On the Media

This week, the White House agreed to restart student loan payments to broker the debt ceiling deal. On the latest On the Media, hear how a prominent lawsuit against Biden’s student debt relief plan falls apart under scrutiny. Plus, a look at ways journalists have faltered in covering the Supreme Court. 1. Eleni Schirmer [@EleniSchirmer], writer and research associate with the Future of Finance Initiative at UCLA's Luskin Institute on Inequality and Democracy, on the legal battle being waged against relieving student debt. Listen. 2. Dahlia Lithwick [@Dahlialithwick], lawyer and writer at Slate, on how we cover the Supreme Court when it doesn't act like one. Listen. 3. Dan Charnas [@dancharnas], associate arts professor at NYU, on how music copyright law suppresses the artistic voices of hip hop producers. Listen.

Last week, Tasha Adams watched her ex-husband, Stewart Rhodes, get sentenced to 18 years in prison for seditious conspiracy. Rhodes both founded and led the Oath Keepers, a far-right anti-government militia group that marched on the Capitol during the January 6th insurrection. Earlier the same week, Adams also finalized her divorce proceedings against Rhodes — ending over twenty years of a marriage that culminated in abuse and isolation. In our last episode, OTM correspondent Micah Loewinger and Anna Sale, host of Death, Sex & Money, traveled to Montana to speak to Adams about her marriage with Rhodes. Now we're giving you an extended look at that conversation through a segment that originally aired on Death, Sex & Money. Anna and Micah talk to Tasha about her decades-long marriage with Stewart, from their courtship in a ballroom dance class in Las Vegas, to abuse and isolation as Stewart became transfixed on politics and apocalyptic ideas. Plus, Tasha sits down with Kelly Jones, ex-wife of far-right radio host Alex Jones, and they compare notes on their marriages, and reflect on their secret text exchanges from 2018, when Tasha was plotting her escape from Stewart with her six kids.

On Thursday May 25, founder of the Oath Keepers Stewart Rhodes was sentenced to 18 years in prison for his role in the January 6th attack on the Capitol. On this week’s On the Media, hear how OTM correspondent Micah Loewinger’s reporting became evidence in a federal trial. Plus, what can history tell us about when journalists are called to testify. 1. OTM reporter Micah Loewinger [@MicahLoewinger] speaks with senior editor of Lawfare, Roger Parloff [@rparloff], about becoming a federal witness in the trial of Oath Keeper Stewart Rhodes. Listen. 2. Micah talks to Lee Levine, first amendment lawyer, about the case of civil rights reporter Earl Caldwell and the impact it continues to have on journalists testifying in court. Listen. 3. Micah and Death, Sex, & Money host, Anna Sale [@annasale], speak with Stewart Rhodes' ex-wife Tasha Adams [@That_Girl_Tasha] on her relationship with Rhodes and the impact of his 18-year prison sentence. Listen.

On April 20, 2023, BuzzFeed CEO Jonah Peretti announced that BuzzFeed would be closing down its newsroom and laying off 15 percent of its staff. The news came amidst a deluge of headlines about struggles in the media industry, including: layoffs at NBC, Vox, NPR, Spotify, Insider, News Corp, ABC, and Gannett; the closure of MTV news; bankruptcy at Vice. But the end of BuzzFeed News in particular symbolized the end of an era. BuzzFeed's rapid rise and success in the late aughts and 2010s helped define the style and format of digital media. In 2013, BuzzFeed was getting 130 million unique viewers a month. Disney made an offer to buy BuzzFeed for half a billion dollars that same year, which Peretti turned down. In 2016, BuzzFeed was valued at $1.7 billion. And then, last fiscal quarter, BuzzFeed reported $106 million in net losses. In this conversation, Brooke talks with Ben Smith, the Editor-in-Chief and co-founder of Semafor and author of the new book, Traffic: Genius, Rivalry, and Delusion in the Billion-Dollar Race to Go Viral, about his goals in building a newsroom at BuzzFeed, the lessons he learned, and what he thinks about the future of of news.

