One of the hallmarks of the second Trump era is the way the Pork Reich consistently finds a way to make bad things, infinitely worse. For example, I don't think anyone reading this would be surprised to hear me describe Fox News as an objectively fascist media organization, that is closely aligned with and prepared to lie to promote, Republican political objectives and GOP politicians. "Fox News lies for Republicans" was a pretty heady message in 1999, but it's essentially a "well, duh" moment here in 2025. When you combine the power of the Fox Media apparatus with a Trump regime that approaches governance like a type of reality television show and actively sees control of media messaging as foundation to the success of their fascist project however, this unholy union creates something that roughly approximates "state news" in a dictatorship.

For a closer look at the scale of this collaboration, let's take a look at this Media Matters report from May 1st, detailing just how often, in raw mathematical terms, the Trump administration went on Fox News to speak directly to the nation in Trump's first 100 days.

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/key-trump-officials-appeared-more-500-times-fox-networks-first-100-days-his-presidency

Key Trump officials appeared more than 500 times on Fox networks in the first 100 days of his presidency

"Key Trump administration officials appeared on Fox networks over 500 times in his first 100 days in office. President Donald Trump's “border czar” Thomas Homan led all officials with at least 59 appearances while Fox News' Hannity led all shows with 71 interviews.

Trump officials appeared on Fox networks on 96 of the administration's first 100 days. The number of daily appearances by key officials was highest on both February 3, following Trump's announcement of his first set of tariffs, and March 4, seemingly to prime the Fox audience for his congressional address that evening, with at least 13 appearances on each day.

Media Matters looked at Fox appearances by key nominated or confirmed Trump officials during the administration’s first 100 days. Trump's “border czar,” Thomas Homan, remains the most prominent administration official on the networks, appearing at least 59 times in total. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt (40 appearances), deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller (40), and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin (33) followed. Rounding out the top five most frequent officials who appeared on Fox is former counselor to the president Alina Habba who had 29 appearances before she left the administration when Trump appointed her interim U.S. attorney for the district of New Jersey on March 24."

Obviously this isn't really an article so much as a statistical analysis of how extensively the Trump administration has collaborated with Fox News to disseminate propaganda into the public discourse. You may of course quibble with my characterization of Trump regime media appearances as "propagandizing the American people" but my response to that is going to be to tell you to go fuck yourself with a chainsaw because quibbling with rubes about obviously demonstrable facts isn't my idea of a fun time. In a little over three months of covering the Trump regime, I honestly can't think of a single Fox News appearance by a US government official that hasn't featured lies, manipulation, and fascist propaganda; in fact I'd argue that appearances by overt fascist dipshits working in the Trump administration, folks like Tom Homan, and Stephen Miller, have done more to normalize fascist ideology in our discourse than any overtly nazi YouTuber or essayist in our society. The idea that the Trump administration is working with Fox News to produce pro-regime, pro-fascist propaganda is indisputable in my opinion; and the raw numbers compiled by Media Matters here demonstrates that with absolute certainty.

Look folks, all media organizations, particularly for-profit media organizations owned by reactionary billionaire maggots who love them some white supremacy, have a political bias. But there's a big difference between bias, and a major cable news network offering itself up as Trump state media to push forward an authoritarian agenda and the police state dictatorship necessary to enforce it. As terrible as Fox has always been, they've now become the Völkischer Beobachter for the Trump 2.0 era and administration. While a lot of this thread is about members of the "liberal" establishment collaborating with the fascist Pork Reich regime, the reality is that Trump wouldn't be sitting in the White House without Fox News, and they remain an integral part of his attempts to govern by fascist conspiracy theory and Christian Nationalist animus.

#Fascism #Media #Trump #Lies #FoxNews #Propaganda #StateMedia #MediaMatters #Analysis #Censorship #NaziConspiracyTheories #ChristianNationalism #WhiteSupremacy

Key Trump officials appeared more than 500 times on Fox networks in the first 100 days of his presidency

Media Matters for America
For over a century, U.S. media has painted Asians as threats, villains, or sidekicks. These racist tropes fueled exclusion laws, internment camps & hate. It's not just the past. #BannedHistory #StopAsianHate #YellowPeril #MediaMatters #AsianRepresentation
Hollywood made billions off racist tropes. Blackface, "savage" Natives, and caricatured Asians weren’t accidents — they were strategy. Profit over people. #BannedHistory #HollywoodRacism #TruthInStorytelling #MediaMatters
Bluesky

Bluesky Social
If you still work for Darth Desiccant, you really need to evaluate your poor life choices. #auspol #MediaMatters

