Forward

DEBATE POST-GAME EDITION

And the winner is...

Former NBC exec and debate producer Mark Lukasiewicz summed up Thursday night's debate in 14 words: "Eric Swalwell asked Joe Biden to pass the torch. Kamala Harris just took it."

Harris is the name on everyone's lips after part two of the season's inaugural Democratic debate. "Harris had a moment -- that was two hours long," Van Jones said on CNN after the debate. "A star was born tonight."

--> CNN's Chris Cillizza said Harris gave "the strongest performance not just of Thursday night's debate but of either nights' debate. She was calm, poised, knowledgeable and, yes, presidential." Read on...

--> The New Yorker's Katy Waldman called her the best storyteller on the stage: "We'll remember the busing moment, but Kamala Harris dominated the debate from the start. She is fervent but deploys her anger precisely, like a flashlight..."

--> WaPo's Paul Farhi tweeted: "Guessing that Trump right now is ginning up a nickname for Kamala Harris."

--> Focus grouper Frank Luntz tweeted: "In just about every way imaginable, Kamala Harris dominated. She had the guts to take on and embarrass Joe Biden – not only did she have the best language, she was the most memorable..."

--> What I'm wondering: What will Harris do to capitalize on this moment?

Tweet of the day

Former Obama aide Dan Pfeiffer quipped on Twitter: "Harris's campaign manager is on the phone right now with the DNC proposing more debates..."

How many watched?

The ratings for night one were higher than most TV execs expected. I have to admit -- my guess was WAY too low. I said 8 million. I can't remember the last time I've been so wrong. (Maybe my wife Jamie can 😉)

The actual total: 15.3 million across NBC, MSNBC and Telemundo. The debate came very close to beating the all-time Dem debate record, which was set in October 2015, when 15.5 million tuned in to CNN for the first primary season debate between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders.

I think it's safe to predict that night two will surpass 15.5 million... But we'll know for sure on Friday afternoon...

Why the ratings matter

The Nielsen #'s reflect enormous interest in the presidential race -- with millions of people tuning in to size up the candidates who want to beat President Trump next year. Here's my full story.

--> Reminder: These #'s don't even include streaming viewership on YouTube, Twitter and other sites. (It's impossible to add the web viewership to the TV total, because it's apples and oranges.)

Who had time

The disparities in speaking times were even more glaring on night two than night one: Biden had the most talk time, 13 minutes and 18 seconds, followed by Harris with 12 minutes and 9 seconds. Andrew Yang? Only 2 minutes, 56 seconds...

Twitter's findings...

Twitter said Biden was the most-tweeted-about candidate on Thursday night, followed by Harris, Bernie Sanders and Pete Buttigieg. Here are the three most-tweeted moments:

About those glitches...

Thursday was much smoother than Wednesday, but the glitches on night one were still embarrassing for NBC. A microphone glitch "delayed the debate by about four minutes" and "apparently was caused by wireless microphones" inside the auditorium, WaPo's Paul Farhi wrote. He said the "exact cause still isn't clear." I can only imagine what other networks will be doing to ensure that something like this doesn't happen again later in the debate season...

Another musician tells Trump not to use their music

Trump mocked NBC's Wednesday night technical difficulties by sharing a fan-made video set to Ozzy Osbourne's song "Crazy Train." Ozzy's wife Sharon Osbourne shot back on Thursday night: "Based on this morning's unauthorized use of @OzzyOsbourne's 'Crazy Train,' we are sending notice to the Trump campaign they are forbidden from using Ozzy's music in political ads," she wrote...

On to the next debates...

CNN will host the next two-night Dem debate on July 30 and 31 at the Fox Theater in Detroit...

IN OTHER NEWS...

After the debate, MSNBC's David Gura noted: "Not addressed tonight, notably: E. Jean Carroll's allegation against President Trump."

E. Jean Carroll on this week's "Reliable Sources" podcast

Carroll's allegation about Trump attacking her in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room in the mid 1990's was first published by NYMag last Friday. So I wanted to speak with her about all of it -- the alleged sexual assault, the reactions, the news coverage, and the broader point of her new book. Tune in to the podcast via TuneIn, Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, or your preferred app. There were several new stories to ask her about...

Carroll's friends go public

The two friends who were told about Trump allegedly assaulting Carroll at the time, in the mid 1990s, are no longer anonymous. Lisa Birnbach and Carol Martin spoke to The New York Times for Thursday's episode of "The Daily" and an in-depth story by Jessica Bennett, Megan Twohey and Alexandra Alter.

