NewsBusters Podcast

Is public trust in the media completely broken? Can it ever be fixed? The last Gallup poll found only 14 percent said they have a "great deal" or "quite a lot" of confidence in TV news. Former ABC News political director Mark Halperin explores how this has happened, and how he would try to fix it.

If a Democrat had proposed giving every American $5,000, the liberal, elitist media would be heralding it as a stroke of genius, not panning it like they did Wednesday and Thursday after President Trump raised the specter of it at night one of the GOP midterm convention. NewsBusters Managing Editor Curtis Houck and Associate Editor Nick Fondacaro broke down the highlights and lowlights before covering a fascinating study on CBS’s ‘60 Minutes’ before Sunday’s season premiere. The fellas also marked a year since Charlie Kirk’s assassination, 25 years since 9/11, and a new CNN-led smear against GunTuber Brandon Herrera.

NewsBusters young bucks Associate Editor Nick Fondacaro and Managing Editor Curtis Houck come to you on Labor Day to give you a preview of The View as they prepare to head into their 30th season on Tuesday. As ABC planned to celebrate their pearl anniversary, the purported “bona fide news program” bore the scars of the network’s recent tussle with the evidence collected by the Media Research Center over the years and submitted to the FCC: Not a single Democratic Party or major liberal political figure was among the guests advertised for the first two months. 

Managing Editor Curtis Houck and Associate Editor Nick Fondacaro dove into the results of a new study from Tim Graham about Politifact's ongoing double standard when it comes to fact-checking conservatives vs. liberals. Spoiler alert: They only really try when they can make the right look bad. The fellas also covered more incendiary, pants-on-fire rhetoric from far-left loon Jennifer Welch. Whether it's Welch, Abdul el-Sayed, or your garden-variety MS NOW host, it must be great knowing you can say anything without fear of being fact-checked by the elitist media.

CNN host Dana Bash pressured Tom Homan -- "as a border czar and as a human" -- how can you be comfortable with sending Haitians back to Haiti? Emotional appeals against most if not all deportations is what journalists do now. They can't admit the border czar might also have emotional appeals for getting dangerous people out of the country.

Jason DeFord -- the country music singer known as "Jelly Roll" -- guest-hosted Jimmy Kimmel's late-night show this week. He acted upset when people protested the hostile jokes about President Trump, and claimed they should have voted for Kamala Harris if they wanted Harris jokes. That ignores the entire late-night pattern of ritual Trump loathing.

TV "news" hosts have come rushing to the defense of radical-left and DSA-backed Democrats. Over the weekend, Kristen Welker and Al Sharpton both threw the "no evidence" card at anyone asserting Senate candidate Abdul el-Sayed has ties to terrorist sympathizers and terror groups.  

Sen. Jon Ossoff delighted liberal journalists when he smeared young Trump aide Natalie Harp as carrying on a sexual affair with the president. It showed "the art of the viral clip," claimed CNN's Brian Stelter. They didn't really care to ask: But is that true?

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt is departing to spend time with her young children. Who is Jen Psaki to criticize Leavitt for how she has to please the president? And who is she to say the press corps is suddenly too "friendly"?

The broadcast networks are allergic to finding a "far left" within the Democrat Party, so every far-left candidate is hailed as a "progressive" (or a "populist"), or even "capitalist." The label is "moderate" if you oppose the socialist in a primary. If you like Thanksgiving and deplore 9/11? "Moderate." 

Over the weekend, Indiana Fever basketball player Sophie Cunningham was brutally whacked in the face going up for a layup after she became controversial for wanting to keep women's basketball limited to women. Sports Illustrated called it a "Bitter Taste of Karma." The WNBA can't seem to define what a woman is, just like Ketanji Brown Jackson struggled with it.

Journalists are often firmer with Democrats before they win a primary election. Then, when facing off against a Republican in the general, they go soft on the Democrat and rough on the Republican. That's already happening in the Michigan Senate race with Abdul el-Sayed vs. Mike Rogers.

CNN reporter Donie O'Sullivan hosted a Sunday night special tilted "The Left Insurgency," promoting radical leftist Hasan Piker's designs on the Democratic Party. When Jorge Bonilla began tweeting video during the show, Donie started mocking Jorge and the MRC on X. 

Republican Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky dropped some fascinating messages from Dr. Anthony Fauci and his very political approach to "the science" of Covid, not to mention the chummy collusion between Fauci and the press. After Paul's hearing, the networks and the News Apps painted Fauci as a victim of unhinged Republicans waging a war on science.

President Trump finally served up his long-planned speech at the White House Correspondents' Dinner, and they hated it so much the reporters started kvetching about how they need to "rethink" this event, since Trump was not "advancing" the First Amendment with his mockery of the press.

The networks reported that New Jersey found 6,600 illegal immigrants on its voting rolls, but labored mightily to play down its importance. CNN posted an article headlined “New Jersey’s non-citizen voting reveal isn’t all it seems.” CNN host Abby Phillip argued the aliens who voted didn't know what they were doing was wrong. The spin is dizzying.