This week, the CEO of OpenAI testified at a senate hearing about the dangers of artificial intelligence and called for its regulation. On this week’s On the Media, how long-term fears about AI are shaping perceptions of the technology today, and steps Congress could take to fix problems with internet platforms. Plus, debunking myths about the writers’ strike. 1. Will Oremus [@WillOremus], technology and the digital world reporter for The Washington Post, on the fears and hopes circulating around AI in Congress and Silicon Valley. Listen. 2. Emily St. James [@emilystjams], TV critic turned TV writer, on the age-old myths around Hollywood writers' strikes. Listen. 3. Cory Doctorow [@doctorow], journalist, activist, and the author of Red Team Blue, on solutions to the enshittification of the internet. Listen.

On Tuesday we entered the third week of one of the largest entertainment strikes in recent memory, the first TV writer's strike since 2007. More than 11,000 people are participating in the action by the Writers Guild of America, resulting in shows like The Tonight Show and Last Week Tonight going dark. At the heart of the strike are concerns about the changes streamers like Netflix have presented for writer pay and career development. For one, the streamers don’t pay writers residuals, the cut of money they would traditionally get every time their show was rerun on television. Now writers are more likely to be paid for the number of days they work on any given show. But while writer's fight for a new contract some old myths are resurfacing about the strike's impact, including the idea that when writers stopped working in 2007, there was an explosion of reality tv shows. For this week's podcast extra, Brooke speaks with former TV critic turned TV writer Emily St. James about some of the less than true notions about the current strike and previous strikes and why they keep circulating.

This week, E. Jean Carroll was awarded 5 million dollars in damages in a trial that found Donald J. Trump liable for sexual abuse and defamation. Shortly after, Trump mocked Carroll in a town hall on CNN. On this week’s On the Media, hear what Carroll’s case, and its coverage, tells us about the progress of the Me Too Movement. Plus, how Big Tech has made the internet harder to use. 1. Our host Brooke Gladstone [@OTMBrooke] on what the CNN town hall actually revealed. Listen. 2. Rebecca Traister [@rtraister], writer-at-large for New York Magazine, and author of Good and Mad: The Revolutionary Power of Women’s Anger, on what E. Jean Carroll's case can tell us about the #MeToo movement. Listen. 3. Cory Doctorow [@doctorow], journalist, activist, and the author of Red Team Blue, on the political attitudes and technical mechanisms that lead to the decline of platforms online. Listen.

If you discovered this series through Apple podcasts, or because you heard that we won a Peabody Award for our work; WELCOME! For our longtime listeners who have heard these episodes before, your weekly dose of On the Media will be available as ever, on Friday afternoon. Enjoy! Episode 5: There's Something About Radio Highly politicized, partisan companies like Salem have a hold on the airwaves — and they don’t plan to give it up. Senior Vice President of Salem, Phil Boyce speaks candidly to Katie about the personalities he handpicked to spread Salem’s message and about the company’s plans to expand into the media world off the airwaves. And in this final episode of the series we ask the perennial question: peddling election denialism seems to be a solid business model — but is it legal? The Divided Dial is hosted by journalist and Fulbright Fellow Katie Thornton. Her written articles and audio stories have appeared in The Atlantic, 99% Invisible, The Washington Post, BBC, NPR, WNYC, Minnesota Public Radio, The Guardian, Bloomberg’s CityLab, National Geographic, and others. She is a lifelong radio nerd who got her start in media as a teenager, volunteering and working behind the scenes at radio stations for many years. You can follow her work on Instagram or on her website. The Divided Dial was edited by On the Media's executive producer, Katya Rogers. With production support from Max Balton and fact-checking by Tom Colligan, Sona Avakian, and Graham Hacia. Music and sound design by Jared Paul. Jennifer Munson is our technical director. Art by Michael Brennan. With support from the Fund for Investigative Journalism.

