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Tuesday, August 06, 2024

Charles Barkley reaffirms commitment to Turner Sports, Kevin Merida joins The WaPo, Axios cuts 10% of its staff, Bob Iger visits the ABC News newsroom, Elon Musk and Linda Yaccarino sue advertisers, Reddit beats on earnings, Taylor Swift snags the most MTV Video Music Awards nominations, Olympics viewership passes all previous games combined, and so much more. But first, the A1.

THE A1

Tear Down This Walz

CNN Photo Illustration/Fox News

The Republican Party's media allies are — yet again — struggling to coalesce around a single attack on the Democratic ticket.

In the hours since Kamala Harris tapped Tim Walz as her running mate, top figures in right-wing media have thrown everything but the kitchen sink at the Minnesota governor as they race to define him, seeking to tarnish the Midwesterner's image with only 90 days to go before Election Day.

On Tuesday, Walz was portrayed in harsh light as a left-wing "radical" who is supposedly out of touch with everyday Americans; he was criticized as a governor who allowed Black Lives Matter protesters to riot, engage in violence, and burn Minnesota's cities without consequence; and was accused of being "groomed by the Chinese" after he spent his honeymoon in China.

Fox News, naturally, led the charge, with the right-wing network devoting segment after segment to assailing Walz and his character.

Sean Hannity opened his program arguing that Harris's choice of Walz — who he called the "most far-left governor in the United States" — revealed she was the most extreme Democratic presidential candidate in history. Hannity not only disparaged Walz with a wide range of negative descriptors, but he also criticized his personal demeanor, claiming he is "pretty weird."

Meanwhile, other MAGA Media figures, without an ounce of self-reflection or evidence, tried to shame the Democratic ticket by claiming that Walz was selected over Josh Shapiro simply because the Pennsylvania governor is Jewish.

"He was denied this because he is a Jew," Jeanine Pirro declared on Fox, citing his position on the war in Gaza. "And the problem right now is they are pleasing the Hamas end of the Democrat party."

Never mind that it was Donald Trump who dined at Mar-a-Lago with Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes and the Adolf Hitler-loving rapper Kanye West, among other moments in which he has embraced White nationalism over the years.

The wide array of attacks on Walz highlighted the GOP's ongoing difficulty in settling on a single, effective line of attack against the Harris campaign. Since she assumed the top spot on the Democratic ticket in July, right-wing media has been noticeably struggling to present a cohesive narrative against her. Instead, they have resorted to a range of disparaging remarks, branding Harris as a "DEI" candidate and mocking her laughter, among other offensive criticisms.

It remains to be seen whether the Trump campaign will eventually establish a clear and consistent strategy for defining Harris and Walz. While Trump previously fixated on President Joe Biden's age and stamina, he has struggled to craft a compelling narrative against his new Democratic rival.

And if the disjointed coverage from right-wing media on Tuesday indicates anything, it suggests that Trump and his allies are facing a formidable challenge in rallying around a unified strategy as the clock ticks toward Election Day.

WALZ TO WALZ COVERAGE

The WaPo Wednesday A1: "With Walz pick, Democrats' ticket is set."
CNN was the first outlet to break news that Kamala Harris had selected Tim Walz as her running mate. (CNN)
Walz "rocketed into consideration after a series of media interviews that excited Democrats," Lisa Kashinsky, Natalie Allison, and Meredith McGraw reported. (POLITICO)
Hollywood power players are uniting behind Walz, Dominic Patten and Ted Johnson report. (Deadline)
Fox News' coverage of Walz "shows a glimpse of the coming attack line," Jesus Mesa reported. (Newsweek)
Right-wing pundits have responded to Harris tapping Walz "with anti-Muslim, anti-trans, and anti-Black bigotry, alongside attacks on Walz's folksy appearance," John Knefel observed. (MMFA)
Case in point: Chuck Schumer lambasted Erick Erickson following remarks by the conservative radio host that Jews aren't "allowed" to lead the Democratic Party. (Mediaite)
And on CNN, Jamie Gangel pushed back against Scott Jennings, who was also advancing the narrative: "Scott, Scott, Scott ... take the beat." (Mediaite)

