News company owners meddling in content has sparked another resignation. This time, from a cartoonist after her cartoon was blocked.
Throughout 2024, we noted the mainstream media’s intense effort to not only sane-wash convicted felon, Donald Trump, but also concerted efforts to bring down Democrats as well. This clear biased efforts, as I pointed out, has a massive potential to backfire on the media thanks to Trumps long stated goal to go after anyone who would ever have the audacity to say something that would hurt his or his MAGA inner circles feelings – intentional or not.
The efforts seem to showcase the mainstream media’s efforts to shoot themselves in the foot in the most vivid way possible – even eclipsing efforts to institute a link tax on the internet. Of course, these efforts to tilt the election in the Republican’s favour didn’t go unnoticed. This was reflected in countless polls over the last year where trust in the media is hitting rock bottom. Simply put, the media tried to curry favour from the far right who are impossible to win over while rejecting left leaning people outright who at least still had some faith in the media. Not exactly the brightest move, but here we are.
So, what is the source of all this mainstream media bias? Some of it may well be from the journalists writing the stories, but a lot of that is likely coming from right wing owners of those outlets meddling in the content of the journalists work. If you write an investigative piece into the MAGA movement, that is likely to be subjected to watering down or outright nixing altogether for the reason of potentially upsetting Trump and his political base. This, of course, is not a reason to run a piece, but mainstream media has rejected basic journalistic integrity standards and dedication to the truth in pursuit of business interests. Distorting the truth or outright publishing disinformation has been happening for a while now on a variety of topics.
For some, however, these observations are over the top and not really happening. For them, if that were to truly be happening, journalists with integrity would be resigning their positions because there are plenty out there dedicated to the truth. The last thing they would be interested in is being silenced by their outlets owners. For those voices, I would say in response that they are right on that point because that is exactly what is happening these days at multiple outlets.
As I reported back in October, journalists at the Washington Post and the LA Times are sounding the alarm over political interference in their work. Journalists and editors at both papers, during the last election, had come together to round up all the facts and perspectives to consider whether to make a political endorsement or not. In both instances, the choice was clear: they are making an endorsement and that endorsement would be for Vice President, Kamala Harris. Yet, those endorsements never got published because the owners at both outlets intervened and blocked the endorsement.
In response, reporters, including a Pulitzer Prize winner, began resigning at the Washington Post, disgusted at the political bias being forced on them. Word of journalists being silenced by their owners, unsurprisingly, spread like wildfire and caused a massive backlash as people started cancelling their paid subscriptions. In the midst of the fallout, Jeff Bezos published a response, saying that his award winning journalists were the best in the business, but he couldn’t leave his newsroom on auto-pilot, requiring his intervention. It’s safe to say that he didn’t exactly win very many hearts and minds with that nonsensical answer.
Nevertheless, the owner of the LA Times, Patrick Soon-Shiong, undeterred by the backlash for his part, started cracking down on editorial headlines, ensuring that they were MAGA friendly headlines or face getting nixed. This only further fuelled controversy that the content of mainstream media outlets are being directly controlled by right wing billionaires silencing anything that might make left leaning politicians look good.
Back at the Washington Post, it seems that the fallout is continuing as another resignation has hit the paper. This time, it was cartoonist, Ann Telnaes. She announced on her Substack that she is quitting the Washington Post and explained her reasons why. Unsurprisingly, it’s political interference on her work:
I’ve worked for the Washington Post since 2008 as an editorial cartoonist. I have had editorial feedback and productive conversations—and some differences—about cartoons I have submitted for publication, but in all that time I’ve never had a cartoon killed because of who or what I chose to aim my pen at. Until now.
The cartoon that was killed criticizes the billionaire tech and media chief executives who have been doing their best to curry favor with incoming President-elect Trump. There have been multiple articles recently about these men with lucrative government contracts and an interest in eliminating regulations making their way to Mar-a-lago. The group in the cartoon included Mark Zuckerberg/Facebook & Meta founder and CEO, Sam Altman/AI CEO, Patrick Soon-Shiong/LA Times publisher, the Walt Disney Company/ABC News, and Jeff Bezos/Washington Post owner.
While it isn’t uncommon for editorial page editors to object to visual metaphors within a cartoon if it strikes that editor as unclear or isn’t correctly conveying the message intended by the cartoonist, such editorial criticism was not the case regarding this cartoon. To be clear, there have been instances where sketches have been rejected or revisions requested, but never because of the point of view inherent in the cartoon’s commentary. That’s a game changer…and dangerous for a free press.
She went on to publish a sketch of the cartoon that sparked this whole thing. Then, she concluded with this:
As an editorial cartoonist, my job is to hold powerful people and institutions accountable. For the first time, my editor prevented me from doing that critical job. So I have decided to leave the Post. I doubt my decision will cause much of a stir and that it will be dismissed because I’m just a cartoonist. But I will not stop holding truth to power through my cartooning, because as they say, “Democracy dies in darkness”.
Thank you for reading this.
This showcases a pattern of mainstream media outlet owners interfering in the work of their staff for political purposes. Whether that is blocking presidential endorsements to curry favour to Trump or nixing cartoons because it criticizes the efforts of these owners to kiss Trump’s ring, the political interference is happening again and again.
As I’ve said on multiple occasions, the image of an owner trying to control the narrative of journalists work for political purposes (or, in this case, an editorial cartoonist) is absolutely devastating to the credibility of said news organization claiming to be devoted to the truth. It’s not just me that is noticing this. The audiences are noticing and the people that work at these outlets are witnessing this as well. What’s more, the evidence is overwhelming here.
While this latest resignation might end up being a case of moving the deck chairs while the ship sinks (given that Trump is set to become the next US president), it does set the stage for how people view and trust the media. This in an environment when free speech has never been more precarious in the US – whether that is through online sources or physical print. It’s one of many reasons why there is reason to worry for what’s to come this year.
