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Sanders, Senate Dems to CBS Owner: 'Do Not Capitulate' to Trump Assault on Press Freedom
"In the United States of America, presidents do not get to punish or censor the media for criticizing them. Freedom of the press is what sets us apart from tin-pot dictatorships and authoritarian regimes."
May 07, 2025
U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders and a group of Democratic lawmakers on Tuesday implored the owner of CBS News' parent company not to cave in the face of President Donald Trump's legal assault on the outlet and other media organizations that he perceives as political enemies.
Sanders (I-Vt.) and his Senate colleagues argue in a letter to Shari Redstone, the controlling shareholder of Paramount, that the $20 billion lawsuit Trump filed against CBS News late last year represents "a blatant attempt to intimidate the media and those who speak out against him."
The lawsuit, which First Amendment experts have described as "frivolous" and potentially dangerous to press freedoms, claims CBS deceptively edited an interview it conducted with former Vice President Kamala Harris ahead of the 2024 election.
The senators wrote in their Tuesday letter that "this lawsuit is an attack on the United States Constitution and the First Amendment."
"In the United States of America, presidents do not get to punish or censor the media for criticizing them. Freedom of the press is what sets us apart from tin-pot dictatorships and authoritarian regimes," the senators added.
"It will only embolden him to shake down, extort, and silence CBS and other media outlets that have the courage to report about issues that Trump may not like."
But the lawmakers raised alarm over Redstone's push to settle the Trump lawsuit as she seeks to close a merger deal with the entertainment company Skydance. If federal regulators approve the deal, Redstone's family stands to receive $2.4 billion in cash from Skydance in exchange for the controlling stake in Paramount.
The Wall Street Journalreported last month that Redstone "has advocated for a settlement with Trump, hoping it would clear the way for the merger's approval."
According to the Journal, Paramount leaders have discussed settling the Trump lawsuit for up to $20 million. Redstone has also reportedly "kept tabs" on recent "60 Minutes" segments to monitor Trump-related coverage.
Sanders and his Senate Democratic colleagues argued that settling the lawsuit "would be a grave mistake," warning that "rewarding Trump with tens of millions of dollars for filing this bogus lawsuit will not cause him to back down on his war against the media and a free press."
"It will only embolden him to shake down, extort, and silence CBS and other media outlets that have the courage to report about issues that Trump may not like," the letter states. "We urge you and the board of directors at Paramount to make it clear to President Trump today that Paramount will not surrender to his attack on the First Amendment."
"Stand up for freedom of the press and our democracy," it continues. "Do not capitulate to this dangerous move to authoritarianism."
CBS is one of several media outlets Trump has targeted with legal action in recent months as part of a far-reaching assault on journalism in the United States.
"After nearly a decade of repeating insults and falsehoods, and filing lawsuits, Trump has normalized disdain for media to an alarming degree," the Committee to Protect Journalists said in a report released last month.
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The Fetterman Exposé is a Testament to How Badly Democracy Needs Fearless Journalism
Without good reporting, negligence and abuse would go unchecked, and corruption’s roots in democracy would be deeper and wider.
May 07, 2025
On May 2, New York Magazine’s Ben Terris penned a bombshell exposé that profiled Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman’s struggles with mental health, his maltreatment of staff, and his pervasive support for the genocide in Gaza, among other concerning discoveries. The coverage was extensively sourced and researched, and many of the revelations Terris uncovered were previously buried by stakeholders who counted on the Pennsylvania seat to hold blue. This sort of fearless and intrepid journalism, unattached to political or partisan interests, is a crucial requirement for our democracy to maintain a shred of integrity.
The shocking disclosures made in Terris’ piece did not all occur overnight—these indications of Fetterman’s inability to appropriately serve in the Senate date back years. The senator’s mental health, as described by his closest advisers in the coverage, has been detrimental to not only his ability to represent the people of Pennsylvania but also to his own well-being and the health of his family. All parties privy to any of this information would have had every reason to bury any trace of the senator’s behavior, except a reporter brave enough to tell the story.
Now more than ever, we need truth tellers who are willing to be uncomfortable.
Sen. Fetterman’s win in 2022 delivered Democrats the majority they needed to control the Senate. Per Terris’ reporting, that majority came at a cost. The standard that our partisan system places on individuals who will hold great power is dismal, including the lowest bar possible for a commitment to human dignity as represented in Fetterman’s consistently violent comments on the genocide in Gaza.
In a two-party system that continues to compromise below bare minimum standards for human rights to make partisan gains, there has to be a robust media ecosystem that uncovers those compromises. Just days before the Fetterman exposé, The Colorado Sun’s Jesse Paul released a year-long investigation covering former Rep. Yadira Caraveo’s (D-Colo.) significant struggles with depression, mental health, and alarming concerns from staff. Rep. Caraveo lost a razor-thin general election in November and is now seeking to regain her seat in 2026. With a swing district like Colorado’s 8th, the Democratic Party would gain nothing from being forward about Caraveo’s mental health status. Colorado needed this investigation by Paul to make an appropriate decision about who represents them in Congress. Rep. Caraveo’s party needed this investigation to hold them accountable for their dismissal of concerning behavior when a candidate seemed electable. Democracy needs more of this.
