I think were good. Jorge good afternoon and welcome to the ninth bienial alter cronkite award for excellence in television journalism. Im marty kaplan and on the faculty for school and journalism at the university of southern california, where im the director of the norm lear center, which has administered these awards since Walter Cronkite gave out the first one here in washington in 2001. If you are with us on cspan or facebook live, welcome to you, too, from the National Press club in washington. If you are watching to see the proposal dresses and movie stars or absence of them, thats the other media gathering in washington this weekend. But please do stay with us. Looking around this room, i see lenty of glamour right here in the middle english root meaning of glamour, learning, knowledge, insight. And if you believe that the of glamour that you bear witness to something called alternative facts, which is a wrong that Good Journalism tries to right. Todays Award Winners and networking stations across the station country, i see a number of other distinguished guests whom i would like to recognize. You know who you are. [laughter] heres how today will go, first, before we present the trophies, ill ask the winners in our National Award categories to come up and grapple with questions about trust and legitimacy, about fake news and real journalism, about the assault on the free press in an age of alttruth. And then well serve lunch. And well feed you and invite each of our winners to come up and accept their awards. Joining me to present them will and anothergue judy colleague from the university of pennsylvania, kathleen. D winners, if you are as succinct in accepting your awards as you are on the air, well get you out of here to get back to work or travel home or cumup your see quinns and ber bonds. Want to show you their. Cronkites signature signoff, thats the way it is, avows there is a way it is. It attests to the existence of reality, the reality of truth, the truth of evidence. But why do these values matter . What difference does excellence in Television Political call journalism make . We are not intelligent enough or educated enough to perform what is necessary act of selecting our leaders for the future. We have got to improve that situation. Nd its going to be to a large agree up to us in television and radio, in broadcasting, to get that job done. If we fail at that, our democracy, our republic is, i think, is in serious danger. Fewer people trusting the facts. Are we moving into a fourth media climate. Russia, china, anybody, to interfere to hack into a system of anybody in this country. Let the president talk. Does that give you pause . To have a foreign government. President trump you know what gives me more pause that a person in my government, crooked Hillary Clinton. Be quiet. That a person in our government would delete or get rid of 33,000 emails. What we got here is a case of overclassification. Im not concerned about it and not worried about it and no democrat or american should be either. Cheers and applause] there was no permission to be asked. It had been done by my predecessor and it was permitted. Is that true, was Hillary Clintons use of a private email server for official business while she was secretary of state . Absolutely permitted . No, thats not true. Hillary clinton is no friend of the media. Trump sought to sfress the press of credit built and he claimed it has a massive conspiracy. President trump im not running against crooked Hillary Clinton, im running against the crooked media. There is a question about immigration. President trump sit down. Sit down. Sit down. Im an immigrant and u. S. Citizen and i have the right to ask the question. President trump no, you dont. Go back to univision. President trump she is back there, little katy, what a lie it was [aweden booing] the rest of the crowd was angry, they were angry. And at the end of it, one of trumps people there got a secret service guy and said very rude, its not about you. Get out. Im a u. S. Citizen. Well, whatever. Its not about you. Its about the united states. He peddled so much misinformation, the journalists took a much more forceful. If you are saying he cant do his job because of his race, isnt that the definition of racism . President trump i dont think so. Look at all the crime that is being committed. The crime did not match what you are saying. The pew research, which is independent. President trump you are very naive. Some say mexico will pay for that wall. Im not going to pay for that [bleep] wall. He should pay for it. He has the money. This is a murder, fiction and contradicted by evidence reviewed in at least six investigations, one of them by ken starr, hardly a bill clinton defender, to say otherwise is ridiculous and hardly shameful. This is not a antitrump position, it is a protruth position. Only 14 of republicans say they trust the news media this year. I bring back my panel to talk about this and talk about what journalists or commentator to get those numbers back up. We can either regain Peoples Trust or lose even more of it. President trump i called the fake news the enemy of the people, and they are, the enemy of the people. Martin please join me. [applause] martin so we have the pleasure of the winners in our national category, winning for individual achievement in national ournalism, jorge ramos, jake tapper and katy tur and winner for National Network news program is cnns reliable sources is host brian stelter. You just welcomed them warmly, but why not do it again. [applause] martin in a little while, they will be given their trophies and well have a chance to thank and say what else they want to say, but right now, i would love to dig in to what we just been talking about and the life that we are living. And so, ill just start by noting a contrast between what Walter Cronkite said in that opening, in which he described the press as the allies of democracy, the protectors of our freedom, the key role in making the public able to choose its leaders. And then at the end, the press as the enemy of the people. So whats happened . What is going on when the press is called