| | | | | Exec summary: Roy Moore says he's being "harassed" by the media... Sean Hannity says Moore needs to explain himself or drop out... In other news, Jeff Sessions sidestepped Q's about the AT&T deal... NBC News fired an SVP... and Taylor Swift topped the 1 million mark... | | Big news from AG Jeff Sessions at Tuesday's House hearing: The DOJ is conducting 27 investigations into an "epidemic" of classified leaks. Sessions said the Obama-era DOJ investigated "three per year" in the past three years, "about nine" total, while his department has "27 ongoing investigations" right now. Here's my full story...
>> Reality Winner is the only person known to be charged with leaking info to a journalist so far this year. Winner has pleaded not guilty... | | "Music to the ears of the president." | | | That's what Fox's Ed Henry called it on Tuesday night. Many of us had the same thought during the hearing: Trump is going to love this... | | Here's reaction from one top news outlet... | | | When I asked for reaction, AP general counsel Karen Kaiser emailed: "The Associated Press is always concerned about any potential infringement upon the ability of journalists to safely and effectively gather and report the news. We call on the government to ensure journalists are protected from prosecution in connection with any investigation of leaks, and to refrain from interfering with the role of a free press." | | Wednesday night: CPJ's annual benefit dinner in NYC | | | The Committee to Protect Journalists' annual International Press Freedom Awards and benefit dinner will be held Wednesday night in NYC... Christiane Amanpour will host... this year's dinner is chaired by David Rhodes... | | John Skipper's contract extension | | ESPN President John Skipper's contract is being extended through 2021, a source familiar with the deal said Tuesday. The extension was first reported by The Big Lead. Skipper joined ESPN as president in 2012. The contract renewal is a vote of confidence in Skipper during a turbulent time... Here's the story Ahiza Garcia and I wrote...
-- More ESPN contract news: THR says midnight "SportsCenter" host Scott Van Pelt has re-upped... | | | That was one of the banners on "The Situation Room" Tuesday night. The RNC is withdrawing $$$ support for Roy Moore... But he's vowing to keep campaigning... while complaining about the press... | | So I checked in with Michelle Holmes, the VP of content for the Alabama Media Group, which operates the state's biggest papers. Tuesday's editions included an editorial calling Moore "grossly unfit." Holmes told me: "The reaction to our online editorial, shared more than 14,000 times from AL.com alone, mirrors the pulse of Alabama: Those outraged and repulsed that Moore remains a candidate offer some support for our stand; meanwhile, Moore's loyal base hurls insults or celebrates Moore's Godliness, shaming us for (as one commenter put it) 'the treatment you are handing to a fine Christian gentleman like Mr. Moore.'"
Holmes said AL.com's comments section is "a reminder that we are not the monolith so many outside the state believe us to be..." | | -- Great video: ABC's Tom Llamas pursuing Mo Brooks down a stairwell...
-- "Bernie Bernstein?" Seriously? "A robocall from someone posing as a Washington Post reporter offering money for 'damaging remarks' about Moore is fake, the Post said Tuesday..."
-- Via Slate: "On his radio show, Rush Limbaugh reminded listeners that Moore was a Democrat at the time his misconduct allegedly occurred..."
-- Steve Deace, on Facebook, says a lawyer for Moore sent a threatening letter to the Alabama Media Group on Tuesday night... | | Hannity breaking with Moore | | At the end of Tuesday's show, Sean Hannity slammed Moore for inconsistent explanations, then said this: "For me, the judge has 24 hours. You must immediately and fully come up with a satisfactory explanation for your inconsistencies... You must remove any doubt. If you can't do this, then Judge Moore needs to get out of this race."
