by tyler | Mar 31, 2023 | CNN, media
The leaders of more than 30 news organizations around the world signed a letter Thursday to the Russian ambassador to the US, Anatoly Antonov, demanding the release of imprisoned Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich.
“Gershkovich is a journalist, not a spy, and should be released immediately and without conditions,” said the letter, spearheaded by the Committee to Protect Journalists, which was made public Friday.
The letter was signed by the leaders of the Associated Press, The New York Times, The Washington Post, the BBC, TIME, Euronews, Bloomberg News, Sky News, The New Yorker, and The Economist, among many others.
“Gershkovich’s unwarranted and unjust arrest is a significant escalation in your government’s anti-press actions,” the letter said. “Russia is sending the message that journalism within your borders is criminalized and that foreign correspondents seeking to report from Russia do not enjoy the benefits of the rule of law.”
A representative for the Committee to Protect Journalists told CNN that the group had not received a response by Friday afternoon.
Gershkovich was arrested in Russia on suspicion of espionage, the first time a US journalist has been detained on accusations by Moscow of spying since the Cold War.
In a Thursday statement, The Wall Street Journal said it “vehemently denies the allegations from the FSB and seeks the immediate release of our trusted and dedicated reporter.”
Almar Latour, the CEO of Dow Jones, which publishes The Wall Street Journal, condemned Russia’s arrest of Gershkovich in a memo to staffers Thursday, saying the company is working “around the clock” to secure his release.
“This is an incredibly disturbing development,” Latour said in a memo to staff obtained by CNN.
by tyler | Mar 30, 2023 | CNN, media
Wall Street Journal Editor-in-Chief Emma Tucker told staff in a memo Thursday that she was “very concerned” for the safety of Russia-based reporter Evan Gershkovich, who was arrested Wednesday by security forces in the city of Yekaterinburg.
“I am very sorry to let you know you that one of our reporters Evan Gershkovich was yesterday detained outside Moscow according to a statement put out by the Russian security services,” Tucker wrote in a memo to newspaper staff at 5:11 am ET and later obtained by CNN.
“We are very concerned for the safety of Evan and will keep you informed of the situation,” Tucker continued.
Gershkovich was arrested in Russia on suspicion of espionage, the first time a US journalist has been detained on accusations by Moscow of spying since the Cold War.
In a statement, the Wall Street Journal said it “vehemently denies the allegations from the FSB and seeks the immediate release of our trusted and dedicated reporter, Evan Gershkovich.”
“We stand in solidarity with Evan and his family,” the newspaper said. A person familiar tells CNN that the Journal is in contact with the family about the matter.
The New York Times said in a statement Thursday that it is “deeply concerned” by the arrest of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich in Russia.
“Evan is a former Times employee whose coverage of Russia for the Wall Street Journal has been unfailingly fair and accurate,” a spokesperson for The Times said. “We urge his immediate release. As we have seen too often, the arrest of journalists anywhere in the world deprives the public of news that is essential to all of us.”
The New York Times said it currently has no reporters inside Russia.
The National Press club on Thursday called on Russia to immediately release Gershkovich, calling his detention “unjust,” and is also urging action from the State Department.
“Evan Gershkovich is a journalist. He should be released immediately and unharmed and allowed to return to his important work,” said Eileen O’Reilly, president of the National Press Club, and Gil Klein, journalism president of the National Press Club, in a statement.
The group, described as a global organization for journalists, said that in addition to considering this an unjust detention, it’s calling on the State Department to “designate his detention in that manner at once.”
CNN has contacted the US State Department for comment. The US government was informed of the arrest of Gershkovich by the Wall Street Journal, according to a US official. The Journal declined to comment.
CNN’s Kristina Sgueglia contributed to this report
by tyler | Mar 30, 2023 | CNN, media
ABC News on Thursday stunned staffers, laying off several senior executives and restructuring its newsroom amid a broader workforce reduction being carried out by its parent company Disney, people familiar with the matter told CNN.
“Throughout the company, teams are being impacted by the downsizing that was announced several weeks ago, including our own ABC News family,” ABC News President Kim Godwin told staffers in a memo.
“While these actions are never easy,” Godwin added in the memo obtained by CNN, “they are a necessary step to ensure we’re on solid footing for the years ahead as we chart a sustainable, growth-oriented path forward for the entire organization.”