RE: https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:bmfpkqzxtmm3wkrpcizzvuoz/post/3llyz2p5om22w
Bluesky

Bluesky Social

#FoxNews goes full #fascist, saying we should get rid of "due process" because it's too cumbersome.
________________

Via #MediaMatters @ 10:14am ET on Mar 24, 2025

#BrianKilmeade: "But I also think it's not practical to think that we can do #DueProcess on 8 million people."

https://www.mediamatters.org/brian-kilmeade/foxs-brian-kilmeade-its-not-practical-think-we-can-do-due-process-8-million-people

Fox's Brian Kilmeade: “It's not practical to think that we can do due process on 8 million people” Co-host Lawrence Jones: Constitutional rights “are afforded to illegals in this country. We should revisit that.”

Media Matters for America

This is partly why I think the #fediverse could give the building blocks to slow this down by neutralizing right-wingers to buying up the advertising and followers. But I don't see that happening for a long time.

#mastodon #mediamatters #conservative #followers #rightwing

@paninid
Kudos to the people at #MediaMatters for their extensive work creating this piece.
I am curious about how the data changes when the 100ish non-aligned shows are included.
Are there shows that pull off being overtly political without being partisan?
Finally, my fantasy would be a comparison of political leaning vs how often shows are inaccurate or outright lie.

My favorite quote from the article:
"72% of the 111 supposedly nonpolitical shows that we determined had an ideological bent were right-leaning."

Interesting #MediaMatters analysis of online media

"The right dominates the online media ecosystem, seeping into nonpolitical spaces"

https://www.mediamatters.org/google/right-dominates-online-media-ecosystem-seeping-sports-comedy-and-other-supposedly

#media #information #news #uspol #USPolitics #journalism

The right dominates the online media ecosystem, seeping into sports, comedy, and other supposedly nonpolitical spaces

As Americans increasingly get their news from online shows and streamers, the influence of this media ecosystem becomes more prominent — and Media Matters has found that the most popular of this content is overwhelmingly right-leaning.In a new study, Media Matters assessed the audience size of popular online shows — podcasts, streams, and other long-form audio and video content regularly posted online. To do so, we gathered data on the number of followers, subscribers, and views across streaming platforms (YouTube, Spotify, Rumble, Twitch, and Kick) and social media platforms that are used to amplify and promote these shows (Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok). Apple Podcasts does not publicly provide follower counts on its platform, so it was not included in the audience data.This analysis was based on 320 online shows with a right-leaning or left-leaning ideological bent. We found that right-leaning online shows dominate the ecosystem, with substantially larger audiences on both politics/news shows and supposedly nonpolitical shows that we determined often platformed ideological content or guests.Key findings:We found 320 online shows — 191 right-leaning and 129 left-leaning — that were active in 2024 and covered news and politics and/or had related guests. These shows had at least 584.6 million total followers and subscribers.We found substantial asymmetry in total following across platforms: Right-leaning online shows had at least 480.6 million total followers and subscribers — nearly five times as many as left-leaning.Across platforms — YouTube, Rumble, Twitch, Kick, Spotify, Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok — right-leaning online shows accounted for roughly 82% of the total following of the online shows we assessed.Comparatively, left-leaning online shows had nearly 104 million followers and subscribers across the eight platforms — nearly five times less.Nine out of the 10 online shows with the largest followings across platforms were right-leaning, with a total following of more than 197 million. The only left-leaning show among the top 10 was What Now? with Trevor Noah, which had 21.1 million total followers and subscribers across platforms.Our analysis — which looked entirely at shows with an ideological bent — found over a third self-identify as nonpolitical, even though 72% of those shows were determined to be right-leaning. Instead, these shows describe themselves as comedy, entertainment, sports, or put themselves in other supposedly nonpolitical categories.Out of 320 online shows, right-leaning programs categorized as comedy — 15 shows in all — had 117.5 million followers and subscribers, or 20% of the total following of all programs we assessed. This category included The Joe Rogan Experience, This Past Weekend with Theo Von, and Full Send Podcast.Right-leaning shows accounted for two-thirds of the total YouTube views on videos from channels affiliated with the shows we assessed — 65 billion views in total. Comparatively, left-leaning online shows totaled 31.5 billion total views.Right-leaning shows use Rumble to expand their audience — gaining millions of subscribers and billions of views for their content.

Media Matters for America
X’s globe-trotting defense of ads on Nazi posts violates TOS, Media Matters says

X allegedly ignored the chosen venues in the TOS when filing “thermonuclear” lawsuits.

Ars Technica