If you discovered this series through Apple podcasts, or because you heard that we won a Peabody Award for our work; WELCOME! For our longtime listeners who have heard these episodes before, your weekly dose of On the Media will be available as ever, on Friday afternoon. Enjoy! Episode 4: From The Extreme to The Mainstream In the 1970s, talk radio was hitting its stride, with hosts and listeners from all political persuasions. But the radio dial was about to change forever. Community needs assessments, requirements to offer public service programs and multiple perspectives, and limits on how many stations a single company could own were all eradicated. Technological and legal changes would consolidate the radio industry exponentially, allowing conservative talk radio hosts like Rush Limbaugh to take over the airwaves. In this episode, we look at radio’s last four decades to understand how we got to where we are today, and how conservative talk radio came to dominate a medium that once thrived on varied viewpoints. The Divided Dial is hosted by journalist and Fulbright Fellow Katie Thornton. Her written articles and audio stories have appeared in The Atlantic, 99% Invisible, The Washington Post, BBC, NPR, WNYC, Minnesota Public Radio, The Guardian, Bloomberg’s CityLab, National Geographic, and others. She is a lifelong radio nerd who got her start in media as a teenager, volunteering and working behind the scenes at radio stations for many years. You can follow her work on Instagram or on her website. The Divided Dial was edited by On the Media's executive producer, Katya Rogers. With production support from Max Balton and fact-checking by Tom Colligan, Sona Avakian, and Graham Hacia. Music and sound design by Jared Paul. Jennifer Munson is our technical director. Art by Michael Brennan. With support from the Fund for Investigative Journalism.

If you discovered this series through Apple podcasts, or because you heard that we won a Peabody Award for our work; WELCOME! For our longtime listeners who have heard these episodes before, your weekly dose of On the Media will be available as ever, on Friday afternoon. Enjoy! Episode 3: The Liberal Bias Boogeyman How did the right get their vice grip of the airwaves, all the while arguing that they were being silenced and censored by a liberal media? In this episode we look at the early history of American radio to reveal that censorship of far-right and progressive voices alike was once common on radio. And we learn how, in the post-war and Civil Rights period, the US government encouraged more diverse viewpoints on the airwaves — until it didn’t. The Divided Dial is hosted by journalist and Fulbright Fellow Katie Thornton. Her written articles and audio stories have appeared in The Atlantic, 99% Invisible, The Washington Post, BBC, NPR, WNYC, Minnesota Public Radio, The Guardian, Bloomberg’s CityLab, National Geographic, and others. She is a lifelong radio nerd who got her start in media as a teenager, volunteering and working behind the scenes at radio stations for many years. You can follow her work on Instagram or on her website. The Divided Dial was edited by On the Media's executive producer, Katya Rogers. With production support from Max Balton and fact-checking by Tom Colligan, Sona Avakian, and Graham Hacia. Music and sound design by Jared Paul. Jennifer Munson is our technical director. Art by Michael Brennan. Special thanks this episode to Tianyi Wang. With support from the Fund for Investigative Journalism.

If you discovered this series through Apple podcasts, or because you heard that we won a Peabody Award for our work; WELCOME! For our longtime listeners who have heard these episodes before, your weekly dose of On the Media will be available as ever, on Friday afternoon. Enjoy! Episode 2: From Pulpit to Politics How did the little-known Salem Media Group come to have an outsized political influence? In this episode we trace the company’s rise to power from its scrappy start in the 1970s to the present day — a growth that paralleled and eventually became inextricable from the growth of the Religious Right. We learn that Salem is tightly networked with right wing political strategists, pollsters, big donors, far right leaders and Republican party mainstays thanks to their involvement with the Council for National Policy — a secretive group of Evangelical and conservative leaders. For decades, the CNP has been working behind the scenes to get a specific, highly influential subset of voters to act. And Salem has been a megaphone for their cause. The Divided Dial is hosted by journalist and Fulbright Fellow Katie Thornton. Her written articles and audio stories have appeared in The Atlantic, 99% Invisible, The Washington Post, BBC, NPR, WNYC, Minnesota Public Radio, The Guardian, Bloomberg’s CityLab, National Geographic, and others. She is a lifelong radio nerd who got her start in media as a teenager, volunteering and working behind the scenes at radio stations for many years. You can follow her work on Instagram or on her website. The Divided Dial was edited by On the Media's executive producer, Katya Rogers. With production support from Max Balton and fact-checking by Tom Colligan, Sona Avakian, and Graham Hacia. Music and sound design by Jared Paul. Jennifer Munson is our technical director. Art by Michael Brennan. With support from the Fund for Investigative Journalism.