Marco Rubio claimed “the very idea that far-left terrorism could be a serious threat is treated as a right-wing fever dream, or worse, as a dangerous fascist conspiracy.” National Review writer and author Noah Rothman explains how the media and extremism “experts” combine to claim there’s not a serious amount of left-wing political violence.

The latest NewsBusters study of the guests interviewed on the “PBS News Hour” now shows the liberal-conservative disparity to be 5.2 to 1. Removing their government funding might have encouraged a deeper leftist tilt. But at least conservatives aren’t forced to support it.

The most obvious occasion for civility in Washington is the sudden death of a public official. It shouldn't be a time for score-settling and expressing glee. Lindsey Graham's death led to both of these. Plus: Ro Khanna's West Bank stunt backfires.

The latest NewsBusters study from Curtis Houck underlined that ABC, CBS, and NBC unloaded more than 27 hours of coverage on the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, mostly playing up his association with President Trump (and not Bill Clinton). By contrast, the networks spent months ignoring Graham Platner's Nazi tattoo and other embarrassing scandals.  

The elitist media put Independence Day fireworks on national TV, but afterward, they treated the smoke as a health hazard. PBS put on a half-hour special on Bruce Springsteen, who claimed his vicious partisan attacks are "critical patriotism." We hate, because we love? 

It's pretty sick that Socialist Revolution is the new fad in primary elections around America's 250th birthday. The media have a nasty habit of disparaging America, especially on race, and can even warn the American flag is a "red flag," now triggering people like "a MAGA hat on a stick." 

In 2018, after President Trump suggested Haiti was a terrible place, Jake Tapper gave a softball interview to comedian Conan O’Brien, who made a special for TBS mocking Trump by going to Haiti and telling everyone what a beautiful place it was. Now in 2026, Tapper lectured that Haiti is a very dangerous place, so you shouldn't send Haitians back home.

When radical socialist nuts endorsed by New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani won their House primaries (in overwhelmingly Democrat districts), the "news" networks responded by sanitizing their extremism. For example, their support for Hamas and for eradicating Israel means believing “the U.S. relationship with Israel needs to be rethought.”  

Over the last few days, the networks have overflowed with gooey propaganda about the new Obama Presidential Center in Chicago. But the fakest news in the goo was claiming Obama's career was all about "bridging divides and finding common ground." This spin pretends there was only unity, and no conservative opposition.

The "Big Four News Apps" -- Apple, Google, MSN, and Yahoo! -- have a nasty habit of promoting not just "news" sites, but trashy opinion bins like the Daily Beast, Salon, and Rolling Stone. MRC Free Speech America studied 100 days of GOP primaries, and these "curators" are heavily leaning on negative midterm messages.  

The effete snobs of the leftist media were on full display as they lamented the "despicable vulgarity" of President Trump hosting a UFC event on the White House lawn on his 80th birthday.  Plus: Ladies of "The View" kvetch about talking to Vice President Vance. 

The liberal broadcast and cable news networks have attacked widespread skepticism about the slow-moving reversal in the Los Angeles mayoral election results as Trump and the Republicans spreading “baseless conspiracy theories.” California's unique way of taking a month to count votes was touted as careful, not manipulative.

Media Research Center President David Bozell and NewsBusters Managing Editor Curtis Houck spoke to Universal Coin & Bullion Founder and President Dr. Mike Fuljenz, a leading numismatics expert with more than 60 awards to his credit on why now is a great time to invest in gold and silver. Fuljenz shared how the Founders believed in the necessity of investing in precious metals, advice on where to start your investment journey, why President Trump was right to kill the penny, and how Universal Coin & Bullion provides peace of mind through its free Gold Guide. Dr. Fuljenz also brought along a special offer ONLY for NewsBusters Podcast listeners. Beforehand, David and Curtis shared the winners of the Worst Media Quote of the Week plus their thoughts on Scott Pelley's absurd, tear-filled interview with The New York Times on his ouster from CBS.

NewsBusters editors Curtis Houck and Nick Fondacaro were joined by 2026 MRC Bulldog Award winner for Outstanding Reporter Jennie Taer of the Daily Wire to discuss her latest news-breaking scoops on the immigration beat, including one about the left’s latest meltdown over an ICE facility in northern New Jersey. They also discussed Taer’s rise from The Laura Ingraham Show intern to one of the country’s leading immigration reporters. Before that, the fellas tore into Scott Pelley for his arrogant ambush of his CBS News bosses and the subsequent pearl-clutching once he was fired.

You have to laugh when Jim Acosta is warning that CBS and CNN are going to turn into a "propaganda giant" when they're in danger of being a little more balanced in their "news." The CBS show "Sunday Morning" has been a routine propaganda stop for Democrats, and that was no different for Jill Biden, who preposterously claimed her husband was still lucid.   

New York Giants quarterback Jaxson Dart spent half a minute last week introducing President Trump at a rally in the suburbs, and somehow became Public Enemy #1 to the Left. But the media adore political athletes when they land on the radical left, like former pro quarterback Colin Kaepernick kneeling to protest the police during the national anthem.   

