| | | | Sessions to would-be leakers: "don't do it" | | "President Trump's Justice Department is considering making it easier to subpoena journalists. Attorney General Jeff Sessions said Friday that the DOJ is reviewing its existing guidelines for media subpoenas," Dylan Byers reports.
Will anything come of this? We'll find out...
The DOJ clearly wants government employees, journalists and members of the public to know that it is cracking down on leaks of classified information. Since January, Sessions said, the DOJ has "more than tripled the number of active leak investigations." However, there's only been one known prosecution of an alleged leaker since Trump took office... | | Sessions trying to save his job? | | There's no need to tap-dance around this: Sessions was speaking to POTUS through the TV. And there's a very good chance the president was watching. The anti-leaks event was promoted ahead of time by Fox News, and was carried live by both Fox and MSNBC. Everyone was aware that Trump has been harshly critical of Sessions and expressed regret about appointing him. Trump has also called for more aggressive leak investigations. So isn't that what this "crackdown on leaks" event was all about?
-- Chuck Todd on Twitter: "If DoJ media source threat is real (I assume it's not; just a show presser to please WH) then I look forward to ignoring that subpoena..." | | -- Dylan's full story explains the existing guidelines that provide journalists with broad protections from subpoenas and govt monitoring...
-- "As of now, the department is still operating under the 2015 guidelines," HuffPost's Michael Calderone reports. Rod Rosenstein is "scheduled to meet next week with members of the News Media Dialogue Group," including DC bureau chiefs from several news orgs...
-- I didn't know this til Betsy Woodruff wrote it: "A major subtext of today's leak presser is that members of Congress may be prosecuted for leaking..." Here's her story co-bylined with Noah Shachtman... | | Prove it, Mr. Attorney General | | Press freedom "is not unlimited" and journalists "cannot place lives at risk with impunity," Sessions said, insinuating that some national security stories containing info from leakers "place lives at risk." What's the evidence for that? Where's the proof?
The DOJ declined to elaborate or explain on Friday. Sessions left the room without answering any Q's. One reporter asked: "Are you saying you will jail journalists, Mr. Attorney General? Do you plan to prosecute journalists?" No answer... | | "That's the problem of the leaker, not the journalist" | | | Paul Ryan's reaction when asked at a press avail on Friday evening: "I have not seen what Jeff said about this. Leaks are a bad thing. Leaks are concerning, because leaks can often compromise national security, but that's the problem of the leaker, not the journalist." | | | What's your reaction to today's anti-leak event? Your comments will help inform Sunday's discussion on "Reliable Sources." Email reliablesources@cnn.com... | | -- NBC: "Robert Mueller has tapped multiple grand juries, including juries in Washington and Virginia... three sources familiar with the matter told NBC News..."
-- On Page One of Saturday's NYT: This "document request is the first known instance of Mr. Mueller's team asking the White House to hand over records..."
-- Shimon Prokupecz, Pamela Brown and Evan Perez's latest for CNN: "FBI tracked 'fake news' believed to be from Russia on Election Day"
-- Josh Dawsey's latest for Politico: "Lawyers warned Trump against transgender military ban for days. He tweeted it to end the arguments..." | | About those leaked transcripts... | | | Francesca Giuliani-Hoffman emails: Freedom of the Press Foundation exec director Trevor Timm, writing for CJR, disagrees with those who decried Thursday's publication of transcripts of the president's calls with two foreign leaders. He says the WashPost "should be commended," and that "if there's anything that's "unprecedented, shocking, and dangerous" about these leaks, "it's Donald Trump's foreign policy." Timm will be on "Reliable Sources" this Sunday... | | 📡 New chatter about AT&T deal | | "REPORT: AT&T MAY SELL CNN, TMZ" was the lead headline on The Drudge Report Friday evening. Drudge was linking to a Deadline story by by Anita Busch and David Lieberman, who say "there are rumblings at the highest executive levels that AT&T's top executives are considering divesting some Time Warner assets -- including news organization CNN and celebrity gossip site TMZ -- after they merge."
The sale of Time Warner is expected to close in the coming months, which means this newsletter and the rest of CNN will soon be part of AT&T.
There's been talk of a CNN spin-off before. But the TMZ piece is new. Deadline quotes a source saying "they" -- meaning AT&T execs -- "don't want any controversy." The story also says "this would be a good time to sell CNN" and notes that CBS chief Les Moonves is interested in doing a deal.
An AT&T spokesman declined to comment on Deadline's story Friday night. There's been no past indication from AT&T about a spin-off plan. A knowledgeable source told me the story is "total B.S." If nothing else, it's an example of the rumor-rich environment surrounding the biggest media deal of the year...