the enemies of the people . What is the agenda . What is the consequence . And are you the enemies of the people. And this is a jump ball that i would love you to have a chance at it. Jake we are not the enemies of the people and it is fairly obvious at this point that the goal is to undermine the criticism. The president and his team have waged campaigns differently, but with the same goal against legislative oversight, against the Judicial Branch. But obviously most forcefully, against us. And the goal is so that when we provide a check, that check that is so enshrined in the First Amendment, its ineffective. And you know, we see that it is working to a degree. There was a poll out this week, abc News Washington post that showed 32 of the country believes that president obama spied on donald trump and his campaign and 52 of republicans believe that. Doesnt matter that paul ryan says there is no evidence or james comey or devin nunes. All three said the tweets that President Trump made has no basis. Undermining us allows us to say what he says and make ineffective the checks and balances, not just on wild outlandish claims that might not mean that much such as the one against president obama but what he wants to do with this country. We want to cover in a fair and impartial way. But this other stuff keeps getting in the way of that. Katy if they do have biases, our job is to put those aside and report fairly. If we have any bias, its a bias towards the facts, its not that we are rooting for donald trump or Hillary Clinton but rooting for the democracy we live it. It is shared principles and adherence to truth. Make no mistake, donald trump isnt the first president , politician to not like the press. There are long standing tensions, but first one to go forcefully against us, to campaign against us. He was campaigning against Hillary Clinton, but he was campaigning against us. He didnt care that that was out there. He wanted that to be out there as jake was saying so eloquently, if we report something that is not friendly towards him, if he undercuts our credibility and diminishes us, he innoculates himself. He can appeal to the voters in this country and appealed to their most base fears and base frustrations and anger and that works for him, partially because they didnt have trust in the press and they were sick of washington and felt left behind and he said outrageous things and refused to apologize for it and allowed people that they can take control of their lives. They can yell at the top of their lungs if they want and somebody will finally hear them. Where that goes from here, well thats a good question. Brian that sound bite where he is im battling you. We have seen that again this week. The president wants a war with the press and some of the aides described him that way. The ground was fertile for that in june of 2015. Its why the first time i saw you on the campaign trail two weeks, he was already picking you in the crowd and complaining about the press. This is when he was having small events before having rallies. The ground was fertile for it because of decades of criticism from the press. So the ground was fertile for someone to come along and take a subtexan turn it into a text. This idea of campaign against the press, you could see the groundwork for decades in the past and for a confluence of reasons, it was trump who took it to a different level. Martin enemies of the people is not your bias or liberal but something that cuts deeper. Jorge he was criticizing us because we were criticizing him. As a journalist, we have to reflect reality not as we wish it would be. The most important social responsibility that we have is to challenge and question those who are in power. So we have a president who lies, if we have a president who may we have or sexist, if a president that criticizes judges and the president and if we have a president who behaves like a bully during the campaign, then we cannot remain neutral. I think on certain occasions we have to take offense. And it my possession when it comes to racism, discrimination, and violation of human rights, we have to take a stand. I know that many people believe that he was completely, which he was not during the Second World War and during the Civil Rights Movement, he took a stand. Ut the important thing is that if the president said things hat are not look, if we remain neutral with trump, we are normalizing his behavior. And he is not an example, not even for school children. And it is our responsibility to be critical of him. Thats it. Thats what we are doing. Thats the role of journalism, i think. Martin is there a sense of which he is just not criticizing your particular criticism of im, that he is cite sizing the enterprise of journalism brian enemies of the people is so far beyond telling you to watch fox and not cnn, which he has said a couple of times. That is so far behind. Its about dismissing the existence of a press that can report fairly on his presidency. Maybe because he hasnt said it in recent weeks, we shouldnt take him at that word. Jorge we could remind him. Katy only insofar as it relates to him. He will uphold journalism when it benefits him and retweet Washington Post articles even though he says that the Washington Post is full of a bunch of liars and same thing with the new york times. He doesnt hate the press, he hates factbased coverage of him, period. Brian he has done nine interviews of him and he is said im going down to pennsylvania and all this evidence and accumulated the evidence of his love of journalists, level of this on who are more is not anything new. Everyone is criticizing President Trump right now and during the campaign at the end probably most journalists did it. Remember on june 16, 2015 he aid mexicans were criminals, rapists. Katy thats the reason im on this campaign because i did stories about that. The reaction from maybe the general public was a little more mute. But we covered that. Jorge criticizing right at the beginning as forcefully. And i dont think we were critical enough of President Trump in the beginning especially when he was criticizing mexican immigrants. After