Forward

Trump suggests a boycott of AT&T to punish CNN

We all know that President Trump has been engaged in a years-long effort to punish CNN for its news coverage. His biggest fans may insist it's justified, but there's no doubt about what he has been doing. That's why Monday's escalation was new, yet wholly unsurprising. He suggested a boycott of CNN's parent company AT&T -- the idea being that if enough people cancelled their AT&T subscriptions, "they would be forced to make big changes at CNN."

The NYT's Peter Baker framed Trump's tweets this way: "The president of the United States just called for an economic boycott of one of the country's largest telecommunications firm as a way of pressuring a media organization to cover him in a way that he approves of."

And a team from the WaPo followed up by calling historians who were floored by Trump's conduct. Key graf: "Historians struggled to cite an equivalent threat even from presidents such as Richard Nixon renowned for their hostility toward the press. Less democratic nations with more tenuous press freedoms often use government regulatory power, criminal investigations or tax audits to punish news organizations seen as providing unflattering coverage, but past U.S. presidents rarely have taken such public shots at the businesses of the owners of major American news organizations, historians said."

AT&T's reaction to Trump: a shrug

Two years ago, when everyone was still adjusting to Trump's abuse of his presidential platform, Trump's tweets would have caused some consternation at CNN and AT&T. But Monday's reaction amounted to a shrug. AT&T's spokesman declined to comment on Trump's provocation and went about his day. Notably, shares in AT&T surged in early trading and closed up 1.67% for the day, outperforming the wider market.

-- Here's the thing: AT&T execs expected that Trump would single out the company for its ownership of CNN at some point, according to a source familiar with the matter. So Monday's tweets were predictable. Not startling at all. And there are no signs that customers are abandoning AT&T on Trump's signal. Here's my full story...

-- Bottom line: As is so often the case in the Trump years, his tweets shattered norms but were not taken very seriously. I mean, as a presidential candidate he called for a boycott of Apple. Nothing came of it. No one really even remembers it...

While on foreign soil...

Trump was evidently inspired to tweet about AT&T when he landed in the United Kingdom for his state visit and tuned into CNN. He repeated a complaint he has lodged in the past: That CNN has a dominant worldwide footprint, informing people around the world about American politics. It's "all negative & so much Fake News, very bad for U.S.," he wrote. "Big ratings drop. Why doesn't owner @ATT do something?"

One of the Democratic candidates for president, Amy Klobuchar, called out Trump for his conduct. "The President is on foreign soil advocating boycotting an American company because the press isn't covering him favorably. Un-be-lievable," Klobuchar wrote.

And PEN America, an organization that represents writers and journalists and is suing Trump on First Amendment grounds, said his boycott suggestion "makes plain the self-serving, insidious nature of his attacks on the media and his total disregard for the principle of press freedom."

So, that's how Trump started his day on Twitter. Here's how he ended his day...

"House just passed the 19.1 Billion Dollar Disaster Aid Bill. Great, now we will get it done in the Senate! Farmers, Puerto Rico and all will be very happy."

Numerous journalists and others responded by pointing out that, um, the Senate already passed the bill. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer replied: "President @realDonaldTrump, you're clearly confused. The Senate passed the bill two weeks ago. Hopefully after blocking it for so long, you're not too confused to sign it!"

FOR THE RECORD, PART ONE

-- The Newseum rededicated its Journalists Memorial and added 21 new names on Monday, including the journalists who were killed in the attack at the Capital Gazette last year... (Capital Gazette)

-- Alexander Nazaryan's latest: "Discounting climate change, EPA chief faults the media for the rise of bad environmental news..." (Yahoo)

-- Max Fisher and Amanda Taub's latest: "On YouTube's Digital Playground, an Open Gate for Pedophiles" (NYT)

Co-author of controversial NYT Biden-Ukraine story is hired as Ukraine president's spokesperson

Oliver Darcy emails: How about this twist of irony: The co-author of a controversial NYT story that suggested Joe Biden had a conflict of interest as vice president for ousting a Ukrainian prosecutor, appears to have had her own conflict of interest. Iuliia Mendel, who co-wrote the May 1 story for NYT as a freelancer, in addition to another about Ukrainian politics on May 20, announced on Monday she had joined the Ukrainian gov't as spokesperson for the president.

