If you are in San Francisco trying to follow the goings-on in your neighborhood or within city hall, you may have come across The Dissent. The website brands itself as “an AI newsroom” with work “reported, edited, and produced by named agents.” Its founder and publisher Dakota Carrasco — a real person, and, incidentally, an analyst at the notorious investment firm BlackRock — published text on the…
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As social media networks filled with posts from journalists “deeply saddened” to reveal they were part of McClatchy’s latest round of “gutting” layoffs this week, newspaper staffers and the unions that represent them highlighted “how local coverage will suffer” because over 90 workers were fired by the hedge fund-controlled publisher. “I’m part of this bloodbath. After dodging layoffs for my…
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The conflict between Disney’s ABC and Donald Trump’s Federal Communications Commission has been intensifying for months, leading to questions about whether the network might take the matter to court.
Those questions now have an answer: On Tuesday morning, ABC filed a case in federal court in Washington, D.C., accusing the FCC of trying to interfere with the network’s First Amendment rights. From the court filing:
Again and again, the Administration has attacked ABC’s speech — the stories its journalists report and the viewpoints its network programs air. Over time, those attacks have escalated into express demands that ABC be stripped of its broadcast licenses because of its speech.
“Government censorship,” the suit added, “is deeply un-American.”
The commission did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the litigation.
The path leading to this point is long and circuitous. After Donald Trump targeted ABC late-night host Jimmy Kimmel, for example, Brendan Carr, the president’s FCC chairman, appeared on a far-right podcast last September and discussed his agency’s role in granting broadcast licenses. Referring specifically to a Kimmel monologue that Republicans didn’t like, Carr said, “When we see stuff like this — look, we can do this the easy way or the hard way.”
Roughly seven months later, the public got a better sense of what “the hard way” looks like. In April, the FCC launched a highly unusual early review of ABC’s broadcast station licenses. Although the commission claimed the review was related to the network’s efforts to hire a diverse workforce (which the Republican administration apparently finds offensive), the developments came immediately after the White House condemned a joke Kimmel told about the
As progressive, DSA, and DSA-adjacent candidates win primaries throughout the US, corporate media is rushing to prop up their favorite “centrist” and “moderate” critics — who, ostensibly, are just looking out for the wellbeing of the Democratic Party — to explain why these candidates people are voting for are actually dangerous and “unelectable.” What the media is refusing to do…
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President Donald Trump has casually boasted about the destruction of Iran’s infrastructure during the U.S.-Israeli war, including bridges, desalination plants, and major industries relied on by civilians. Among those attacks on infrastructure, but less reported on by the international press, has been the targeting of Iranian media. Iran’s newsrooms, broadcasting studios, publishing houses…
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When workers at the historic Pittsburgh Post-Gazette newspaper hit the picket line in October of 2022, they had no idea that they would be on strike for over three years—or that the strike would end with new owners taking over the paper and most strikers losing their jobs. But now, a new chapter is being written in their epic story. This week, workers and community supporters launched the Pittsburgh Progress, “a cooperative news organization, owned and democratically run by its workers and members… dedicated to looking out for, and telling the stories of, the working-class people who form the heart and soul of our diverse communities.” In this episode of Working People, we discuss the birth of the Pittsburgh Progress, and what it means for working people in and beyond Pittsburgh, with Steve Mellon and Natalie Duleba, both former strikers at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and both founding worker-members of the newly launched Pittsburgh Progress.
Additional links/info:
Pittsburgh Progress website, Facebook page, Bluesky page, and Instagram
Steve Mellon, Pittsburgh Progress, “This new media cooperative invites the community to join us on our journey of creation”
Maximillian Alvarez, Working People / TRNN, “The longest-running strike in the US is over—and the workers won”
Maximillian Alvarez, Working People / TRNN, “They won their strike fair and square. Now their rich bosses are closing up shop”
Maximillian Alvarez, Working People / TRNN, “Venetoulis Institute ‘saves’ the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette by purging union members who went on strike”
Featured Music:
Jules Taylor, Working People Theme Song
Credits:
Audio Post-Production: Jules Taylor
Transcript
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. It will be updated.
Maximillian Alvarez:
Alright. Welcome everyone to Working People, a podcast about the lives, jobs,