Three men were killed at the San Diego Islamic Center by two teenagers who were then found dead of self-inflicted gunshot wounds. It’s easy for us to feel unified in horror over this, but it’s also going to become grist for claims America is overwhelmed by "Islamophobia."

Democrats want to exploit the war in Iran to claim they’re the Affordability Party. Trump bluntly answered a Daily Caller question by saying Americans’ financial situation didn’t matter “not even a little bit” in his negotiating with Iran to end the war. “They can’t have a nuclear weapon.” 

There's a ludicrous talking point being shopped by the Democrats, that somehow blacks have been denied their "voting rights" unless they're allowed to be represented by a black Democrat. If you end "majority-minority" districts, their votes no longer count. MS NOW has been a hourly cesspool of leftists crying "Jim Crow" and "Dred Scott" and "most racist Supreme Court ever" over their decision against racial gerrymandering.

The Democrats are fighting among themselves, and it's the "establishment" versus the fringe. But the media can't find an actual extreme, so they just find "outsiders" who oppose the "centrists," defined as the Biden Democrats. This leads them to make excuses for candidates who have a Nazi tattoo, for example.

CNN contributor Shermichael Singleton has daily or nightly adventures sparring with liberals (including the liberal CNN hosts at times). We awarded him our MRC Bulldog Award for Outstanding Achievement Behind Enemy Lines, and he came into our studio to discuss cable-pundit battles and the expectation that blacks must always stay "with their own kind" on the Left.   

Former White House press secretary Sean Spicer has a brand-new book titled "Trump 2.0: The Revolution That Will Permanently Transform America." He discusses how "markedly different" the second Trump term is, and how Republicans should never go to the White House Correspondents Dinner.

A California man decided to shoot up the White House Correspondents Dinner, and ruined all the fun where President Trump was expected to unload about an hour of mockery on the elitist media. Does anyone expect this scare to change the longstanding hostility of the press corps?

The Justice Department has indicted the Southern Poverty Law Center for financial fraud, taking money from leftist donors and paying informants inside racist and extremist groups and trying to hide the money trail as they "fight extremism and hate." Naturally, the leftist networks and newspapers don't want to get into the ugly specifics of the indictment underlining that scam.  

Violent crime has declined dramatically in the District of Columbia since 2024, but can we trust the statistics? Washington Examiner reporter and author Anna Giaritelli discusses her book "Under Assault" and how her sexual assault in 2020 was left out of the DC police statistics, as well as how crime and illegal immigration are filtered through the elitist media.   

A bill moving through California's state legislature would give taxpayer-funded "immigrant service providers" the power to demand the removal of videos recorded in public spaces that they don't like — and impose steep financial penalties on them. It's a narrowly tailored punishment on "anti-immigrant" journalists. Republicans call it the "Stop Nick Shirley Act."  

When Americans interview foreign tyrants, you have to question how they paint themselves as champions of democracy. They’re often so pleased to be granted access that this leads to compliant questioning. That happened on "Meet the Press" with Cuban “President” Miguel Diaz-Canel. "It's an honor," Kristen Welker said.

The elitist media are wildly inconsistent on President Trump, except for one thing: the coverage has to be negative. So this week, it swung from "Trump's about to destroy Iranian civilization" to "Trump chickened out again" when they announced a ceasefire. Whichever direction Trump takes -- left or right, backward or forward -- it's always wrong. 

Executive Editor Tim Graham and Associate Editor Nick Fondacaro welcome Daily Wire’s Isabel Brown to discuss how she managed to unintentionally trigger the Cackling Coven of ABC’s The View into an absolute meltdown by encouraging women to get married and have kids during a CPAC panel. Brown dismantles The View co-hosts and calls out their hypocrisy since most were happily married, and all had kids of their own.

On "International Fact Checking Day," we discuss how PolitiFact can't find any Democrats saying false things with Matthew Hoy, author of the new book "Fact-Checking Frauds: How Fact-Checkers Distract, Deceive, and Distort Our Politics." What tactics do they use? There's obvious selection bias -- in targets, in fact claims, and in expert testimony.

The elitist media celebrated another "massive" and "historic" set of "No Kings" protests on the Left, but they can't seem to remember the Democrats cracking down on conservative "disinformation," from COVID to climate to the Biden scandals. The new free-speech victory in the Missouri v. Biden case was ignored by the press.   

Sheridan Gorman, an 18-year-old college student at Loyola University in Chicago, was shot dead by an illegal alien. The networks hate reporting on crime committed by illegal immigrants. They would insist it’s atypical, and it seems too racist and pro-Trump to cover. News loses to narrative, and that narrative is Trump is ruining everything.

The "climate emergency" pushers have pompously predicted planetary doom within ten years for more than 30 years. Why are they never checked? Author Kevin Mooney has a new book titled "Climate Porn," and we discuss the remarkable imbalance of climate coverage and the nasty tendency to punish people who even gently question the panic on the Left. 

Sunday's Oscars telecast on ABC declined in the ratings again as the comedians -- both host Conan O'Brien and presenter Jimmy Kimmel -- drowned the event in a series of ridiculous anti-Trump jokes and comments.