The move raised no shortage of eyebrows because the May 1 story she had co-authored with Ken Vogel had received significant scrutiny from Biden allies and other critics who felt NYT had been used to print a story Trump's allies had been pushing. A Biden spox declined to comment to me on Monday, but Symone Sanders, a senior advisor to Biden's campaign and a former CNN contributor, tweeted, "The fact that the NYTs acted as a willing agent for the Trump White House's lies and defended the paper's publishing of them, makes this even more eyebrow raising. Have folks learned ANYTHING from the last presidential election?"

NYT says it stands by "fair and accurate" reporting

Darcy adds: NYT spokesperson Ari Isaacman Bevacqua said in a Monday evening statement that the newspaper learned last week that Mendel had applied on May 3 -- two days after the controversial Biden story had been published -- for the position as spokesperson for Ukraine's president. Referring to the May 20 story Mendel wrote, Bevacqua said, "Had she informed editors of her job application, they would not have given her that assignment and we would have stopped working with her immediately given this serious conflict of interest."

BUT, Bevacqua added that editors "are confident" that "despite the conflict that should have been disclosed," Mendel's reporting, including the controversial May 1 story, "was fair and accurate."

"Here come the Feds"

That was the headline on Michael Nathanson's Monday afternoon note to clients about "press reports today that the U.S. government is examining BOTH Facebook and Alphabet over competition concerns."

Some major papers are leading Tuesday's front page with the news. WSJ: "Congress, Agencies Target Tech Giants Over Competition." NYT: "Tech Titans Face Tough Scrutiny From All Sides." Here's the sweeping lead from the NYT's Cecilia Kang, David Streitfeld and Annie Karni: "The federal government is stepping up its scrutiny of the world's biggest tech companies, leaving them vulnerable to new rules and federal lawsuits... After a spate of unusual negotiations, the Justice Department has agreed to handle potential antitrust investigations related to Apple and Google, while the Federal Trade Commission will take on Facebook and Amazon." AND "lawmakers in the House said on Monday that they were looking into the tech giants' possible anti-competitive behavior."

-- Reuters has the ad biz angle: "U.S. probe of Google's online ad dominance would appease long suffering rivals, publishers..."

About the House probe...

Rhode Island Democratic Rep. David Cicilline, who's leading the investigation, "said it is aimed less at specific companies than at the 'tremendous concentration of market power' held by Silicon Valley's most dominant platforms," CNN's Brian Fung reported Monday. "Key areas for the investigation include the tech industry's impact on local journalism, consumer privacy and the ability for new startups to enter the marketplace, according to Cicilline."

>> Fung noted that this probe is "partly a shot at the antitrust agencies..." Cicilline said "I don't have a lot of confidence that these agencies will get the job done..."

WWDC headlines

Heather Kelly has "everything Apple announced at WWDC, from Apple sign-in to dark mode." As expected, Apple is phasing out iTunes and replacing it "with three separate apps that are familiar to iOS users: Apple Music, Apple TV and Apple Podcasts." But the iTunes Store app will still exist on mobile.

The WSJ wrote the news as an actual obit: "Apple iTunes, the Mac music software that first connected the iPod to millions of computers, died on Monday at age 18. The brand will remain in fragments across Apple's products." EIC Matt Murray quipped, "One of the most eagerly awaited obituaries we have ever run..."

Cook's privacy pitch on CBS

"Privacy is, again, at the center of Apple's sales pitch," Kelly noted. "Apple is launching its own login platform called Sign in with Apple, which will let you log in to outside apps with FaceID. It has the option to hide your real email address and instead give each app a randomly generated email address."

Tim Cook talked about this in an interview with CBS's Norah O'Donnell after his keynote.

Key quote: "I think that everybody's beginning to care more – people are becoming more aware of what's been happening. Many people are getting more offended. I think this is good. Because we need to shine a light on it. You can imagine an environment where everyone begins to think there's no privacy. And if there's no privacy, your freedom of expression just plummets. Because now you're going to be thinking about how everybody's going [to] know every single thing you're doing. This is not good for our country, not good for democracy."