When I spoke with her later in the day, Carroll said "I'm deeply grateful that they came forward and put their names on record, which is a very big deal when you think of the onslaught." She also went out of her way to praise the Times for its reporting -- which stood out to me since Dean Baquet admitted earlier this week that the paper was "overly cautious" when her account first came out in NYMag...

About that "SVU" episode

A 2012 episode of "Law & Order: SVU" includes a storyline that sounds quite similar to the outline of Carroll's allegation. The "SVU" mention is brief, while Carroll's account is quite detailed, and her two friends say they heard about it from her at the time. Still, Donald Trump Jr. and others who've been trying to discredit Carroll have promoted this "SVU" clip and used it to demean her.

She says it is just a "huge" and strange "coincidence." And CNN's Sara Murray hears the same from NBC world: "A person with knowledge of how the 'Law & Order: SVU' episode came together said there's 'no correlation -- none whatsoever' between the 2012 episode and Carroll's allegations..."

Carroll's overall message

"This is not a Trump book," she told me at the end of the interview. That's what she wants people to know. The book is titled "What Do We Need Men For? A Modest Proposal" -- it comes out next Tuesday -- and it recounts her trip across the USA asking women, basically, "what do we need men for?" Carroll says "the culture has changed" since the '90s, but "men have not changed..."

FOR THE RECORD, PART ONE

-- Keith J. Kelly's latest: Condé Nast "quietly expanded its board to eight members months ago and added two prominent executives to the board as independent directors: former Forbes Chief Executive Mike Perlis and former Gucci CEO Domenico De Sole." Why it matters: "The directors are the first truly independent ones ever added to the board, which in the past was dominated by family members of the billionaire Newhouse family..." (NYPost)

-- Bustle Digital Group's Bryan Goldberg has closed a deal "to buy Nylon, the 20-year-old fashion, beauty, music and pop-culture media brand — the company's seventh acquisition to date," Todd Spangler reports... (Variety)

One year since the Capital Gazette attack

One year ago Friday, a gunman stormed the Capital Gazette newspaper's office in Annapolis, Maryland, and killed five employees. Two others escaped with injuries. It was the single deadliest day for journalists in the United States since 9/11. And it continues to have ripple effects in Annapolis and beyond. Earlier this week a group of civic leaders gathered in DC to announce plans for a Fallen Journalists Memorial. A press freedom memorial is also in the works in Annapolis. And there was a Safe Cities Summit there on Thursday, hosted by the mayor, as Lauren Lumpkin reports here.

The paper continues to provide complete coverage of the shooting's aftermath. Check out the special coverage of the anniversary here...

Moment of silence on Friday afternoon

Friday has been designated Freedom of the Press Day in the state of Maryland. Staffers from the Capital Gazette and other Tribune Publishing papers will dedicate a memorial garden in Annapolis on Friday morning. Details here.

And at 2:33 p.m. ET, the time of the shooting, Tribune Publishing staffers all across the country will hold a moment of silence.

There will also be a "concert and community gathering" at Maryland Hall in Annapolis on Friday evening...

AP to build Local News Sharing Network, starting in New York state

Katie Pellico emails: "With support from the Google News Initiative, AP will build an online tool that enables members to share their coverage plans" and content, "to more efficiently cover local news," the AP announced Thursday. AP's deputy managing editor for US news Noreen Gillespie said the aim is to "find ways to work together to fill... coverage gaps," in an interview with NiemanLab's Christine Scmidt. Read on...

>> Two dozen local newsrooms across New York state are involved in the pilot project, including the Adirondack Daily Enterprise and Fordham University's WFUV radio station. Thursday's release explains, "New York was selected because of its rich history of journalism, AP memberships, broad geography and news volume." Read the full release here...

FOR THE RECORD, PART TWO

-- This will be useful for journos: WaPo's Arc Publishing is launching "Broadcast, a first-of-its-kind mobile app that allows journalists to stream high-quality live video to multiple sites and social platforms simultaneously..." (WaPo)

-- From Poynter VP Kelly McBride: "Good editors must be thoughtful when showing readers hard truths, like photos of dead bodies..." (Poynter)

Sinclair's trouble

Did Sinclair Broadcast Group mislead the FCC during its attempt to buy Tribune Media? A probe is underway: "In a June 25 letter to Sinclair viewed by the WSJ, the FCC said it is investigating whether the nation's biggest owner of local television stations 'engaged in misrepresentation and/or lack of candor' with the agency when it was seeking approval for the $3.9 billion deal," Joe Flint and Lillian Rizzo scooped on Wednesday night.