that, when we saw that horrible video from access hollywood, things started to change. Brian you are saying criticized. And reports. What most of the Mainstream Press has been doing is reporting, not criticizing. There has been a critical tone, but i think you see by the way, i think one of the benefits of 2016 and 2017 is the existence of hundreds of reels, news outlets with different perspectives and ways of going about it. I wouldnt say the word criticize. Jake all all of us have different takes. Jorges show is different from mine. We all have different views of these things. I doubt that theres any uniform way of looking at President Trump. I probably draw a line at a different place than jorge does and thats fine and i respect his right to do what he does. I assume he respects mine. My general view of President Trump is that, i cover him as i cover him. As i would cover any president. When i feel that theres behavior that violates norms of decency or truth, i will come out and say. It but i dont view everything through that prism. So when he says cnn is fake news, that a character attack . Whats happening in that exchange . Jake i should say that of all the things that President Trump has said in the last year and a half, attacking cnn is very low on my list of what offended me personally. [laughter] i was far more personally offended when he made fun of the disabled reporter. I was far more personally offended when he belittled the 5 1 2 years that senator john mccain spent in a p. O. W. Camp. Those two instances i should say. Not to mention obviously the access Hollywood Tape and now were on a list. But going after cnn doesnt offend me or hurt me. Its part of the, i want to delegitimatize my critics. By the way, at cnn we have an interesting role because we are also the network that continually gets hammered from the left because we go out of our way to bring people who believe in President Trump onto our channel. Sometimes as paid commentators. Because, i dont know if youve noticed brian weve been criticized for that . Jake not a lot of republican pundits in this town supported President TrumpPresident Trump during the campaign. So we had to go out and find people like the Lieutenant Governor of South Carolina and the guy who cant manage his campaign in pennsylvania. Those sorts of voices. So we get it from both sides in that respect. In any case martin do you think having but paying surrogates, whose job is to deliver the talking points of the administration, do you think that putting them in a coequal position with everyone else on a panel is traditional standards of journalism . Jake i dont think that thats what we have. We have people, andre bauer, who is a former Lieutenant Governor of South Carolina, was on my show last night. Hes a trump supporter. But he doesnt believe be in he doesnt agree with verything donald trump does martin but there are others who do who are on panels. Jeffrey lorde. Do you think paying him and thers to be on these panels is what journalism at its best should be up to, or should the voices of criticism not be voices which you can predict them bringing the white house line to the panel, instead bringing a point of view which is contrary to other people there. Jake without getting into any specific commentator, i think that we live in a nation that has President Trump as president. One of the criticisms of the media, not without some basis, is that we live in a bubble and that were all shocked because, you know, was iting me greenfield who said she couldnt believe George Mcgovern lost because she didnt know anybody who vote the for nixon. Something like that. It might have been reagan. I feather. In any case, going i forget. In any case. It would be a lot easier if jeb bush or marco rubio had been the nominee and won because republican pundits in this town are more comfortable with that sort of person. I think it is journalistic to go out and make an effort to hear from people who support President Trump. And i dont see really that much of a difference when it comes to having a liberal democratic pundit who shares his or her views and maybe sometimes sounds as though he or she is reciting talking points, and somebody who supports donald trump. I really honestly dont. See thatch of a difference. Jorge the issue is not only among journalists but among academia on neutrality. Should we be neutral all the time . With trump . I dont think we should. Let me do my homework. [laughter] these are the quotes that i got from Walter Cronkite now that were right here with him. This is what he wrote. He said, early 1943, i reported a bombing raid over germany in my lead i wrote that had just come back from an assign frment hell. If neutrality is the test of integrity, journalism, then we failed in our dutyy the to accord that coverage. During the Civil Rights Movement jake he used the term fair and balanced . Jorge yes. [laughter] thats interesting. He says, fair and balanced coverage. Walter cronkite, what were you thinking . Then the second quote is really interesting. During the Civil Rights Movement he wrote, basic human decency, as you were mentioning, was making neutrality futile. No amount of neutrality could now rescue the south from itself. So in other words, Walter Cronkite, when it comes to vietnam, when it comes to Second World War, when it comes to the Civil Rights Movement, he took a stand. He put neutrality aside because neutrality was not an option. Know this is debatable. Jake so let me ask you. Martin so many people have run panels today. [laughter] jake im sorry. Im used to being in the middle chair. Martin i was poking. [laughter] jake do you think that do you view the position that the media should not be neutral towards President Trump, do you view every action and every policy position he takes that way . I dont think you do based on your coverage. Jorge absolutely. But when hes talking about we counted, for instance, in the last 100 days 44 times in which President Trump or his administration criminalized or demonized immigrants. Of course thats an issue that we care a lot about. So i think we have to jake on that issue. But you dont assume