-- Yesterday on Deadline: Peter Bart's column: "Will Time Warner's Creative Energy Survive AT&T Takeover?"
-- Earlier this week AT&T vet John Stankey officially took over the Time Warner Merger Integration Planning Team... Here's my story... | | Fox says it will investigate report about Bolling behavior | | | Fox News says it will investigate after HuffPost published a scandalous story about Fox News host Eric Bolling. The headline: "Fox News Host Sent Unsolicited Lewd Text Messages To Colleagues, Sources Say." Yashar Ali said he worked on the story for three months and reached "14 sources in and out of Fox News and Fox Business." Fox's response via a spokesperson: "We were just informed of this late Friday afternoon via a HuffPost inquiry and plan to investigate the matter." Bolling's attorney had more to say: "Mr. Bolling recalls no such inappropriate communications, does not believe he sent any such communications, and will vigorously pursue his legal remedies for any false and defamatory accusations that are made." | | -- Why is "the NRA's new enemy" news outlets like the NYT? Philip Bump explores the gun group's anti-media bent here... (WashPost)
-- Neil Cavuto thinks Newsweek's cover illustration of Trump as a "lazy boy" is "over the top" and "a sin..." (Mediaite)
-- Media Matters for America is pressuring Sean Hannity's advertisers "to shun him." It's a brand-new boycott campaign, David Bauder reports... (AP)
-- With Choire Sicha taking over Styles, Emily Peck asks: "Why Hasn't A Woman Run The New York Times Styles Section In Decades?" (HuffPost) | | --> Weekend programming... | | "Reliable Sources" guest list | | | "Reliable" topped Fox and MSNBC in the key 25-54 demo for the month of July. Thanks for 👀ing! On our first August edition, Trevor Timm will join me along with Jeff Greenfield, Kathleen Hall Jamieson, Matt Schlapp, new WHCA president Margaret Talev, ProPublica president Richard Tofel, and CNN's own Oliver Darcy. Sunday, 11am ET, CNN, with a replay at 1pm ET on CNN International... | | "Sharknado 5" on Syfy this Sunday | | | Brian Lowry emails: "Sharknado 5: Global Swarming" still boasts plenty of Comcast synergy -- including talent from the "Today" show, like Al Roker -- but expands its web internationally, with morning-show hosts from the U.K. And Australia getting in on the silliness. Here's the review! | | Gore's climate change doc | | | "An Inconvenient Sequel," all about Al Gore's climate change awareness efforts, arrived in theaters nationwide on Friday. Gore will be on "Fareed Zakaria GPS" right before "Reliable." I'm curious to see how well it does at the box office compared with Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth" in 2006, which made $24 million in the U.S. and $25 million in international markets... | | HBO: When it rains, it pours... | | "Game of Thrones" ep leaks two days early | | | Megan Thomas emails: Sunday's upcoming episode of "Game of Thrones" leaked online Friday morning, but it wasn't part of the email hack that HBO is grappling with. The "Thrones" leak came through HBO's distribution partner Star India. There's a Star watermark on the video. "We take this breach very seriously and have immediately initiated forensic investigations at our and the technology partner's end to swiftly determine the cause. This is a grave issue and we are taking appropriate legal remedial action," a rep for Star India told The Verge... | | By Francesca Giuliani-Hoffman:
-- Here are Ken Doctor's nine midsummer media takeaways... (Nieman Lab)
-- David Uberti, now at Splinter, writes about the troubled relationship between Slate and their bargaining unit... (Splinter)
-- Today in "everybody is ripping off Snapchat," Google is now developing a media product to resemble Discover... (WSJ)
-- The Atlantic goes full-on "kids these days" with a feature on whether smartphones have destroyed the post-Millennial generation. (No, they haven't!) (The Atlantic)
-- BuzzFeed News is expanding its tech coverage with two senior hires: Vocativ's Kevin Collier, covering cybersecurity, and Wired's Davey Alba covering AI... (Mic)
-- A new role is born at the WSJ, and Jason Anders is now the paper's Chief News Editor in charge of daily news reports... (Talking Biz News) | | Today's new developments in the Wheeler suit against Fox | | -- Rod Wheeler to Chris Cuomo: "My goal is to clear my name." Here's the full interview, and the transcript...