Among the staffers let go, according to people familiar with the matter, were senior vice president of newsgathering Wendy Fisher; senior vice president of talent Galen Gordon; vice president of talent Mary Noonan; Los Angeles bureau chief David Herndon; vice president of communications Alison Rudnick; senior executive producer Chris Vlasto; and executive editorial producer Heather Riley.
The C-suite bloodbath astonished staffers at the network, people familiar with the matter told CNN.
“There’s a ton of shock that’s gone through the newsroom,” one ABC News staffer told CNN. “So many people with institutional knowledge are gone.”
A person familiar with the matter said the cuts impacted approximately 50 roles across the organization, including those that were open and yet to be filled.
“While this is a difficult time for all of us – particularly those directly affected by these tough decisions – it’s important to remember that together, we are resilient, and will emerge from this period of transition stronger than before,” Godwin told staffers in the memo.
Godwin said she promoted London bureau chief Katie den Daas to vice president of newsgathering and that executive vice president Derek Medina will now oversee talent strategy. Godwin also said that investigating and enterprise units will be overseen by executive editor and senior vice president of news Stacia Deshishku.
“In the coming days and weeks, we will share additional information about these teams and our plans,” Godwin said.
The cuts come after Disney chief executive Bob Iger said last month that the media giant will lay off approximately 7,000 staffers. Iger said this week that the layoffs had started and that they will take months to complete.
The cost cutting is not unique to Disney or ABC News. In the last several months, the media and technology sector has been battered by brutal economic headwinds and uncertainty. Most major media and technology companies have conducted layoffs and downsizing while also working to trim costs wherever possible.
by tyler | Mar 30, 2023 | CNN, media
Fox News CEO Suzanne Scott sounded the alarm inside the company about the financial fallout that the right-wing network would suffer if it continued aggressively fact-checking then-President Donald Trump’s lies after the 2020 election, according to messages that became public Wednesday.
In one instance, Scott emailed Meade Cooper, executive vice president of prime time programming, and expressed frustration after correspondent Eric Shawn appeared on Martha MacCallum’s show and fact-checked Trump and a Sean Hannity guest.
“This has to stop now,” Scott said in a December 2, 2020, message.
“This is bad for business and there is a lack of understanding what is happening in these shows,” Scott added. “The audience is furious and we are just feeding them material. Bad for business.”
A Fox News spokesperson told CNN that Scott was not taking issue with the fact-checking, but said the matter was about “one host calling out another,” seemingly referring to the fact that MacCallum and Shawn fact-checked a guest that appeared on Hannity’s show.
The email to Cooper was revealed as part of Dominion Voting Systems’ $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit against Fox News. Like several documents made public Wednesday, the email had previously been redacted in earlier court filings. The new emails were included in a presentation that Dominion showed at a hearing last week in Wilmington, Delaware. The voting technology company publicly released the full slideshow Wednesday, per a court order. Fox News, which denies any wrongdoing, has accused Dominion of cherry-picking emails to present a self-serving narrative about what the right-wing network did after the 2020 election.
“These documents once again demonstrate Dominion’s continued reliance on cherry-picked quotes without context to generate headlines in order to distract from the facts of this case,” a Fox spokesperson said in a statement. “The foundational right to a free press is at stake and we will continue to fiercely advocate for the First Amendment in protecting the role of news organizations to cover the news.”
In another email written by Scott, zinging correspondent Kristin Fisher, who now works at CNN, for her supposed “dismissive tone” in November 2020 after the presidential contest, the Fox News chief disclosed that the company had “lost 25k subs from FOX NATION,” its streaming service.
In earlier court filings, the data about the Fox Nation subscriptions had been redacted.
The messages underscore the panic that gripped Fox News in the wake of the 2020 election when its viewers rebelled against the channel for accurately calling the election for President Joe Biden.
Other newly released emails showed network producers discussing how putting Trump lawyers Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell on the air inflated ratings. At the time, Powell, Giuliani and host Lou Dobbs were promoting debunked conspiracy theories that Dominion had rigged the 2020 election by flipping millions of votes.
“Any day with Rudy and Sidney is guaranteed gold!” the Dobbs producer wrote. In another email, another Dobbs producer wrote, “to keep this alive, we really need Rudy or Sidney.”
The full email chains are not publicly available.
Rupert Murdoch, the Fox Corporation chairman, called Donald Trump’s election lies that incited the January 6 attack on the US Capitol “pretty much a crime,” according to an email that became public Wednesday. The email had previously been redacted in earlier court filings.
