents at serious risk
25:46while an operation was ongoing,
25:48which it very much did not.
25:50Nevertheless, that complaint
25:52made its way to Brendan Carr,
25:54who later got himself in front of a camera,
25:56to say this. What happened was you
25:58had ICE agents undercover
26:00in operations in East San Jose,
26:02in part of the town known for
26:04violent gang activity, and you had this radio
26:06station broadcasting the live
26:08location, identifying the unmarked
26:10vehicles that they were in. So we have
26:12sent a letter of inquiry, a formal investigation
26:14into that matter, and they have just
26:16a matter of days left to respond to that inquiry
26:18and explain how this could possibly be
26:20consistent with their public interest obligations.
26:22What are you
26:24talking about? Covering stories like that
26:26is literally the whole point of local
26:28radio. That, and delivering the driest
26:30imaginable ad read for a local deck
26:32staining company.
26:34Now, legal scholars will tell you, this FCC
26:36investigation is also meritless.
26:38As one First Amendment expert put it,
26:40law enforcement operations, immigration or otherwise,
26:42are matters of public
26:44interest. So it comes to a...
26:46If it comes to a court case, and KCBS
26:48chooses to fight, it will
26:50almost certainly win. But
26:52it's a little worrying that so far,
26:54they haven't openly defended their journalists, who again
26:56did absolutely nothing wrong.
26:58And on one hand, I get it.
27:00Fighting the FCC costs money and opens
27:02the station up to risk when their
27:04license comes up again. But staying silent
27:06has real cost too.
27:08As that First Amendment expert says,
27:10even if charges are never filed, people have
27:12to look over their shoulders to wonder,
27:14is the government going to come after me because I'll
27:16report something that the government doesn't like me to
27:18say? Sadly, that is a
27:20reasonable question to ask now.
27:22Much more reasonable, you could argue, than
27:24the president's workout DVD dropping.
27:26And this
27:28feels like where the biggest potential
27:30harm may be done. Because the government
27:32directly or indirectly is
27:34controlling criticism. And that is, to put
27:36it bluntly, authoritarianism.
27:38We've seen countries
27:40backslide and the press tends to be
27:42one of the first casualties. It
27:44happened under Viktor Orban in Hungary
27:46and Rodrigo Duterte in the Philippines.
27:48And those who've watched it happen in person
27:50will tell you, this is where it
27:52starts. And this is also the one
27:54chance you get to stop it.
27:56Maria Ressa is a journalist who was arrested
27:58in the Philippines for standing up to the
28:00Duterte regime. She ultimately won a Nobel
28:02Prize for doing that.
28:04And she said she sees parallels here
28:06with what happened there.
28:08And her warning to people like Shari Redstone
28:10is pretty stark.
28:12Don't voluntarily give up your rights.
28:14I mean, again,
28:16I'll give you our example in the Philippines
28:18where the
28:20first, the newspaper
28:22gave up, the television
28:24station gave up largest.
28:26It lost its franchise
28:28or license to operate.
28:30And guess what? It never regained
28:32it, even after the time of Duterte.
28:34I guess what I'm saying is,
28:36hold the line is the phrase we
28:38use because it's connected
28:40to the rights that you
28:42deserve as a citizen.
28:44And if you do not hold the line
28:46at this crucial moment,
28:48this is the moment when you
28:50are strongest.
28:52You will only get
28:54weaker over time.
28:56Exactly. Fundamental rights
28:58and freedoms are worth
29:00fighting for. And this is one of the
29:02fights that nerds who work in newsrooms
29:04can actually win, mostly because
29:06it doesn't require any upper body strength.
29:08So, what can
29:10we do? Well, obviously, public support for
29:12organizations like the AP and 60 Minutes
29:14is important, but we also need
29:16to pay attention to what's happening at places
29:18like KCBS. And I'd
29:20argue there's a special obligation
29:22here to any outlets owned by
29:24extremely wealthy people, like this
29:26lot, to fight back.
29:28Don't comply with Trump's
29:30ridiculous demands prematurely. I know
29:32he and the FCC are making a lot
29:34of intimidating-sounding threats
29:36and fighting them will undeniably
29:38take time, effort, and money. But I'd
29:40argue it is very much worth it,
29:42especially when the likeliest outcome is
29:44that you win definitively.
29:46If I may quote someone who I hope
29:48meant it when she said
29:50it, press freedom is never
29:52guaranteed, it must constantly be
29:54defended, and that often comes
29:56at a significant cost.
29:58The point is, if media owners
30:00enjoy the applause they get when they say
30:02things like that, now is the time
30:04to pay for it.
30:06Think of it this way. A free press is
30:08really a lot like Doctor Odyssey.
30:10It's rare.
30:12It's special. We're very lucky to
30:14have it.
30:16And if we're not extremely careful, we're all gonna
30:18miss it terribly when it's gone.
30:20And now, this.
30:22And now,
30:24local news has some pretty
30:26hot takes on HBO's
30:28latest rebranding.