that just because brian on that issue. But you dont assume that just because he takes a position on korea or nafta that hes wrong . Jorge absolutely not. But when it comes to racism, the way he remarks about women, about immigrants, yes, i think we have to take a stand. Katy cronkite and cutting through and taking a position and not being neutral in those circumstances. I think the reason he did cut through and the reason somebody like Edward Moreau cuts through and the other examples you can pull from history of somebody a journalist taking a stand and having it resonate is because the level of rhetoric from everybody wasnt up here. All the time. I mean, you turn on anything and the level of vitriol against donald trump is always up here. No matter what he says. Its very hard to cut through that to say, no, this is what hes saying here actually is appalling or actually is very dangerous or it really is important because everythings already here. So we cant hear it. Jake when he talks about breaking up the ninth Circuit Court and people on twit railroad like, hes a dictator 2008 twitterer are like, hes a dictator. Then do you one round of google and youre like, this has been a conservative thing theyve talked about for decades. Thats an important point that im sure everybody here agrees with. We cant give our the people who are labeling us the enemies of the people, we cant give them the ammunition. We have to be reasoned, point out when things are appalling, theyre appalling but not everything is appalling. If everything is a crisis, nothing is a crisis. Martin let me try something out thats appallinging all the time. About which being neutral is dangerous. Thats the idea that facts dont matter. That you can make things up. Katy i was on the campaign no, twitter. Everything blurs together. I tweeted something just factual. Heres what donald trump said or this sky is blue and somebody tweeted back at me, who are you to decide the facts . We decide the facts. I said, no, you do not decide the facts. The facts are facts. Nobody decides them. But it was emblematic of exactly what we were facing on the campaign trail every day. When you would interview Trump Supporters, they did not care what we said. They did not care. They didnt want to hear it. They didnt care that donald trump was inconsistent. They dont care if he builds a wall or not. For the most part. They dont care what he does. They believe that when he got into office, and they still largely believe this, that he will make the decisions that are best for the country. So facts are of the just these little wisps of things in the wind that blow away. Martin if thats the case, why bother correcting facts . Brian i dont think were in a postfact world or a postfactcheck world or a posttruth world. Were only in that world if all us in this room agree to be. If everybody else in every other room agrees to be. There are alternative realities, though. To put it simply, two alternative realities and then many, many alternative realities. What youre describing about a certain kind of trump supporter, who is with him no matter what, thats an emotional, guttural reaction that i think we dont do a good job always expressing on television. Actually having protrump commentators try to get at that issue by understanding the emotional reactions to any president , but right now President Trump, there were similarities with some supporters of obama in 2009, with him no matter what. Right now its about trump. I think im finding myself on television trying to figure out a way to convey, its not about those its not always about the very specific policy debates were having. Its sometimes about the emotional reactions to seeing him in the oval office. Wanting him to be there. I find myself thinking about that. Posttruth, postfact, the only if we all allow it to be. Just because theres an alternative reality that we might label as the alex jones info wars bubble, just because those folks live with a different set of facts doesnt mean that were postfact as a society. Jake let me also say. Theres been a lot of attention on Trump Supporters and i think thats good. Because the media does need to get outside the bubble. But they are minority of the electorate. Not even a minority of the American People or minority of the world. Theyre a minority of the electorate. And not all of them believe President Trump no matter what he says. The reason why facts matter is because when President Trump says something about the u. S. Armada being headed to the Korean Peninsula and it turns out its not, that becomes a major issue in south korea during their election. Because when President Trump suggests that vaccines cause autism, despite the fact that the medical community, the respected medical and Scientific Community say thats not true, please dont say that or else people will stop getting their kids immunized, that could have a life or death consequence. So facts do matter. Its ok that some people dont believe them. 18 of the public thinks that they have seen a ghost. Good luck. But the idea that we are supposed to beholden, to be beholden to people who dont have respect for Empirical Data or facts is ludicrous. Martin does it strike you that there is a as it its campaign to delegitimatize the enterprise of fact finding . Of verification . Of evidence . Jake thats what fake news is all about. Brian do you think folks wake up in the morning and say, i want to make sure i delegitimatize facts today . I think theyre trying to get through the day. Trying to put a few points on the board. Whether thats the Trump Administration or an opponent. I dont know if theres a concerted effort to say facts dont matter. There are a lot of lies and misstatements and falsehoods. Martin at the end jorge at the end when youre facing facebook or twitter or cnn or nbc, after a few months you know who is telling the truth and who is not. Then we are measuring trump. Now we know how to measure trump. When he lies and hes lying about not only president obama but about five Million Immigrants voting, which is ridiculous, of course. Jake they voted in all the wrong states. [laughter] jorge exactly. Actually, if