-- "When you've lost Sean Hannity, it's pretty close to the end of the road," Frank Bruni said on "CNN Tonight..." | | Trump waking up with "Fox & Friends" in the A.M. | | | POTUS arrived back at the W.H. on Tuesday evening... He didn't respond when the press pool shouted Q's about Moore... But several analysts pointed out that he'll probably be turning on "Fox & Friends" Wednesday A.M. when he wakes up. (Jet lag permitting!) | | -- "Trump has made 1,628 false or misleading claims over 298 days." That's the latest tally from the WashPost's fact-checking team...
-- Reps. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) and Jim Jordan (R-OH) are introducing H.R.4328, a bipartisan federal shield law... "the Free Flow of Information Act of 2017..." (Twitter)
-- An update on the journos who were arrested amid inauguration day protests: Two "are still scheduled to stand trial." One of the trials starts Wednesday... (NYT) | | | THE AT&T-TIME WARNER DEAL | | No new comment from Sessions | | USA Today's Brad Heath tweeted Tuesday afternoon: "Sessions testified that restoring integrity to DOJ is among his top priorities, but won't answer whether White House tried to sway AT&T merger talks."
For the record, this was Rep. David Cicilline's question: "Has any W.H. employee or official, including the president, contacted the Justice Dept. regarding the AT&T-Time Warner transaction or any other transaction?" Sessions: "I am not able to comment on conversations or communications the Department of Justice top people have with top people at the White House."
Here's the vid. I noticed lots of skeptics on Twitter interpreting his no comment to be a "yes." Last week DOJ and W.H. officials denied improper influence... | | Tuesday's notes and quotes | | -- Cicilline and his Democratic colleague John Conyers want the House Judiciary Committee to hold a hearing examining potential W.H. meddling, Bloomberg's Gerry Smith reports...
-- Michael Wolff is critical of AT&T in his latest column about the deal: "Even when directly told that the White House didn't like it, and that senior Trump officials were saying it was going down, AT&T put its fingers in its collective ears..."
-- THR's Paul Bond points out that shares of Time Warner "have fallen 15% in less than a month" amid deal concerns... | | Toobin writing book about Mueller and Trump | | | Doubleday editor in chief Bill Thomas: "This is the book that Jeff Toobin was born to write." You can say that again! Toobin has inked a deal to write about Robert Mueller's probe and the other investigations roiling the Trump presidency. He has been covering the story on CNN and in the pages of The New Yorker; the book will bring it all together in a "single narrative that tells the tale in all its bizarre glory." Details here via the NYT... | | Michael Wolff's book now has a title and pub date | | | Michael Wolff's fly-on-the-wall look at the Trump W.H. will be titled "Fire and Fury," and it'll hit bookshelves on Jan. 9, publisher Henry Holt announced Tuesday... | | | The Forbes #30Under30 Media list came out on Tuesday -- Elaine Welteroth, Jim Bankoff and I were the three industry judges who helped narrow down the list -- check it out here! | | -- An update from Charles Krauthammer: "I have graduated from the ICU to an advanced rehab facility to regain my strength and stamina..." (Fox)
-- Alexis Simendinger, previously of RCP, is joining The Hill as a national political correspondent and podcast host... (Twitter)
-- Philo is the latest entrant in the "over the top" cable TV marketplace... Peter Kafka breaks it down here... (Recode) | | | In the afternoon, Shep Smith "methodically debunked" the "Uranium One conspiracy theories" that have filled up hours of the network's airtime, Mediaite's Justin Baragona writes. In the evening, Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum co-hosted a town hall about taxes with Paul Ryan. At night, Tucker Carlson led with "JUSTICE DEPT. MAY INVESTIGATE HILLARY," and then Sean Hannity presented this "web of corruption" flow chart purporting to show scandals surrounding Hillary Clinton... | | ICYMI: Pirro's meeting with Trump | | On Monday night, the NYT reported that Fox's Jeanine Pirro met with POTUS in the Oval Office on Nov. 1 and "said that a special counsel needed to be appointed" to pursue Clinton.