Big news for podcasters

NiemanLab's Joshua Benton monitored WWDC and wrote about all the implications for the media biz. Check out his recap here. "The biggest news for podcasts — which was presented as part of the new Mac app but which I have to imagine will also be available on mobile — is full-text podcast search," he wrote. "Apple will now use machine learning (of course) to index the spoken content of all the podcasts in its database and make it searchable." This seems big!

"Imagine being able to search for a person's name and find every podcast episode she's ever been a guest on or even mentioned on," Benton wrote. "We'll see what search is like in practice, but it could be like Google Search for one of the most opaque forms of popular media."

"Jared talked to Axios"

Jonathan Swan's questioning of Jared Kushner reverberated all day long on Monday... a clear win for Axios and its partnership with HBO. CNN's Chris Cillizza has a list of the 29 "most eyebrow-raising lines" from the interview here.

Some of the discussion on cable was about why Kushner was so unprepared. Kaitlan Collins reported on Jake Tapper's show that the interview "caught the eye of a lot of people inside the West Wing today, Jake, who were asking me about how he seemed ill-prepared to answer these questions that seemed like pretty obvious questions he was going to get, especially about the Saudi crown prince, and they were kind of surprised why he did this interview."

I thought it was revealing when Trump was asked about the interview on Sunday night, on his way out of the country. "Mr. President," a reporter asked, "are you willing to say that MBS is responsible for Khashoggi's death?"

"When did this come up again?" Trump said. "What are you, back — are you back —"

"Jared," the reporter said. "Jared talked to Axios."

Trump: "Are you back — what — 4 months ago? No."

What about next time?

Monday's "AC360" led with Swan asking Kushner if he'd alert the FBI if Russians again offered dirt on a Trump rival, and Kushner saying "I don't know."

Watch Jeffrey Toobin's reaction: "The Trump universe obviously thinks that it is perfectly appropriate to get the help of foreigners to win presidential elections. That's illegal."

FOR THE RECORD, PART TWO

-- Read Philip Bump on "a new dividing line in American politics: The semantics of the adjective 'nasty'" (WaPo)

-- David Bossie "reportedly profited off his association to Trump." The president was enraged about it. And now Bossie "is longer going on Trump's favorite network," Asawin Suebsaeng and Andrew Kirell report... (Beast)

-- CNN's DJ Judd tweeted: "In the 24 hours since her Fox News Town Hall, presidential hopeful Kirsten Gillibrand has changed her Twitter bio, cut a video, sent out fundraising emails and branded merchandise, all reflecting moderator Chris Wallace's remarks calling her comments on Fox 'not...very polite.'" (Twitter)

-- "The House Judiciary Committee plans to hold a series of hearings on the Mueller report, beginning next week with former Nixon White House counsel John Dean..." (CNN)

Tiananmen Square at 30 years

An Phung emails: It's no secret to the west that there is a whole generation of Chinese millennials who have no idea what happened on June 4, 1989. Thanks to the Great Firewall and a strong grip on the press, many Chinese citizens in the Middle Kingdom have no clue that Liberation Army tanks swept through Beijing's Tiananmen Square that day and killed throngs of peaceful protestors. Thirty years later, with an internet that is becoming increasingly porous, I wonder how long China's communist party can keep the massacre a secret and how young Chinese will reckon with their past. I wondered this in the days leading up to the 30th anniversary on Tuesday as media outlets around the world published columns and anniversary stories. Here is CNN's story as well as some other coverage that really stood out to me:

-- Photos of the Tiananmen Square Protests Through the Lens of a Student Witness (NYT)

-- Louisa Lim's column for the New York Times: "After Tiananmen, China Conquers History Itself" (NYT)

-- Rowena Xiaoqing He's column for the Guardian: "China continues to deny Tiananmen, but we won't let the world forget" (The Guardian)

-- Minnie Chan's exclusive for the South China Morning Post: "How Tiananmen crackdown left a deep scar on China's military psyche" (SCMP)