you take away all the kids who are under 18, it would be almost half the undocumented population went to vote. Its a matter of credibility. I know that were concerned about fake news. The fact is that you do trust some journalists, i hope. And theyre telling you the truth. But when it comes to the credibility of President Trump, its a matter of really difficult. Because if he decides to get into a war with north korea, do we trust the president . Lets remember what happened with george w. Bush when there were no weapons of mass destruction. Were forgetting that the country completely changed, even though he was not telling the truth. What happens with trump now if he decides to bomb syria . Its very dangerous. Jake its a problem for him. In our new cnn poll, for a president , hes already unpopular, to an unprecedented degree in modern polling. For a president within his first 100 days. Its staggering. Then we had a poll number, i think it was last night or the night before. The number the percentage of americans who think that honest and ump is trustworthy is 37 . Thats fewer than the percentage that voted for him. That is a horrible number for a president. If i were him or on his team, i would really work on stopping with the falsehoods, stopping with the wild claims. Because that can be rebuilt. That can be regained. The American People are a for giving people. Its a nice term for it. Gag op poll trust in tv news, 21 said they think they have quite a lot or a great eal of trust in tv news. Martin congress was at 9 . Congress is at 9 . But the real action rate of scong 96 . I think thats the issue. Jake they dont have jerrymandering at the networks. Martin i think the issue is a lot people hate the media but they have their channel that they watch. Katy the media is a broad brush. Martin everyone trust its some media. They just dont trust the same media. You mentioned brian hopefully everyone here trusts some journalists. Even the most loyal supporter of President Trump who thinks cnn is the clinton or communist news network, does trust fox or does trust breitbart or everyone trusts some media. What i find myself wanting to do more of is to find out what to do to reach across various aisles and figure out how to improve trust between those different bubbles, or those different silos. Jake some of it is our fault, dont you think . Brian yes. Jake some of the distrust of the media is the medias fault, i think. Thats fair to say. Martin what about it . Jake there have been in the last decade alone a number of scandals where people in the media were not telling the truth. Jason blair, etc. Judith miller. I think election coverage in general, we all were way too reliant on polling that was faulty. There is a reason for the public to have skepticism in the media and i think we need i think by the way that twitter, im not be a solving myself of this, i think im not absolving myself of this, i think twitter has been good and bad. If you have a machine that allows to you convey every emotion, every moment you have one, i dont think its good for when President Trump gives into that impulse and i dont think its good when reporters give into that impulse. So i think there are a lot of reasons why the media still has a lot of work to do. And we need to make sure that when we do reports on President Trump and his administration or anyone, but especially him, because hes so targeted, that we need every word, every letter needs to be right. We need to be 100 right. We need to have made sure that we gave the administration ample time to respond to the story. I think its just a very perilous time and we need to rise to the occasion. Katy we also need to moderate ourselves a little bit and make sure were not being alarmists about every little thing. I think it goes deeper than just us trying to rebuild our trust. Its kind of like trying to teach a 17yearold to read. You have to teach a 3yearold to read. Or 4, whatever. I dont have kids. [laughter] 4 . Martin its close enough. Katy thank you. We should be teaching journalism in school. Really making an effort to teach what journalism is in history classes and civic classes. Try to convey it. Media literacy. But this is not im not the first 2001 say it. Cronkite said this in i think at the 1972 convention. People dont understand the media. They dont read enough. They cant just turn on the television. Theyve got to get out there and read not only the front page of the new york times, but the opinion pages as well. To find out all view points on a certain subject. It should be taught to our children so they understand why it is an important part of our democracy. Thats how we are going to rebuild our trust. Its got to go from the bottom up. And weve got to be assigning example a shining example. Jake there were instances in that video, in your coverage of the last 17 months or longer now martin when youre interviewing the president , for example, and he says something, which is not true. What do you do . Katy i tended to stop and try to get him to explain where he got that information. Or to say, hey, thats not true. As you saw it just there. The thing about trump, and, jake, you interviewed him a number of times as well. Hes slippery. He just wont answer a question. Hell just spin and spin and spin, start going on these tangents. Its a word salad that hell throw at you. You continue to ask the question. You can spend the entire interview asking one question over and over again. Martin you followed up 23 times, Something Like that. The interview about the judge, it was in june and it was the last time he let me interview him. Katy at least you made it to june. I didnt get that far. [laughter] jake so, he had made a comment at the wall street journal the night before about how the judge couldnt be fair because he was mexican. Even though hes american and from indiana. Obviously of mexican heritage. I came with a sheet of questions, but i knew that was the most important question. Because it was just such an outrageous comment. On its face racist. Or xenophobic, i guess technically. So i had to get through it. I wouldnt call it slippery. Its more like a