Pirro's statement to the paper: "Everything I said to President Trump is exactly what I've vocalized on my show, 'Justice with Jeanine.'" | | Cohen: "How Rupert Murdoch destroyed the Republican Party" | | Brian Lowry emails: Richard Cohen's Washington Post column about Rupert Murdoch's corrosive effects on the Republican Party through Fox News brought to mind something I wrote back in 2014, when Murdoch was inducted into the TV Academy's Hall of Fame. The premise was that while Murdoch's influence is undeniable, the impact of what he has brought to the media ecosystem -- and the divisiveness his assets have stoked -- yields a more complicated legacy...
>> Read Cohen's full column here... | | On the one year anniversary of Gwen Ifill's death... | | | "Simmons College announced Tuesday the Gwen Ifill College of Media, Arts and Humanities in honor of Ifill, who graduated from the private college with a communications degree in 1977," the AP reports... "The formal launch of the school is planned for 2018..." | | | For the record, part three | | | -- NYT's latest on the anti-Hannity campaign: "Advertisers are sending mixed messages in response to calls for a boycott of Sean Hannity," Sapna Maheshwari reports... (NYT)
-- "Bloomberg's new Twitter network will launch on Dec. 18," Sara Fischer reports... (Axios)
-- Ruth Ben-Ghiat has signed a deal with W.W. Norton to write "Strongmen: How They Rise, Why They Succeed, How They Fall," a history of authoritarian rulers that will include Trump...
-- A powerful #LongRead by Kristen Hare: "These editors left their newsrooms instead of laying off more journalists..." (Poynter) | | "Super Mario Bros." animated movie in the works at Illumination | | | Frank Pallotta emails: Super Mario could be making his leap to the big screen. Nintendo is close to a deal with Illumination Entertainment for an animated movie based on "Super Mario Bros." The WSJ's Ben Fritz and Takashi Mochizuki broke this news on Tuesday. Read Frank's full story here... | | -- Ronan Farrow's latest must-read is about Rose McGowan and the drug charges she's fighting...
-- Via THR: "Harvey Weinstein and The Weinstein Co. are being sued by an anonymous actress who says she was raped at a Beverly Hills hotel in 2016..."
-- Katherine Goldstein's in-depth piece for Nieman Reports: "The News Industry Has a Sexual Harassment Problem. #NowWhat?"
-- "One Tree Hill" creator Mark Schwahn has been accused of sexual harassment by former cast and crew members of the series, Sandra Gonzalez reports...
-- Via Variety: 20th Century Fox tech exec Claire Schmidt "has started a new venture that will let people anonymously report incidences" of sexual harassment or bias... | | NBC dismisses Matt Zimmerman | | NBC News fired the head of its network booking unit, Matt Zimmerman, on Tuesday. "We have recently learned that Matt Zimmerman engaged in inappropriate conduct with more than one woman at NBCU, which violated company policy. As a result he has been dismissed," a spokeswoman said. THR's Marisa Guthrie has details here...
-- Yashar Ali tweeted: "Per Insider: NBC Universal policy says that relationships with underlings/direct reports must be reported to human resources...in at least one case, Zimmerman failed to do this..." | | Jon Stewart "stunned" by Louis C.K.'s sexual misconduct | | Frank Pallotta emails: Jon Stewart made awkward jokes a year ago when pressed about the Louis C.K. rumors. Now C.K. has confessed, and Stewart says he's stunned. "You always find yourself back to a moment of, 'Did I miss something? Could I have done more?'" Stewart said on Tuesday's "Today" show.