If you discovered this series through Apple podcasts, or because you heard that we won a Peabody Award for our work; WELCOME! SUBSCRIBE TO ON THE MEDIA TO LISTEN TO THE OTHER 4 EPISODES IN THE SERIES Episode 1: The True Believers In 2016, Christian talk radio host Eric Metaxas begrudgingly encouraged his listeners to vote for then-presidential candidate Donald Trump. By 2020, he pledged his life to fighting the “stolen election” while talking with Trump on the air. Ahead of the midterm elections, Metaxas and many of his fellow talk radio hosts made sure the falsehood of massive 2020 election fraud was top of mind — on the airwaves and beyond. And while election-denying candidates didn't do as well as many on the right had hoped, at least 170 such candidates have been elected to state and national offices, some of whom will be in charge of future elections. We meet the company whose hosts never backed down from the lies of the stolen 2020 election: Salem Media Group, the largest Christian, conservative multimedia company in the country – and perhaps the most influential media company you’ve never heard of. The Divided Dial is hosted by journalist and Fulbright Fellow Katie Thornton. Her written articles and audio stories have appeared in The Atlantic, 99% Invisible, The Washington Post, BBC, NPR, WNYC, Minnesota Public Radio, The Guardian, Bloomberg’s CityLab, National Geographic, and others. She is a lifelong radio nerd who got her start in media as a teenager, volunteering and working behind the scenes at radio stations for many years. You can follow her work on Instagram or on her website. The Divided Dial was edited by On the Media's executive producer, Katya Rogers. With production support from Max Balton and fact-checking by Tom Colligan, Sona Avakian, and Graham Hacia. Music and sound design by Jared Paul. Jennifer Munson is our technical director. Art by Michael Brennan. With support from the Fund for Investigative Journalism.

Two decades have passed since George W. Bush gave his “Mission Accomplished” speech about the U.S. invasion of Iraq. On this week’s On the Media, hear how Iraqi journalists have fought to tell their stories over the last twenty years. Plus, what coverage of the Disney v. Florida lawsuits is missing, and a theory to account for the internet’s creeping demise. 1. Mark Joseph Stern [@mjs_DC], a senior writer covering courts and the law for Slate, on Disney taking Ron DeSantis to court. Listen. 2. OTM producer Suzanne Gaber [@SuzanneGaber] takes a closer look the troubles and triumphs of Iraqi journalism, twenty years after George W. Bush delivered his famous “Mission Accomplished” speech. Listen. 3. Cory Doctorow [@doctorow], journalist, activist, and the author of Red Team Blue, on his theory surrounding the slow, steady descent of the internet. Listen. Music from this week's show: I’m Not Following You - Michael Andrews I'm Forever blowing bubbles We Insist - Zoe Keating The Glass House - David Bergau The Hammer of Los - John Zorn

On April 9, 2003, a US marine battalion rolled triumphantly into Firdos Square, in the center of Baghdad, two and a half weeks after the US invasion of Iraq began. Hours later, the marines toppled a statue of Saddam Hussein, amongst what seemed like a roaring, jubilant crowd of Iraqis. It became, perhaps, the most televised image of the Iraq War — and it seared itself into the minds of its viewers. Twenty years later, that image is still circulated, and sometimes celebrated. Peter Maass, then a contributing writer for the New York Times Magazine, stood at the edge of Firdos Square that day. What he witnessed, was vastly different from what viewers were seeing on their television screens across the world. Years later, Maass reconstructed the chain of events that led to the toppling to see what went wrong. For this week's podcast extra, he speaks with Brooke about how the media subconsciously creates events for itself to cover — and how the rampant misconceptions that followed in the wake of the toppling led to a pernicious view of the Iraq War that we're still trying to divorce from today.

In late 2016, American diplomats in Havana, Cuba started hearing a mysterious buzzing sound, followed by debilitating symptoms. On this week’s On the Media, why the government now disputes theories that it was a secret Russian weapon. Plus, what the electric hum of your refrigerator and the uncanny hearing ability of pigeons reveal about the world we live in. 1. Adam Entous, staff writer at The New York Times, Jon Lee Anderson, staff writer at The New Yorker, and Robert Bartholomew, sociologist and author of Havana Syndrome: Mass Psychogenic Illness and the Real Story Behind the Embassy Mystery and Hysteria, on the investigation into the mysterious affliction that spread across the globe. Listen. 2. Jennifer Munson, OTM Technical Director, and Nasir Memon, New York University professor of computer science and engineering, on the obscure technology called electrical network frequency analysis, or ENF, and the world of audio forensics. Listen. 3. Robert Krulwich [@rkrulwich], co-creator and former co-host of Radiolab, and John Hagstrum, a geophysicist emeritus at the U.S. Geological Survey, on the mysterious avian disappearance that rocked world headlines. Listen.