barge. A battering ram. Hell interrupt and bust through. All politicians have their own ways of avoiding questions. But i had to get to that question. It was very important. By the way, afterwards, he was very lovely in person. Katy thats what he would do. The press conference are we told me to be quiet. A few minutes later he walks out and looks at me and smiles and says, thank you. Im like, ok, thank you. He is a very personable person oneonone. Martin is that theeter . Katy to a degree, yes. He understands ratings. The Washington Post had a little item about this over the weekend. Which is, why would i get rid of sean spicer, he gets good ratings . Thats fundamentaly the core of donald trump. He thinks its good theater. He enjoys the sparring. He knows its mustsee tv. Thats part of the reason why he kept doing press conferences all the time. Thats one of the reasons why his aides had to say, stop it. Jorge now hes concerned about the leader of north korea that [inaudible] hes not 27. Jake hes 33 now but he was 27 when he lost his dad. Anyway. Jorge the important thing, when, for instance, when we decided, its not easy to, as you experienced, to talk to trump. When we decided to talk to trump at the press conference with the producer here, we started donald trump and we knew he was going to interrupt us completely. So we had a plan. We were going to be asking the questions standing up, not sitting down. We a microphone. So he could everybody could listen. Then i would keep on talking and ask him my question, until i finished. Because otherwise he would say, excuse me, excuse me, excuse me, or hed interrupt me. Thats the only way. Jake you did get to ask him a question, though, right . Jorge exactly. Being personable, i was ejected from the press conference and his de the room, then came press person. She told me, do you want to go back . He said, ill go back as long as, with the condition that he allows me to ask a question. Then we spoke for almost 10 minutes. Jake it was a Good Exchange also, as i recall. Jorge he said, welcome back. I said, thank you very much. [laughter] he was personal at the end. Martin is there a sense in which he got the nomination by gaming the Business Model of the news industry . Knowing how dependent it is on selling eye balls to advertisers and he was reliably entertaining and therefore he didnt have to pay for media, he was relentlessly able to get it. Katy i think that is a fair estimate of what his strategy was. And he said it. He said, as long as youre interesting, the eyes will watch you. Martin what do you do about that . Katy thats a good question. Thats above my pay grade. Brian there were 16 republican candidates that didnt learn from it. A couple of Democratic Candidates who didnt learn from it. Katy what are they going to do . Theyre going to come out and say more outrageous things . Brian rallies, interviews, unpredictable comments. Jake doing a sunday show this idea, its gets me soing an when i ri when people from competing republican campaigns complain about how much President Trump, how much time candidate trump got. He did interviews. He agreed to do interviews. He stopped doing them after he got the nomination as much. But he did interviews and we would beg for marco rubio and jeb bush and ted cruz and all the others to come on television. And they wouldnt do it. They did it in a very old school way. The old model of, on our time, on our terms, seven minutes, when we have a message we want to get out there. Meanwhile, trump was appearing on all five or six sunday shows at a time. Not yours. But he was going on almost as Many Television shows as every other republican combined was doing that sunday. So its not i dont even think its about necessarily being interesting or gaming the system by being provocative. Although that certainly was part of his appeal. Although i think that is also who he is. Its showing up. Its showing up and also by the way, those other guys were so busy raising money. And he was not. Really. He subscribed to a new model of running for president. And everyone else was really stuck doing the old model. Martin brian, on the clip that we ended with, you were talking about the press regaining its trust. What good ideas have you heard . Brian this is the hard part. I think we were discussing earlier some of the attributes. First and foremost of getting it right. Jake was referring to various scandals that have it got an lot of attention involving majorerism and exaggerater and other sins of journalism. Those are real scandals, real failures. Then they are magnified by partisans and by folks that want to exploit that for political reasons. When you screw up in a big way, youre giving those partisans ways to exploit it. Certainly weve seen President Trump try to do that even with mistakes that were not significant and were not worthy of being condemned for days and weeks on end. It is those basics about accuracy and fairness and i think the other thing we would all agree here is transparency. Even though five of us have tweets that wed like to take back. For the most part social media has encouraged the industry to be more accessible and forthcoming and open. It doesnt just mean using twitter and facebook. It means in the delivery, in the presentation of your program or in the afternoon, the way you speak to the viewer. I think were seeing changes in the delivery of news. Its in part influenced by social media and some of the sins of the past. These are maybe all small steps. But hopefully adding up. But i think we should acknowledge before we talk about trust in media, there are concerted efforts to be tearing it down. Not that i think people wake up in the morning with a plot to do this. But there are websites that benefit from tearing down of the press. Business molds behind this mod moddles behind this. Think models behind this. Sean handitys show is a media criticism show but more than that. Martin tweets. Brian the criticism from the president , it is a form of poison. I say that because we dont know martin a form of poisen . Brian yes. When he says enemies of the people up there. That is a form of poison. Verbal poison. That