The far-right, including the Trump White House, continues to challenge the trustworthiness and ethics of our media landscape. Media conglomerates are constant in their pursuit of cutbacks and layoffs as an editorial recession continues to toxify the spaces where news is created. An estimated 1 in 10 editors and reporters have lost their jobs over the past three years. The future of traditional media is dark, as print, broadcast, and digital media continue to lose subscribers, make detrimental cuts to staff, and face continued attacks from political stakeholders. The decay of American media is concerning for a plethora of reasons, but most importantly because pieces like Terris’ and Paul’s would never have seen the light. Negligence and abuse would go unchecked, and corruption’s roots in democracy would be deeper and wider.
Now more than ever, we need truth tellers who are willing to be uncomfortable. Willing to negate personal political interests in pursuit of a story that loses a congressional race but holds power accountable and raises the bar for who power is afforded to. The Fetterman exposé is not an easy read, but democracy doesn’t need more fluff pieces.
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Trumpism Can’t Be Broken With the Hammer Of Reason—Because It’s Liquid
Rational arguments, fact-checking, and the forced “neutrality” of “both sides” journalism are now being drowned in the waves, currents, and whirlpools of half-truth, disinformation, and bullshit.
May 05, 2025
If you hit a wall with a sledgehammer with enough force there is a good chance you can eventually bring it down. If there is water behind that wall, that sledgehammer does nothing to stem the tide. You can flail away, but, at best, all you will become is tired and wet.
At worst? You drown.
Journalism and political opponents are still using the sledgehammer of facts, reason and logic, thinking that this will weaken, crack, and eventually destroy the dangerous political movement we are seeing in the U.S.
The problem? Trumpism-MAGA isn’t the wall. It’s the water.
You can’t defeat antidemocratic water by hitting it, but you can keep it back by building robust barriers in the form of laws, regulations, and rights.
The belief that a sustained appeal to facts, reason, and ethics was sufficient to undermine antidemocratic forces of the type led by U.S. President Donald Trump was charmingly romantic. It illustrated a commitment to the journalistic ideals of holding power to account, and the notion that politicians and their supporters would have enough shame and dignity to take responsibility for lies and corruption.
But it was, more importantly, dangerously naïve and irresponsible. It was precisely the belief that Trump could be treated like any other politician, and MAGA like any other political movement, that led media in the U.S. (and abroad) to mainstream and sanitize what was very clearly not a normal politician nor a normal political movement.
No matter how many times Trump’s lies, corruption, or incompetence were exposed during his first term, he maintained his popularly among Republican politicians and core voters. There was the clear sense that the hammering not only didn’t hurt Trump, it made him stronger. The liquidity of MAGA seemed obvious, yet journalism and political opponents continued to hammer away as if he were a solid. former President Joe Biden’s victory in 2020 seemed to offer proof that the hammering had actually worked. The façade had cracked, and MAGA was crumbling. The old order of walls had been restored.
But the radicalization of the Republican Party became even more apparent under Biden, and the 2024 election created not a tide of anti-democracy, but a tsunami. Rational arguments, fact-checking, and the forced “neutrality” of “both sides” journalism are now being drowned in the waves, currents, and whirlpools of half-truth, disinformation, and bullshit. MAGA flows and morphs daily.
Make no mistake, it’s important that journalism fact-checks things like Trump’s tariff percentages or Vice President JD Vance’s claims about freedom in Europe versus the United States. Citizens need to know the truth, and journalism must provide it. But we can no longer assume that exposing lies or debunking numbers is sufficient in the defense of U.S. democracy, because there will be no consequences.
So, if the institutions of journalism and politics operate on behalf of citizens in the service of democracy—and that is what both institutions claim to do on a regular basis—what is the response to a liquid threat?
Liquids cannot be fractured or broken by force, but they can be contained. They can dry up. For journalism, that could involve things like making a “Democracy” section of a newspaper in the same way that we have Sports, Culture, Travel, or Technology. To explain more regularly and in greater detail how laws work, and provide examples of how they can both protect and harm citizens. To cover more local politics. To give grassroots political or social movements the same volume of coverage given to the release of a new iPhone or an Elon Musk tweet. To not engage in “both sides” reporting when one side is attempting to undermine democracy (journalism has no obligation to amplify antidemocratic forces). To cover the power of media itself as a news story.
These things—understanding the law, understanding how democracy works, understanding how policy works, understanding citizen engagement, understanding rights, understanding media power, understanding the role of money in politics—help to stem the flow by creating dams. They encourage the idea that there are elements of democratic society that need to be protected. You can’t defeat antidemocratic water by hitting it, but you can keep it back by building robust barriers in the form of laws, regulations, and rights. Behind that barrier, exposed to the warmth and light of day, the liquid may evaporate over time. The first step in that building process, however, is awareness and understanding.
Journalism matters now more than ever. It just needs to distinguish between solid and liquid.
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