The Redstone family controls Paramount Global, formerly known as ViacomCBS, Inc., — one of the biggest entertainment companies out there. (Think CBS entertainment, MTV, Nickelodeon.) The family is also one of the inspirations for HBO's Succession, which makes sense the more you get to know them. Sure, Rupert Murdoch plays his kids off each other and broke up with one wife on email. But Sumner Redstone, who died at 97 in 2020, had a love life that shook his media empire to its core, never mind the tabloids. This week, Brooke speaks to Rachel Abrams, a senior producer and reporter for The New York Times Presents, and the co-author with James B. Stewart of Unscripted:​​ The Epic Battle for a Media Empire and the Redstone Family Legacy.

Fox News settled with Dominion Voting Systems for over 780 million dollars on Tuesday. On this week’s On the Media, the impact media moguls, and their families, have had on our culture at large. Plus, the bigger lessons we can learn about money and free speech from the revelations surrounding Clarence Thomas. 1. Jim Rutenberg [@jimrutenberg], writer-at-large for the New York Times and its Sunday magazine, on the Dominion lawsuit settlement and what's next for Fox News. Listen. 2. Robert Thompson, professor of television, radio, and film at Syracuse University, on the impact of the Murdoch family and their media empire, and what can be learned about their real-life power from the fictional tv show. Listen. 3. Corey Robin [@CoreyRobin], professor of political science at Brooklyn College and the CUNY Graduate Center, on what bigger lesson we can learn from the newest controversy around Justice Clarence Thomas. Listen. Music from this week's show: Finding Mink - Danny Elfman Eye Surgery - Thomas Newman Succession (Main Title Theme) Time is Late - Marcos Ciscar String Quartet No. 5 - Philip Glass - Kronos Quartet Tateh’s Picture Book - Randy Newman

Earlier this month, a Texas judge issued a contentious decision about a drug named Mifepristone, widely used as an abortion pill and a medication to aid treatment of people who suffer miscarriages. U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, a Trump-appointee with documented anti-abortion views, ruled to suspend use of the drug across the entire country, saying that the Food and Drug Administration didn't properly vet the drug when it was cleared for market over twenty years ago. The FDA has spent quite a bit of time in the national limelight the past few years, largely due to the pandemic. But despite its occupation of headlines, the FDA’s history–and at times contentious relationship with the government that created it–aren’t always as widely covered. This week, Brooke sits down with Daniel Carpenter, the Allie S. Freed Professor of Government at Harvard University and author of the book, “Reputation and Power: Organizational Image and Pharmaceutical Regulation at the FDA,” to talk about the agency's origins and complicated task in the face of our modern political arena.

For the first time since the Cold War, an American reporter has been charged with espionage in Russia. On this week’s On the Media, hear about one journalist who stayed to cover Putin’s invasion, and from one who left. Plus, a look at why NPR has sworn off Twitter for good, and how it will affect people who get their news from the app. 1. OTM producer Molly Schwartz [@mollyfication], takes a deep dive into the imprisonment of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, and the challenges of reporting on the ground in Russia right now. Listen. 2. Nikita Kondratyev, reporter for Novaya Gazeta Europe, on leaving Russia and covering Putin's invasion in exile. Listen. 3. Zoe Schiffer [@ZoeSchiffer], managing editor of Platformer, on Elon Musk's newest fight with the press and the departure of NPR from Twitter. Listen. Music from this week's show: Berotim - John Zorn We Insist - Zoe Keating April - Kino Fellini’s Waltz - Enrico Pieranunzi Bryter Layter - Nick Drake Blue Monk - Jimmy Giuffre Cello Song - Nick Drake

Donald Trump is the first ever president to be charged with criminal activity. And leading up to his arraignment, cable news has dug in, breathlessly tracing his every movement — his jet touching down in LaGuardia, his short journey from Trump Tower to the courthouse, and even his expressions and body language inside the courtroom. TV news hosts left no detail unturned, offering up 24/7, wall-to-wall coverage. According to Alex Shephard, staff writer at The New Republic, the coverage saw media outlets stumbling back into some of its "worst habits." In this week's podcast, Shephard tells Brooke about what reporters missed about the indictment.