trickles through the blood stream. I dont think we know what the impact is yet. Were starting to see it in polling. The divide between republicans and everybody else with regards to trust of the media getting more severe there. Will be other effects of these words. As we try to regain trust, i think we have to recognize how severe the challenge is from folks that are, for their own, you know, selfish reasons, trying to erode it. Martin let me ask each of you. Is it a form of poison . Katy we have to wait and see. Brian im the media reporter. Katy i think we need to just build our credibility back in the way that i had all these thought whiles brian was talking while brian was talking. We have to build up and support our local news. I think local news is incredibly important in this country. And it has been if we think that our budgets have been slashed, god, they are bare bones at local news departments. They barely have anybody to get their shows on the air. Those are the people who are on the front lines really talking to Everyday Americans every day. Whereas we are in new york and washington and los angeles and in more of these major cities. So i think by supporting our local News Ventures an encouraging people to consume both local news on television, but their local papers and their institutions, we will benefit. And i also think that we just have to as much as donald trump wants to take us down, you cant we cannot go crazy about it all the time. We need to be even keeled, brush it off and move on. And dont take the bait. Continue to report on the facts. Be as fair as you possibly can be. Be partial to the truth. And dont be alarmists when its unnecessary. Jorge may i disagree . Katy sure. Jorge i think we have to get it right. I think we have to be precise and accurate. Because if we make mistakes in that area, then who is going to trust news is so i think we can all agree with that. Theres a second level. And that second level is that, again, the most important social responsibility that we have is to challenge the powerful. It is our role. If we dont do that, nobody else is going to do it. Katy i disagree. I dont disagree with that. At all. Jorge what im saying is our position i think has to be much more aggressive. And we should not expect the democrats to do that job. It is our job. If we dont question the president , if we dont question his lies, if we dont do it, whos going to do it . Its an uncomfortable brian youre almost saying were a standin for the democrats. Jorge no, we shouldnt be partisan. I was a staff with president obama and Hillary Clinton. We shouldnt be partisan. But what im saying is that it is our role. Sometimes i see the interviews on the bbc, those british journalists are really tough on everyone. I think thats our role. If we dont do it, nobody else is going to do it. And once we do it, then people will trust us. But if we dont do it, people wont trust us. Jake i think thats right and we need to stand up for the facts and for the truth aggressively. Whether democrats or lying or republicans. I dont think youre disagreeing. Whether democrats or lying or republicans. One of the issues that some viewers might have is that they discern a much more adversarial approach, not by you, i remember how do you say broken promise in spanish . He would go after barack obama for his broken promise. On deportation. They were not fans of yours, i can attest to that. Or mine. But i think a lot of viewers think the press in general was not as adversarial with obama or really probably even with george w. Bush as we are now. And i dont think that thats an unfounded criticism. I think that there are reasons for it. Including the fact that there are more mendacities coming from this white house than i can remember coming from other white houses in four or eight years. But that said, i think we should keep the attitude that we all have now, no matter who is for the Chelsea Clinton administration and for the Oprah Winfrey administration and the ivanka Trump Administration. Jorge i think we have to be on the other side of power. In spanish theres a beautiful word that basically means, we always have to be on the other side of power. If we have to choose to be friends or enemies of the president , id rather be an adversary. Katy the news should not make you comfortable is what youre saying. We are not trying to bolster your personal world view. We are trying to hold power to account. Absolutely. Aggressively where it needs to be. But also be fair. And not just do it for one side more than the other side. Brian what i wrestle with here listening to the answer, feeling like i dont have an answer to the following comment is, yes, yes, yes, and is that enough . Arent we all struggling with the idea that there are these alternative universes, these what were called filther bubbles five years ago that are now filther prisms that folks lock themselves inside. Some on the right, some on the left. Some on the purple and orange. Pick your color. Folks are increasingly choosing to believe their own sets of facts. When they see a journalist challenging the president aggressively, they pushes them further into their own corner. This is the part i dont have the answers for. But i think we have that sense deep down inside that there is something really amiss and its partsly social networks, its partly the polarization of media and the handities of the world that have created this environment where folks are locked in those cells. Not everyone, though. Jorge interviewing President Trump for this weekend. Count how many of those interviews, i havent seen a sing one, lets see how many of those interviews are really challenging President Trump. Brian the examiner, the Washington Post. Others are cbs. So theres a mix. Jorge the going to be interesting to see how many of them are challenging President Trump. Jake i think we know. [laughter] brian theres a fox interview tonight. Jake the only other point id like to make it, the president says a lot of things that arent true. He has an entire support network of people in the white house and also people in conservative media that support that. Thats bad and