“Trump insisting on the election being stolen and convincing 25% of Americans was a huge disservice to the country,” he wrote to Scott and cc’d his son, Lachlan, on Jan. 20, 2021. “Pretty much a crime. Inevitable it blew up on Jan 6th.”
“Best we don’t mention his name unless essential and certainly don’t support him,” Murdoch continued. “We have to respect people of principle and if it comes to the Senate don’t take sides.”
A spokesperson for Murdoch declined to comment on the message.
Murdoch also acknowledged in his deposition that he had told Scott to stop Trump’s appearances on the network’s air.
“At some time, I certainly said that,” Murdoch said.
by tyler | Mar 30, 2023 | CNN, media
Abby Grossberg, the former Fox News producer who accused the right-wing network of pressuring her into giving misleading testimony in the Dominion defamation case, told NBC News Thursday in her first TV interview that she was “bullied, intimidated and coerced” into protecting the right-ring network to keep her job.
“It felt awful. I mean it felt terrible because I knew that I was bullied, intimidated, and coerced into saying that just to keep my job and stay at the company,” Grossberg told NBC. The full interview is set to air Thursday on “NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt.”
Asked why she did that, Grossberg said “Because I made the decision to keep my job so that I can keep paying my bills. It seemed like the safer decision for me at the time.”
Her latest comments echo what she said last week in an interview with CNN’s Oliver Darcy, where she said she filed the lawsuit to protect her career and “expose the lies and deceit” that she says is rampant at the right-wing network.
Fox News contests all of her allegations and denies that its lawyers did anything improper regarding Grossberg. Fox News also denies wrongdoing in the underlying Dominion case, and says it didn’t defame anyone.
Last week, Grossberg filed explosive lawsuits in New York and Delaware accusing Fox News lawyers of pressuring her into providing misleading testimony in the Dominion case – testimony that would protect the network and its top talent. Since filing the lawsuit, she submitted new sworn testimony in the Dominion defamation case that undermines some of Fox’s defenses.
She also claimed in her lawsuit that she had been subjected to a toxic and sexist work environment while at Fox News. The network has vehemently pushed back against these allegations.
After filing the lawsuit, Grossberg was fired from Fox News. The right-wing network said in a statement that she violated corporate rules improperly exposed legally privileged information in her lawsuit.
by tyler | Mar 29, 2023 | CNN, media
Fox News CEO Suzanne Scott sounded the alarm inside the company about the financial fallout that the right-wing network would suffer if it continued fact-checking then-President Donald Trump’s lies after the 2020 election, according to messages that became public Wednesday.
In one instance, Scott emailed Meade Cooper, executive vice president of prime time programming, and laced into correspondent Eric Shawn for fact-checking Trump.
“This has to stop now,” Scott said in a December 2, 2020, message.
“This is bad for business and there is a lack of understanding what is happening in these shows,” Scott added. “The audience is furious and we are just feeding them material. Bad for business.”
The email to Cooper was revealed as part of Dominion Voting Systems’ $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit against Fox News. Like several documents made public Wednesday, the email had previously been redacted in earlier court filings. The new emails were included in a presentation that Dominion showed at a hearing last week in Wilmington, Delaware. The voting technology company publicly released the full slideshow Wednesday, per a court order.Fox News, which denies any wrongdoing, has accused Dominion of cherry-picking emails to present a self-serving narrative about what the right-wing network did after the 2020 election.
“These documents once again demonstrate Dominion’s continued reliance on cherry-picked quotes without context to generate headlines in order to distract from the facts of this case,” a Fox spokesperson said in a statement. “The foundational right to a free press is at stake and we will continue to fiercely advocate for the First Amendment in protecting the role of news organizations to cover the news.”
In another email written by Scott, zinging host Dana Perino for her “dismissive tone” in November 2020 after the presidential contest, the Fox News chief disclosed that the company had “lost 25k subs from FOX NATION,” its streaming service.
In earlier court filings, the data about the Fox Nation subscriptions had been redacted.
The messages underscore the panic that gripped Fox News in the wake of the 2020 election when its viewers rebelled against the channel for accurately calling the election for President Joe Biden.
Other newly released emails showed network producers discussing how putting Trump lawyers Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell on the air inflated ratings. At the time, Powell, Giuliani and host Lou Dobbs were promoting debunked conspiracy theories that Dominion had rigged the 2020 election by flipping millions of votes.
“Any day with Rudy and Sidney is guaranteed gold!” the Dobbs producer wrote. In another email, another Dobbs producer wrote, “to keep this alive, we really need Rudy or Sidney.”
The full email chains are not publicly available.