He also explained his reaction to being asked about C.K. last year. "My first response was, 'What?' And then, joke, joke, and as he kept going, I was like, 'Look, I know this is very serious, but I know Louis, he's always been a gentleman to me,' which, again, it speaks to the blindness that I think a man has," Stewart said... | | "It's time" for VF "to be rethought" | | | Via Time mag, Tina Brown's advice for new Vanity Fair editor Radhika Jones: "Oh, completely rip it up, and start again if you want. I'm a huge believer in reinvention. And we put out amazing DNA that lasted for, good lord from '84 to where we are now. It's time for it to be rethought. I don't think you want to stay in [a] template left by your predecessor." Brown's new book, "The Vanity Fair Diaries," came out Tuesday... | | Tina Brown on Facebook/Google: "They have stolen so much..." | | | One more notable quote from Brown's interview with Time mag: "I think it's high time that Facebook and Google created a vast philanthropy fund to fund journalism. They have stolen so much that it's high time they gave some of it back..." | | | For the record, part four | | | By Francesca Giuliani-Hoffman:
-- Here's Christiane Amanpour with the latest installment of CNN Opinion's special series "Free Press: What's At Stake..." (CNN)
-- Reddit may go public in 2020, says CEO and co-founder Steve Huffman... (Variety)
-- The Daily Beast looks at Twitter troll "Umpire43," whose tweets attempting to discredit Roy Moore's accusers have gained traction among Moore's fans... (Daily Beast)
-- Freedom House's latest study says that social media manipulation efforts on behalf of governments have dramatically increased in the past year, playing an important role in elections in at least 18 countries, including the U.S... (Freedom House) | | "A whiff of desperation"? | | | Brian Lowry emails: This is a good read from the LAT's Meg James about Murdoch's possible plans to sell off pieces of Fox. Analyst Doug Creutz is quoted: "All of this has a whiff of desperation. For Fox, it doesn't make sense. They would be cutting the heart out of their content creation business..." | | Will "Reputation" topple "1989" by week's end? | | | Frank Pallotta emails: I'm sorry, Taylor Swift can't come to the phone right now. Why? Because she's busy selling a million albums. Swift's latest album "Reputation" sold over a million copies since it was released four days ago. This is her fourth consecutive album to sell more than a million copies in its first week. Now, let's see if it topples "1989" by week's end... | | Megan Thomas emails: "Reputation" is certainly selling, but what is Swift actually singing about? The New Yorker's Carrie Battan tries to take the guess-work out of Swift's new songs here...
>> An excerpt: "On 'Reputation,' she is embittered and vindictive toward a public that she feels has abandoned her, but she's also liberated from the imaginary harness of perfection. 'They took the crown, but it's all right,' she sings with a well-rehearsed shrug on 'Call It What You Want...'" | | People mag's "Sexiest Man Alive" is... | | Lowry reviews "The Punisher" | | | Brian Lowry emails: Marvel and Netflix postponed a scheduled New York Comic-Con preview of "The Punisher," their latest comic-book adaptation, because of its proximity to the shooting in Las Vegas. Now the show finally premieres, but it remains crazily violent, as well as a tad talky and boring in the long lapses between those sequences... | | Jimmy Fallon pays tribute to his late mother Gloria | | | Frank Pallotta emails: "She was the best audience. She was the one I was always trying to make laugh," a very emotional Jimmy Fallon said about his late mother, Gloria on Monday night. "We are going to continue to work really hard to bring some light and some laughter into the world," Fallon said to the audience. "Mom, I will never stop trying to make you laugh..." | | | For the record, part five | | | By Lisa Respers France:
-- The youngest child of the late pop star Michael Jackson is seldom seen these days, but fans were buzzing about him Tuesday thanks to an odd message from his grandfather. Joe Jackson tweeted a video message to 15-year-old Blanket that left some people scratching their heads...
-- Good news for "Wonder Woman 2" fans -- the sequel to the blockbuster superhero film is being released six weeks earlier than previously planned...
-- Jordin Sparks is really good at keeping secrets. Not only is the "American Idol" alum married, she's also expecting her first child...
-- ICYMI: J.J. Abrams gave Jimmy Kimmel an epic surprise 50th birthday gift with a little help from some celebrity friends... | | | Email brian.stelter@turner.com... I appreciate every message. The feedback helps us craft the next day's newsletter! | | | Get Reliable Sources, a comprehensive summary of the most important media news, delivered to your inbox every afternoon. | | | | | |
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