-- "Tiananmen Square massacre: How Beijing turned on its own people" (CNN)

-- "30 years ago a Chinese tank column stopped for 'Tank Man.' Fang Zheng wasn't so lucky" (LA Times)

-- "The Tiananmen Mothers Never Forget" (WSJ)

-- "He lost so much to protest at Tiananmen Square" (CNN)

-- "Why We Remember June Fourth" (China File)

-- And a reminder about today: "Remembering Tiananmen Square Is Dangerous, Even in Hong Kong" (The Atlantic)

Michael Wolff celebrates 'Siege'

Ann Coulter, Ben Smith, Dan Abrams, Steven Brill, Craig Newmark, and Matt Stone were at Stephen Rubin's Monday night book party for Michael Wolff's "Siege," which comes out on Tuesday.

>> Wolff was scheduled to appear on ABC's "The View" on Monday, but after I sent out last night's newsletter, I found out that he would no longer be on the show. No reason was given...

>> At the moment, the book is No. 130 on Amazon... A big come-down from the "Fire and Fury" launch last year...

"There is a business plan, but it's in Alex Jones' head"

Oliver Darcy emails: It's not every day that we get a peek inside Infowars. But a court document submitted last week in a lawsuit filed by Sandy Hook families against Alex Jones includes four depositions that shed light on the inner workings of the fringe media organization. The depositions about Infowars' business model are relevant as the Sandy Hook families alleged in their lawsuit that Jones and Infowars "concoct elaborate and false paranoia-tinged conspiracy theories because it moves product and they make money" and "not because they truly believe what they are saying, but rather because it increases profits."

Some of the key things we learned from the depositions...

>> Being banned from social media "has hurt" Infowars "with acquisition of new customers." That's according to Jones' father. But he said loyal customers are continuing to shop.

>> Jones runs every aspect of Infowars. According to Jones' father, there is "probably not" a written business plan. "There is a business plan but it's in Alex Jones' head," he said at one point. Another employee, "InfoWars Nightly News" director Robert Dew, explained "everything goes through Alex."

>> Prior to being banned, Facebook was one of the top referral websites to InfoWars, according to Timothy Fruge, the business operations manager for Infowars' parent company. Another top referrer? The Drudge Report...

Chernin urging moguls to help the ACLU fight anti-abortion bills

Peter Chernin's email to fellow Hollywood heavyweights: "I am launching a campaign to contribute to the $15 million that is needed to fund the A.C.L.U.'s legal efforts to battle the national anti-abortion effort... We have a moral responsibility to act immediately."

The NYT's Brooks Barnes and Cara Buckley obtained the email and wrote about the fundraising drive. "Recipients included senior executives at all of the major movie studios, as well as entertainment power players like Jeff Bezos, Ari Emanuel, Ted Sarandos, Tim Cook and Shonda Rhimes..."

Carter: Hollywood's stance against Georgia isn't as tough as it seems

Bill Carter's latest column for CNN Business is about the Hollywood studios that say they will rethink production in Georgia if the state's effective ban on abortion is upheld by the courts. "How serious a threat this really is will depend ultimately on a contest of principle versus commerce, a battle that is almost always hugely one-side," Carter writes. "Because in 'show business,' the general rule is: 'show' may come first in the title, but the business end is 'business.'"

He says "the studios can denounce it now safely, without any impact on their bottom lines," while the courts review the bill in Georgia and elsewhere. Read on...

FOR THE RECORD, PART THREE

-- The 2019 TALKERS list of the "100 most important radio talk show hosts in America" is out: #1 is Sean Hannity, followed by Rush Limbaugh, Dave Ramsey, Mark Levin, Howard Stern, Joe Madison, Brian Kilmeade, Thom Hartmann, Mike Gallagher, and Glenn Beck... (TALKERS)

-- Fun piece in this week's New Yorker about CNN's Jim Sciutto returning to his high school stomping grounds for debate prep... (The New Yorker)

-- "Barry Jenkins will direct the untitled Fox Searchlight biopic based on the life of one of dance's most influential choreographers and a seminal figure in the African American culture, Alvin Ailey..." (TheWrap)

Holzhauer falls

James Holzahauer was THIS CLOSE to breaking the all-time "Jeopardy!" earnings record. "But he fell short in his 33rd straight game -- even though he had the right answer," CNN's A.J. Willingham wrote.