——— BELOW THE FOLD ———

CNN Photo Illustration/Jamie Schwaberow/NBAE/Getty Images

Barkley Bounces Back: Charles Barkley isn't ready to sit on the bench quite yet! The NBA hall of famer said Tuesday he will remain at TNT Sports, reaffirming a 10-year deal he inked back in 2022 and reversing a previous statement in which he said he would retire from television. "This is the only place for me," Barkley said in a statement. "I have to say … I've been impressed by the leadership team who is fighting hard and have been aggressive in adding new properties to TNT Sports, which I am very excited about." The statement is a notable reversal for the sports legend. Barkley had previously been extraordinarily critical of WBD brass, zinging management for failing to renew its NBA broadcasting rights. CNN's Liam Reilly has more.

► Related: "The NBA's deal with Amazon included several provisions that Warner couldn't match," The WSJ's Amol Sharma and Joe Flint reported Tuesday. According to the duo, one provision included "spelling out the promotion of the NBA in Amazon's NFL telecasts. TNT doesn't carry NFL programming."

THE INDUSTRY

CNN Photo Illustration/Craig Hudson for The Washington Post/Getty Images

The Ax Falls at Axios: It was a difficult day for the Axios newsroom. Boss Jim VandeHei, in an email using the outlet's trademark "Smart Brevity" style, announced to employees in the morning that the outlet was laying off 50 employees, or about 10% of the workforce. VandeHei said the move was due to "changes in the media business," with the veteran executive calling it "the most difficult moment for media in our lifetime." VandeHei said that Axios needed to reposition itself and that it will hire in certain "key areas." The NYT's Katie Robertson has more here.

First in Reliable |Merida's Move: Kevin Merida, the former Los Angeles Times executive editor who was spotted earlier this year in The Washington Post's newsroom, is joining the Will Lewis-led newspaper. Merida, I'm told, will join the newspaper's opinion section in September to author a column about Lebron James' journey to a post-basketball future.

► Merida isn't the only one joining The WaPo's opinion section. Mizanur Rahman, former editor-in-chief of Houston Landing, is also hopping aboard.

First in Reliable | Iger's ABC News Huddle: Disney boss Bob Iger, in New York City ahead of Wednesday's quarterly earnings report (let me know if you would like to grab a drink, Bob!), stopped by the ABC News newsroom on Tuesday, I'm told. Iger met with key network personnel, including "ABC News Live" executive director Seni Tienabeso, "GMA" boss Simone Swink, D.C. bureau chief Rick Klein, and SVP of editorial Kerry Smith. I'm told that the meeting was about the planned ABC News presidential debate that Donald Trump is now refusing to take part in. Representatives for Disney and ABC News did not respond to requests for comment.

► Inside ABC News, speculation continues to swirl over who will be tapped as the next network boss. But it may be anticlimactic. I'm hearing talk that Debra OConnell might tap two executives to split the responsibilities of the job, which would continue a pattern that has now played out at rival networks NBC News and CBS News.

THE FOURTH ESTATE

CNET will be acquired by Ziff Davis in a deal valued at over $100 million, Ben Mullin reports. (NYT)
End of an era: Broadcasting + Cable and Multichannel News will end their print magazines and daily newsletters. (The Wrap)
✂️ Cuts, cuts, cuts: The Tampa Bay Times offered staffers buyouts as the newspaper announced it needs to reduce payroll by 20%. (TB Times)
The Associated Press has seen a rise in advertising revenue and web traffic after a website redesign, Mark Stenberg reports. (AdWeek)
Several major news companies — including Financial Times, Axel Springer, The Atlantic, and Fortune — will license their content to generative A.I. start-up ProRata.ai, Sara Fischer reports. (Axios)
Samuel Seligson, the independent New York City videographer who filmed a pro-Palestinian protest at which activists threw red paint at the homes of leaders of the Brooklyn Museum, was arrested on felony hate crime charges. Seligson's attorney said her client was acting as a journalist and described the charges as "appalling." (AP)
"Readers are more suspicious of journalists providing corrections than journalists providing confirmations," Randy Stein and Caroline Meyersohn write. (Nieman Lab)
Chris Cillizza examines what readers say they want versus what they really want: "Time after time in my journalism career, which now spans, sigh, 3 decades, I have seen that what people say they want and what they actually read (or at least click on) is vastly different." (Cillizza)