>> On Thursday, a Sinclair spokesman responded by saying, "This is not a new investigation. This is part of an ongoing discussion initiated by Sinclair to work with the FCC to resolve certain allegations raised by the HDO" (Hearing Designation Order).

>> "At our station, we are required to run conservative content," a Sinclair source commented to me on Thursday, asserting that it's mandated to keep Trumpworld happy. "And yet his own FCC administration with conservative leaders are against us..."

Facebook's new report

"Facebook released a research report Thursday summarizing feedback on its proposed independent body to handle community appeals," CNBC's Lauren Feiner wrote.

Slate's Kate Klonick and Evelyn Doueck described Thursday's report as "Facebook's Federalist papers," summarizing, "In the end, the consensus reflected in the report is pretty much exactly what you'd expect from an attempt to find global common ground—which is to say, not much at all."

You can read the PDF for yourself here...

Congrats to this year's Loeb Award winners

Some of the nation's best business and financial journalists gathered in NYC Thursday evening for the presentation of the Gerald Loeb Awards... I had the honor of presenting the investigative award to the team behind the NYT's series on Facebook and disinformation.

Speaking of The Times: James B. Stewart, Rachel Abrams and Ellen Gabler were honored for their reporting about "how Les Moonves tries to silence an accuser." The WSJ's Michael Miller received the Lawrence Minard Editor Award. And The FT's Martin Wolf was the lifetime achievement award winner. The full list will be up on the website here...

FOR THE RECORD, PART THREE

By Laney Pope:

-- India is considering creating "its own WhatsApp," specifically for government officials to communicate without "reliance on foreign entities..." (TechCrunch)

-- Michael Caruso is stepping down as EIC of Smithsonian magazine at the end of the month... (Smithsonian)

-- Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro is looking to hire his fourth press secretary in six months. Among other reasons, "internal disputes over how to handle the media... has complicated the job of government press liaison..." (Bloomberg)

Nielsen releases mid-year music report

Katie Pellico writes: Nielsen's mid-year music report came out Thursday, sizing up who's streaming and selling the most. You can request to download the report here, but Bloomberg's Lucas Shaw tweeted out these helpful takeaways:

-- "Drake is the second-most listened to artist of 2019 — and the most streamed — without releasing a new album." Post Malone joins Drake in the top 10 "even though their albums were released in the first half of last year."

-- "Scandal is good for album sales," Shaw tweeted. R. Kelly, Michael Jackson and Ja Rule streams all spiked amid their respective controversies.

-- "YouTube now influences the rankings," along with TikTok...

-- Movies too... "Queen has also sold the most *physical* albums of any act this year (by a lot). But the best-selling album of the year so far (in terms of actual sales) is.... A Star is Born."

FOR THE RECORD, PART FOUR

-- Related news from The Verge's Natt Garun: "Apple SVP Eddy Cue says Apple Music has surpassed 60 million subscribers, according an interview with French media site Numerama. This milestone adds 10 million more subscribers to the last known figure" in April... (The Verge)

-- Bleacher Report is broadening its football coverage with three new NFL-focused shows coming this summer, after, WSJ's Lee Harris relays, executives "realized that NFL content was among the most viewed by users on its app..." (WSJ)

FOR THE RECORD, PART FIVE

-- "Bravolebrity"-maker Andy Cohen is celebrating 10 years of "Watch What Happens Live." He reflects on diversity in late-night in an interview with THR's Jackie Strause, saying, "It's time for a network to put a woman on five nights a week..." (THR)

-- Here's another look back on 10 years at Andy's Clubhouse, this time with Vulture's Brian Moylan... (Vulture)

CBS saves "One Day at a Time"

The reboot of "One Day at a Time," which was cancelled by Netflix in March, will "continue on with a new 13-episode fourth season premiering in 2020," thanks to Pop TV, a cable channel owned by CBS Corporation, Marianne Garvey reports. Read on...

>> I love this twist: "The show will also be broadcast on CBS," where it originally aired in the 1970s and 80s, following its run on Pop!

FOR THE RECORD, PART SIX

By Lisa Respers France:

-- Duane "Dog" Chapman has revealed his wife Beth's final words: "I love you" and "Are you guys all okay? Don't worry."

-- Country star Jake Owen clapped back at an anti-LGBTQ commenter who took issue with his cover of Cher's "Believe" and support of the community.

-- Turns out you really can get just about anything from Amazon. Taylor Swift will be headlining the company's first Prime Day Concert, which naturally will be streamed on Amazon Prime...

Thank you for reading! See you tomorrow...