30:30The streaming platform Max is changing
30:32its name again. This time it's going
30:34back to the HBO Max.
30:38It was HBO Max.
30:40And then it became Max.
30:42And now it's gonna go back to
30:44HBO Max.
30:46Cool.
30:48Max is changing its name again.
30:50What? Why?
30:52Remember it was HBO, then it was HBO Max,
30:54and then it was Max? Yes.
30:56It's HBO Max again. Oh, great.
30:58Pick a thing, man. No. Pick a lane
31:00and stick with it. Like, I'm not
31:02like the king of all, you know,
31:04protecting your brand, but my lord,
31:06what are you doing, Warner Brothers?
31:08Warner Brothers Studio says this change
31:10puts a focus on quality
31:12rather than quantity.
31:14Okay. Why change it?
31:16Some new marketing guy needed to justify his job.
31:18Look what I came up with, guys.
31:20I have to wonder, too, did they bring in a focus group
31:22to make the change back? And how much money
31:24did that cost? Now, if you really want to get upset,
31:26just stop and think for a second about
31:28the collective salaries of the people that
31:30sat around the table and came up with the decision.
31:32Max, I'm sorry, derivative
31:34Cinemax was always associated
31:36with late-night porn. I mean, let's
31:38call it what it is. I mean, seriously.
31:40And sometimes when you get the knob
31:42and you adjust it a certain way, you can see it
31:44through the... Okay. Okay.
31:46I don't know where we were going with get the knob.
31:52Moving on.
31:54Finally tonight, a quick update. You may
31:56remember two weeks ago, we did a segment about
31:58the incredible institution that is
32:00minor league baseball, which is really just baseball
32:02but with a staggering amount of
32:04younger sibling energy.
32:06In it, we walked you through some of the
32:08spectacular team names, like the
32:10Rumble Ponies, the Trash Pandas,
32:12and the Modesto Nuts, whose logo features
32:14what appears to be a sporty nut thrupple.
32:16We also mentioned some of their
32:18amazing theme nights, like the Charleston Riverdogs
32:20Helen McGuckin night, which was
32:22dedicated entirely to impressing
32:24a random woman who gave the ballpark
32:26a two-star review without ever setting foot
32:28inside it.
32:30A level of pettiness I can only aspire to.
32:32Well, it turns out
32:34a lot of teams and their fans were excited
32:36to be mentioned, including this North Alabama
32:38news anchor, who added an extra detail.
32:40Did anyone catch
32:42John Oliver's shout-out to
32:44the Trash Pandas?
32:50The comedian gave the
32:52Trash Pandas a shout-out during
32:54his weekly show, Last Week
32:56Tonight, while the main story
32:58was about deportation.
33:02Yeah.
33:04It, uh, it sure was.
33:06And, uh,
33:08that right there is the face of a woman
33:10who is suddenly wondering if the word
33:12comedian was the right choice there.
33:14At the end of that episode,
33:16we mentioned that not all teams
33:18seem to be pulling their weight in the eccentricity
33:20department, so we offered to rebrand
33:22one minor league team with a new name,
33:24mascot, and theme night, as long as
33:26they, one, promise to do whatever we told them,
33:28and two, email to
33:30johnoliveratbuntstuff.com
33:32and email address that I promise
33:34made sense in context. Now, I will admit,
33:36when we do things like this, we're not always
33:38sure what level of response we're
33:40going to get, which is why I'm happy to tell you
33:42we got so many
33:44emails, and I will say
33:46a bunch were for non-baseball reasons,
33:48including one guy who simply wrote,
33:50I'd like to say that you look like the wrinkles on my
33:52nutsack, and the makeup
33:54you put on isn't working, accounting
33:56boy, then miraculously
33:58signed off with, best wishes,
34:00mate, which,
34:02thanks, and honestly, you know which
34:04insult hurts the most there? Accounting
34:06boy, because I can brush
34:08off the nutsack thing, maybe yours is
34:10exquisite, and if you saw me
34:12without TV makeup, you'd realize it is
34:14actually working.
34:16This is unfortunately the makeup
34:18working, but accounting boy,
34:20I'm afraid that is just a bullseye
34:22right there.
34:24I also got an invitation to a wedding at the
34:26Indianapolis Zoo from Zach and McKenna,
34:28who wrote, no choice on food,
34:30you will eat what we have and like it,
34:32which I like very
34:34much, but I'm thrilled to say
34:36we also had 47
34:38minor league baseball teams reach out to
34:40take our offer. That is 40%
34:42of all of them.
34:44We got so many emails, we had
34:46to make a beautiful spreadsheet with
34:48multiple tabs to keep track
34:50of them, and the very fact I'm bragging
34:52about a spreadsheet clearly
34:54means I'm not beating the accounting
34:56boy allegations.