IN THE BIZ

Coming Wednesday: Quarterly earnings from Disney, Warner Bros. Discovery, and The New York Times.
Shares in Fox Corporation closed up nearly 7% after the company reported profit slipped, though revenue rose 2% last quarter. Lachlan Murdoch voiced confidence in the advertising market, pointing to the boom prompted by the 2024 race. (Variety)
Shares in Fubo ended Tuesday up nearly 2% after the company's Q2 earnings report. FuboTV said it has 1.45 million subscribers, a drop from 1.51 million, but up from 1.16 million a year ago. (THR)
Fubo boss David Gandler took aim at Venu Sports during the company's earnings call, saying the trio, which "control[s] 80% of the premium sports market" is looking to "limit competition." (Awful Announcing)
Disney is set to raise prices on its streaming services in October. (CNN)
Meanwhile, Netflix is "further lowering the prices of its ads," Catherine Perloff reports. (AdWeek)
Another Paramount exec is out: Michael Engleman, the Paramount+ domestic and Showtime CMO, will exit. (Variety)
Divisions in Tinseltown around A.I. are only growing, Winston Cho reports. (THR)

MEDIA MOVES

Fox News promoted Trey Yingst to chief foreign correspondent. (The Wrap)
CNBC International named Christina Zhao deputy managing editor. (TBN)
Morning Brew hired Vidhi Choudhary as a retail reporter. (TBN)
Consumer Reports hired Derek Kravitz as an investigative journalist and deputy editor. (LinkedIn)

THE INFO WARS

CNN Photo Illustration/David Swanson/Reuters

Musk's Ad Attack: Elon Musk last year told advertisers to "go fuck yourself." On Tuesday, his Linda Yaccarino-led X filed a lawsuit suing a group of advertisers over their "boycott" of his company. The lawsuit alleged the World Federation of Advertisers had worked "to collectively withhold billions of dollars in advertising." X also named several companies that are members of WFA's brand safety initiative, GARM, in the lawsuit, including CVS and Unilever. Musk, who has sued a number of entities critical of him, likely now realizes that he actually does desperately need advertiser dollars to power his social media platform. Advertising has historically made up the overwhelming bulk of the company's revenue, but brands have stayed away from the platform since Musk took over. CNN's Clare Duffy and Ramishah Maruf have more.

🔎 Zooming in: The lawsuit represents a 180 for Yaccarino, who was offered the job of X boss precisely because she rose through the ranks in the advertising business. But after spending the bulk of her career developing positive relationships with advertisers, Yaccarino is now leading a legal assault on them with Musk. You either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain!

IN THE BATTLEFIELD

Elon Musk played into the conspiracy theory that White, far-right "protesters" are treated more harshly than minority groups, calling the U.K. prime minister, Keir Starmer, "two-tier Keir." (The Guardian)
"Musk said 'civil war is inevitable' as the U.K. [was] rocked by far-right riots," Hanna Ziady writes. "He's part of the problem." (CNN)
Will Fox News apologize and retract? The right-wing network "helped spread false claims" about the gender of Olympic boxers Imane Khelif of Algeria and Lin Yu-Ting of Taiwan, Jeremy Barr reports. (WaPo)
Jonesing for Tucker: Tucker Carlson re-added Alex Jones to his nationwide tour. (Barrett Media)
Ryan Mac, The NYT tech reporter, expressed frustration with the forthcoming movie about Peter Thiel funding the Gawker lawsuit. Mac, who broke the story with Matt Drange, noted that the person who will actually get to benefit from the film is the "guy who relied on access to Thiel and told Thiel's side of the story ... that's the lens [through] which this film will be told." (Threads)