Holzahauer tipped his hat to Emma Boettcher, writing, "CONGRATULATIONS to Emma on a world-beating performance. There's no greater honor than knowing an opponent had to play a perfect game to defeat me." And he sent a tweet to Ken Jennings that said: "You win this round. But if Jeopardy ever gives me 43 second chance games, look out!"

How long til "Jeopardy!" invites Holzahauer and Jennings to face off for a special champions round?

About the leak...

Some fans were understandably disappointed that Monday's outcome leaked on social media over the weekend. I have no doubt the producer and syndicator are investigating. But look at it this way: It's amazing the end of the streak didn't leak sooner!

Former "Jeopardy!" researcher Carlo Panno emailed me to point this out: "When Jennings lost, the word got out immediately and Jeopardy! re-recorded the show openings to remove the win count to keep interest high." This time around, "the current season of Jeopardy! wrapped on April 17. They managed to keep it quiet for a month and a half, and it looks like the news only got out after the weekend satellite distribution of this week's shows."

The network chiefs speak

Brian Lowry emails: The Hollywood Radio and Television Society hadn't hosted a network chiefs luncheon in a decade, which made Monday's event something of an occasion. But the representatives of ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox seemed content not to make much news, other than issuing a collective "We're not dinosaurs" defense of their medium.

ABC's Karey Burke touted the unique reach -- even today -- of the broadcast networks, while CBS' Kelly Kahl said the networks need to "push back" on reporting about their declining ratings, given other metrics that are now at work, and "stop apologizing." NBC's Lisa Katz, for example, said the comedy "The Good Place" rises to become the network's fourth-most-watched show when 35 days of delayed viewing are added up, the kind of a measuring stick that's rarely if ever mentioned. "For us, it's about the long tail on some of these shows," Burke said.

Fox's Michael Thorn, meanwhile, said it was too soon to assess the impact of the ongoing standoff between the Writers Guild of America and major talent agencies, and while the execs said they had come through writer staffing season reasonably well, all of them expressed hope that the matter would be resolved relatively quickly...

Lowry's review of "The Handmaid's Tale" season premiere

Brian Lowry emails: As Sunday's "Reliable Sources" underscored, "The Handmaid's Tale" returns at a moment that has made the Hulu drama extraordinarily relevant, with the anti-abortion legislation being passed in Georgia and elsewhere heightening the temptation to compare Gilead to modern-day America. There are obvious benefits, promotionally speaking, in the show having become such a powerful symbol, but also burdens, and risks, built into that status. Read on...

Apple debuts "For All Mankind" trailer

Frank Pallotta emails: During its Worldwide Developers Conference on Monday, Apple showcased a trailer for an upcoming original series called "For All Mankind." This is the FIRST full trailer for one of the forthcoming Apple TV+ shows. It looks pretty cool, especially for space buffs and alternative history fanatics. The trailer presents a series set in a world where the Russians, and not the US, were the first to land on the Moon. It's a pretty heart-racing peek into the type of programming that Apple wants to sell for its new streaming service...

FOR THE RECORD, PART FOUR

By Lisa Respers France:

-- Lindsay Lohan is working on new music, so there's that...

-- Beyoncé's "Lion King" outfit at her mother's gala was everything...

-- Get ready for Robert Pattinson as "The Batman." The director, Matt Reeves, sent a tweet which appeared to confirm the news...

LAST BUT NOT LEAST...

"Keanu Reeves is too good for this world"

Megan Thomas emails: Google Keanu Reeves and you can almost hear the internet swoon. With a publicity tour for "John Wick," his gif-inspiring cameo in "Always Be My Maybe" and his role in the upcoming "Toy Story 4," the ever-enigmatic Keanu Reeves is riding a month-long wave as pop culture's man-of-the-moment. Naomi Fry humorously explores his appeal in this piece for the New Yorker...

Thanks for reading! Send me your feedback, tips, ideas here. See you tomorrow...