-- David Folkenflik tweets: "A small nugget: A Fox News source with direct knowledge of internal decisions said Ed Butowsky is no longer allowed 'inside the building...'" | | Rachel Maddow "like a fad diet?" | | | Via Francesca: Olivia Nuzzi interviewed Rachel Maddow about Maddow and MSNBC's Trump-induced ratings boom. Asked about the reasons for her popularity, Maddow said: "I do long, detailed, context-driven narratives about things that are going on in the news. I did that before, and I'll be doing it when this time period is over. People have an appetite for that now. I'm assuming that I'm like a fad diet..." | | Is Gregg Jarrett "a news anchor or commentator?" | | The Hill's Joe Concha writes: "Former defense attorney and Fox News anchor Gregg Jarrett called grand juries an 'undemocratic farce' on Thursday, just one day after writing an op-ed asking why a grand jury had not been impaneled for former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's mishandling of classified information."
-- Related: BuzzFeed's Jon Passantino tweets: "Is Jarrett a news anchor or commentator? He's blurred the line more than any at Fox with appearances on Hannity." The same Q could be asked of Fox's Ed Henry, a W.H. correspondent who fills in on "Fox & Friends" and "Tucker Carlson Tonight..." | | | For the record, part three | | | By "Reliable" intern Julia Waldow:
-- Archconservative author Dinesh D'Souza tweeted (and then promptly deleted!) pictures of his visit to the White House to give Steve Bannon and Seb Gorka signed copies of his new book that compares Democrats to Nazis... (The Hill)
-- "That's not just big. That's a game changer." THR's Tim Goodman explains how NBC, the CW, and other networks' new revenue strategies might cause a "revenge of the broadcast networks..." (THR)
-- Miranda Hobbes for governor? Cynthia Nixon of Sex and the City fame is being floated as a possible challenger to Andrew Cuomo (D-N.Y.) in 2018... (The Hill) | | ...it's because Trump isn't holding solo pressers | | Can you believe it? The president didn't take the advice from Thursday night's newsletter. He didn't hold a presser before flying off on vacation. In fact, he has let almost six months pass without holding a solo press conference, as I wrote in this story for CNNMoney Friday afternoon. Here's how he stacks up.
# of solo press conferences by presidents after 200 days in office:
Jimmy Carter: 12
Ronald Reagan: 3
George H.W. Bush: 18
Bill Clinton: 8
George W. Bush: 3
Barack Obama: 9
Donald Trump: 1 | | | Francesca Giuliani-Hoffman emails: Dan Froomkin, writing for Poynter, offers "free advice for the next journalist who gets an interview with President Trump," replete with lots of Q's for the commander in chief. A personal favorite item: don't agree to going off the record... | | Spicer turns down "Dancing" and signs up with Barnett | | Page Six's Thursday night scoop: Sean Spicer has signed with Bob Barnett. TV deal and book deal TK? Spicer is still working at the White House, but he's closing up shop... on Friday he handed the @PressSec Twitter handle over to Sarah Huckabee Sanders... Still, as Politico's Tara Palmieri reported here, it's tricky for Spicer to hunt for his next job without breaching the standards of conduct for West Wing staffers...
-- BTW: Spicer confirmed to CNN's Mark Preston that he declined an invite from ABC's "Dancing With the Stars..." | | | Last night I wrote about Comedy Central's "The President's Show," even though I knew it's actually called "The President Show." D'oh! My apologies. | | New out-of-home viewing data from Nielsen | | Brian Lowry emails: Nielsen presented some interesting data Friday at TCA on out-of-home viewing, a metric for which the networks have long advocated, citing tune-in for sports and other shows at bars, hotels, gyms, etc. Among the notable gainers: James Comey's Senate testimony in June. Comey's audience grew by 11% when out-of-home was factored in. USA Today's Gary Levin has a more complete rundown here...
-- Related: Last month CNN and Turner Sports signed up for Nielsen's out-of-home offering... | | "This Is Us" lost one of its 11 Emmy nominations | | | Melissah Yang emails: "This Is Us" has another reason to shed a tear. The hit NBC show lost one of its Emmy nominations after the Television Academy disqualified its submission for "outstanding contemporary costumes..." | | How NBC is combating the 'ridiculous' shortage of female TV directors | | | Sandra Gonzalez reports: NBC has announced the start of Female Forward, an initiative that aims to build toward having the same number of female and male directors at the helm of the network's scripted episodes... Read more here... | | Lowry disappointed by "The Dark Tower" | | | Brian Lowry emails: The spotty record of Stephen King adaptations continues with the much-anticipated "The Dark Tower," yielding what feels like a British tea-time show, only with Idris Elba and Matthew McConaughey. Better luck, hopefully, with "It," which arrives next month... | | "Mr. Robot" season three trailer is out | | | Here it is. Wednesday, October 11 is the premiere date for season three of the USA drama. "The premiere date, trailer, and the first image of Bobby Cannavale's new character Irving were unmasked through a social media scavenger hunt orchestrated by the network," Variety reports... | | | Have a great weekend! See you Sunday. | | | Email us at reliablesources@cnn.com... we 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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