THE VALLEY

TOO MANY TABS

Reddit posted better than expected earnings for Q2, reporting a narrower-than-anticipated loss, buoyed by data-licensing revenue in addition to its ad business. That said, the company's stock still sunk in after-hours trading, down about 5%. (CNBC)
Nilay Patel and Sarah Jeong have highlights from the juicy Google antitrust ruling, including Eddie Cue saying Bing is so bad that "there's no price that Microsoft could ever offer" to make it the default search service in Safari. (The Verge)
Shira Ovide outlines the six ways the Google ruling "could change the internet." (WaPo)
X is inching ever closer to adding a payment system, Lauren Forristal reports. (TechCrunch)
ByteDance released a text-to-video A.I. tool, taking aim at OpenAI's Sora. (Reuters)
Bluesky added Mike Masnick, the Techdirt founder, to its board. (TechCrunch)
"Facebook itself is paying creators in India, Vietnam, and the Philippines for bizarre A.I. spam that they are learning to make from YouTube influencers and guides sold on Telegram," Jason Koebler reports. (404 Media)

CURTAIN CALL

CNN Photo Illustration/Thomas Niedermueller/TAS24/Getty Images

Swift's Summer: Taylor Swift's dominance in the music industry continues to go unmatched. The pop star on Tuesday nabbed 10 MTV Video Music Awards nominations, leading the pack. Following Swift was Post Malone (who she, of course, collaborated with on "Fortnight") with nine nominations. Sabrina Carpenter, Eminem, and Ariana Grande all tied for third with six nominations. Billboard's Paul Grein has more here.

PARIS 2024

"As of 1 p.m. ET Tuesday, streaming viewership for Paris 2024 officially surpassed streaming for all prior Olympics combined," Kayla Cobb reports. (The Wrap)
"High profile, high pressure": Zoe Phillips spoke to the photographers at the Olympics about what it is like to shoot the Paris games. (THR)

OFF STAGE

Kari Morrissey, the special prosecutor in Alec Baldwin's involuntary manslaughter trial, claimed in a filing made public on Monday that the judge "improperly" moved to dismiss the case. (Deadline)
Paramount co-chief Chris McCarthy, the executive behind the ever-expanding "Yellowstone" universe, spoke to Ryan Faughnder about resurrecting "Dexter" from the dead: "I knew that there would be a really big opportunity if we could crack the nut of what is the love and passion of the series but then actually explode it into a franchise." (LAT)
Eugene and Dan Levy are in talks to host the Emmys. (Deadline)
Husband vs wife: Ryan Reynolds' "Deadpool & Wolverine" will square off with Blake Lively's "It Ends With Us" at the box office this weekend. (Deadline)
Searchlight's highly anticipated Bob Dylan biopic, "A Complete Unknown," starring Timothée Chalamet and Elle Fanning, will hit theaters on Dec. 25. (Deadline)
Sony moved up the theatrical release of "Here," which stars Tom Hanks and Robin Wright, to Nov. 1 from Nov. 15. (Deadline)
Zendaya and Robert Pattinson are in talks to star in Kristoffer Borgli's A24 film, "The Drama." (Deadline)
Legendary director David Lynch says he will "never retire" a day after he went public about a chronic lung disease. (CNN)
Netflix's "Stranger Things" prequel, "The First Shadow," will open April 2025 on Broadway. (THR)
Netflix's "SpongeBob" spinoff movie, "Saving Bikini Bottom: The Sandy Cheeks Movie," debuted as the streaming platform's most-watched title of the week. (The Wrap)
Drake released 100 gigabytes of data on a website called "100 Gigs for Your Headtop," including three new tracks and some B-roll. (Pitckfork)

Thank you for reading! This newsletter was edited by Jon Passantino and produced with the assistance of Liam Reilly. Have feedback? Send us an email. You can follow us on Instagram, Threads, and LinkedIn. We will see you back in your inbox tomorrow.

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