American Crisis exclusive: The 'Media Capitulation Index'
A sweeping report — with rankings — on the decline of independence in our corporatized media
If you’ve been paying attention to the news lately, you know that the media has been on a capitulation-and-kowtowing spree.
To tick off a few cases: The parent company of CBS News paid $16 million to settle a suit brought by Donald Trump over a (routinely edited) “60 Minutes” interview of Kamala Harris. Another Trump suit — against ABC News — raked in $15 million, and garnered a note of regret; many legal experts think ABC could have won the case had they tried. The owner of the Washington Post, Jeff Bezos, ordered an editorial endorsing Harris to be killed last fall; and Bezos was front and center at Trump’s inauguration after contributing $1 million to the festivities. Fox News drastically cut back on its coverage of the Jeffrey Epstein story after Trump charged it was a non-story and a hoax.
It’s more than a trend. It’s a growing crisis of the press abdicating its responsibility to hold powerful people and institutions accountable.
In response, Free Press, a 20-year-old media-advocacy nonprofit (definitely not to be confused with Bari Weiss’s similarly named company founded in 2021) did extensive research over many months.
The result is a thorough new examination of how well — or poorly— the American press is doing that core mission. And why it’s mostly failing.
I was offered an early look at the Free Press report, dubbed “A More Perfect Media,” so that I could share it here with you today, along with my interview with the report’s author, Tim Karr.
The study, whose apt subtitle is “Saving America’s Fourth Estate from Billionaires, Broligarchy and Trump,” not only lays out the problem, but offers a way forward. Karr, a former international reporter for large news organizations including the Associated Press and Time, is Free Press’s senior director of strategy and communications.
One element is the Media Capitulation Index, which you can see here. Thirty five of the largest and most influential media organizations in the United States get a rating for their relative independence or lack thereof. The ratings, which come with explanations, range from a star (signaling independence) up to five chickens (signaling propaganda). As you’ll see, there are enough chickens in these ratings to start a good-sized poultry farm.
Bloomberg News earned a rare star. The New York Times got one chicken, which means “vulnerable.” Disney (which owns ABC News) got three chickens, which indicates “capitulating,” as did Paramount Global, which owns CBS News. Fox Corp., which includes Fox News, earned four chickens. So did Meta, once known as Facebook. (An earlier version of this post gave the wrong rating to Fox and Meta, and said the worst rating was four not five. Thanks to a careful reader for correcting me!)
I asked Karr why the Times, which prides itself on its journalistic independence, does not get the star rating.
“There is a tendency to ‘both-sides’ reporting about the Trump administration,” Karr said of the Times, giving “equal weight to the forces of democracy and the forces of authoritarianism.” One sees this particularly in headlines and, he said, in feature reporting that glorifies and normalizes anti-democratic public officials with glowing attention, for example, to their fashion or lifestyle choices. That, he says, amounts to “soft-pedaling fascism.”
Note: The rankings are focused on commercial media, which is why the Associated Press, NPR and PBS are not included. The AP has been notably gutsy in pushing back against Trump’s bullying.
Karr emphasizes that the problem of media capitulation didn’t start with Donald Trump, though his second term has caused it to grow exponentially. The tendency has been worsening since the passage of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, which removed many of the restrictions on media ownership. The result has been a “massive realignment.” Huge, diverse corporations own news companies, and independent journalism all too often takes a back seat to corporate profits, mergers and other forms of consolidation. Meanwhile, public media has been defunded, local journalism lacks local ownership, and partisan propaganda has found an influential home on radio and cable news.
I talked about why these companies are caving to Trump’s demands with the Guardian’s Jonathan Freedland on his podcast. Listen here.
And if you’re disgusted, disheartened and want to know what you can do, Karr wants us to remain optimistic (or at least not to lose hope).
“We’re at a moment of emergency and media crisis,” he acknowledged. But policy continues to be made, particularly at the FCC, and it’s important that the public be informed and that momentum grows to address these problems. The report offers action steps. (See its Section IV on principles, practices and policy.)
It may take a long time to make progress, and it may not happen at all while Trump holds so much power. But change can’t happen at all without public engagement.
“These corporations exist because of public policy,” Karr emphasized, and reforming the system must happen the same way. “There is a genuine popular movement to create a more democratic media system. People should get engaged in this debate.” Free Press takes no money from business, government or political parties; it relies on individual donors.
Readers, thank you for being here and caring about the crucial relationship between the press and democracy. I want to warmly welcome all new subscribers; American Crisis now has almost 48,000 total subscribers, and we’re continuing to grow. Please know that I read your comments with great interest, and I learn from them. I appreciated the many who expressed their opinion on whether the Epstein/Trump story line is a mere distraction or something more important.
Below is some information on who I am and what I’m trying to do here, with your help.
My background: I am a Lackawanna, NY native who started my career as a summer intern at the Buffalo News, my hometown daily. After years as a reporter and editor, I was named the paper’s first woman editor in chief in 1999, and ran the 200-person newsroom for almost 13 years. Starting in 2012, I served as the first woman “public editor” of the New York Times — an internal media critic and reader representative — and later was the media columnist for the Washington Post. These days, I write here on Substack, as well as for the Guardian US, and teach an ethics course at Columbia Journalism School. I’ve also written two books and won a few awards, including three for defending First Amendment principles.
The purpose of ‘American Crisis’: My aim is to use this newsletter (it started as a podcast in 2023) to push for the kind of journalism we need for our democracy to function — journalism that is accurate, fair, mission-driven and public-spirited. That means that I point out the media’s flaws and failures when necessary.
What I ask of you: Last fall, I removed the paywall so that everyone could read and comment. I thought it was important in this dire moment and might be helpful. If you are able to subscribe at $50 a year or $8 a month, or upgrade your unpaid subscription, that will help to support this venture — and keep it going for all. Thank you!
Glad to see someone doing this. Shame can be a powerful tool, if accompanied by volume and repetition. The legacy media is failing at one of its core purposes: afflicting the powerful.
“A nation of sheep will beget a government of wolves.” - Edward R Murrow
I feel vindicated by the NY Times' one chicken rating. In pointing to the Times' misleading headlines and its "both-diderism"and "sane-washing", the study confirms my pained observations throughout the ten years of the Trump catastrophe.