34:58Some teams
35:00were endearingly self-deprecating, like the
35:02Buffalo Bisons, who wrote, we were named the
35:04Buffalo Bisons in 1877, and not
35:06only was that name probably the boring first
35:08thought back in the late 19th century,
35:10it's also grammatically incorrect, which is
35:12of course true. Bison
35:14is one of those words where the plural doesn't
35:16have an S, like sheep or share.
35:18Yeah. This right here,
35:20that's a bunch of share, not
35:22I don't make the rules, I just follow them.
35:24Some teams even sent
35:26videos, like the Lake County Captains,
35:28whose magnificent toilet seating
35:30we featured. They made us a
35:32video that began with the words
35:34Pick Us, John Oliver, and
35:36escalated from there.
35:38We have nine mascots. Not one,
35:40nine. When we needed
35:42a new one, we brought back the most hated
35:44mascot in Cleveland history.
35:46The Baseball Bug!
35:48We gave him a second chance. America loves
35:50a redemption arc. Our mascots
35:52try to do something big to get your attention.
35:54Looks like we're doing the Oliver Wave
35:56here to end this
35:58epistemic. It's always a lot of fun,
36:00but you don't see this many mascots
36:02sitting on a row of toilets in
36:04any other place. That is
36:06pretty good, but I'll be honest, the Lake County Captains
36:08have a row of toilet seats and nine mascots,
36:10one of which looks like someone placed a baseball
36:12cap on top of Elmo's genitals.
36:14On top of that,
36:16they've clearly got the kind of printer that can do full head
36:18printing on a pretty tight turnaround, so I'm not
36:20sure what you really need us to do
36:22for you. I think we'd just be holding
36:24you back. They're not the only
36:26team that reached out despite not needing our help.
36:28We also heard from the Amarillo Sod Poodles, and
36:30what are you doing in our inbox?
36:32You want us to rebrand Ruckus the
36:34Sod Poodle? A giant ground squirrel
36:36dressed like he's attending the Cowboy Carter
36:38tour? Absolutely not!
36:40We also heard from the Quad City River
36:42Bandits who emphasized their bona fides, saying
36:44we were the first team to fill a helicopter
36:46with candy, then drop it all over
36:48the field after a game. Then as the
36:50children ran out onto the field to grab the candy,
36:52we'd have the helicopter circle back
36:54and drop thousands of giant marshmallows
36:56all over the children.
36:58And if you think we're gonna find a way
37:00to one-up the idea of chopper-shitting
37:02a bunch of candy on some kids,
37:04and then when they get all excited, buzz back
37:06around to bombard them with marshmallows?
37:08You're out of your fucking
37:10minds!
37:12Incredibly, the Eugene Emeralds also contacted
37:14us with an email in which they called me
37:16Mr. One John Oliver, which is not how
37:18the English language works, but
37:20we're obviously not gonna even attempt to top
37:22their alternate identity of the
37:24Exploding Wales, or indeed
37:26come up with a mascot that's better than this
37:28cheeky bitch who smirk says,
37:30guess who's about to go boom?
37:32Honestly,
37:34part of this whole process was learning
37:36more about the mascots that already exist,
37:38some of which are really good. The
37:40Fredericksburg Nationals, for instance, told us
37:42that mascot Gus is literally
37:44George Washington's childhood imaginary
37:46friend. We don't fully understand
37:48that either, but kids love him.
37:50Picture in your mind what you think
37:52George Washington's imaginary friend would look like.
37:54Are you picturing it right now?
37:56Have you got it in your head now?
37:58You're wrong, it's this.
38:00That's Gus. That's
38:02who America's father
38:04hung around with as a boy. We're not
38:06touching that!
38:08Overall, picking a team turned out
38:10to be difficult, and before we reveal our choice,
38:12let me just say this. If you haven't been
38:14to a minor league baseball game, you
38:16really should go, because minor league baseball
38:18is clearly both incredibly special
38:20and inescapably stupid
38:22in the very best way.
38:24But in the end, we have made a choice,
38:26so please, come with me.
38:28Because,
38:30as hard as it was,
38:32we did pick one of the
38:3447 entries, and we're excited
38:36to get to work.
38:38The team we've selected is
38:42the Erie Seawolves
38:44in Erie, Pennsylvania.
38:46They've offered us a list of
38:4811 good reasons to pick them, one of which was
38:50the Seawolves play baseball
38:52nowhere near the sea, which, yeah,
38:54that's a problem, Erie.
38:56We can help you fix that, so
38:58congratulations to the Seawolves.
39:00You're about to be called something else.
39:02We are going to research
39:04your area and come up with a new name,
39:06a new mascot and theme night for you
39:08that no one else in the league has,
39:10and that could only come from Erie.
39:12As per our original offer, you will get
39:14no input into this.
39:16If I may paraphrase my now
39:18favourite wedding invitation of all time,
39:20you will take what we have
39:22and you will like it.
39:24All you have to do is
39:26sign the contract we're about to send you
39:28so we can get started, but I promise
39:30this is going to be great. That is our show.
39:32Thank you so much for watching.
39:34We're off next week.
39:36Tune in first. Good night!
40:04.