thats bad for a thriving democracy. Have also seen a lot of evidence evidence evidencefree unfounded stuff out there against donald trump. A congresswoman the other day making some allegation about why Jason Chaffetz was retiring that was entirely based in ludicrous conspiracy. Maxine waters was the congresswoman. And i think that fake news is thriving on the right, it is living on the left too. And it needs to be called out there too. I see a lot of conspiracy mongering, i see a lot of speculation based on fevered theories and not presentation of facts. A lot of it is thrivinging because of twitter. On the right and left. Im not saying people are going to accuse me on twitter, i can hear them right now. I have no idea who is doing it more. I noh know one side has a president pushing it forward. Im not saying theyre equivalent. Its not health oneither side. Martin last question. Is there a danger in criticism or being an adversary that its always framed as a partisan response . Jorge sure. They can say were democrats or that were supporting a party. Then we have to show them that we did exact will the i will the same thing with democrats exactly the same thing with democrats. Can i go back to cronkite . [laughter] we think were in an incredibly difficult position, that were under fire. Its nothing new. He said, Walter Cronkite, Network Television began to draw southern fire during the Civil Rights Movement. It became another one of the socalled outside agitators, tearing up discontent and sell teling southern secrets. Correspondents sometimes felt like soldiers behind enemy lines. Thats how they felt during the Civil Rights Movement. Jake there is a reason for the state to be alarmed in this era. During the obama era, he used the espionage act to go after leakers who provided information to journalists more than every other single president before him combined. So, his white house went out of their way to demonize an entire network and say, its not a legitimate news organization. Not saying that this anchor or this show or this report is illegitimate, but that an entire network was not a legitimate news source. So, again, im not saying its equivalent, but i wasnt a fan of that either. In terms of your question about, is there a danger, i was called a right wing hack for eight years. And now people with pink hats are celebrating me. So i dont know that im supposed to really pay too much attention to it. Martin final thought . Jake you didnt like the pink hat reference . Brian it has a different name. Martin the image it calls to mind is one i try to push away. Jake get your mind out of the gutter. Katy final thought. Im honored to be here. Especially alongside you guys. You have been role models for much longer than i think any of you know, jake especially during the obama years, when you were challenging josh earnest and whoever. So for me, this is a truly tremendous moment. I hope that we find a way to rebuild that trust. And host that we find a way to support and i hope that we find a way to support our local institutions and back each other up and also cool down the rhetoric. On both sides. I think youre right about the left. The left is getting a little spunup too. So good luck. Brian what its working on is the power of the press. I think it comes through in this conversation. What has not happened in 100 days is notable. I dont know if i should at mitt this in this room admit this in this room. On january 21 i was watching cnns primetime coverage, of course this was sean spicers rant with five inaccurate things in five minutes. What a night. And im sitting on the set, it might have been with you, and jim acosta is on the front lawn of the white house reporting and i think to myself, i swear trumps going to walk out of that brand newhouse he has and tell gym to get jim toth off his lawn. To the president s credit, that has not happened. Journalists are still in the west wing. The press Briefing Room is still in the west wing. Briefings are happening almost every day on live television. They might not be as low long as wed like. They interrupt katies show all the time. But they are a constant presence. Theres a lot that hasnt changed in this relationship. In the first 100 days of the Trump Administration. I think some of the fears that First Amendment scholars may have had have not come to pass yet. It is possible well see the espionage act, its possible well see curtailing of press freedoms and attempts to change the liable laws, but were not there. I think its notable to think about the power of the press and the extent to which there are still relations going on between the white house and the news media. Nine interviews this week. Id like to see them with a greater proportion of more skeptical news outlets but we are seeing access, were seeing interviews. Were seeing a lot of Fact Checking going on. And were seeing an enormous number of readers and viewers tuning in and consuming this material. Martin are you that optimistic . Jorge im ot mystic with our job optimistic with our job. I think we are doing what we should be doing. Donald trump will be gone in four years. Or in eight years. But i think we will be judged by how we react to him right now. This is a historic moment for journalism. I want to hake sure that when people think about what we did today, that we were doing the right thing. Even though it might be uncomfortable. This is a historic moment. We have to raise to the occasion. Martin is it dangerous, this moment . Were the Founding Fathers unbelievably prescient. The fact that we have a system of checks and balances that includes the First Amendment is something that we have seen appen in action. Whether its the Judicial Branch sparring with the president , or legislative oversight, we saw some of that this week with congressman chaffetz and congressman cummings coming out and talking about what the former National Security advisor did. When comes to the role that we all play. We are still broadcasting. Newspapers are still publishing. Im optimistic. I think that we all need to rise. I think we all need to make sure that our facts are straight. Before we publish or broadcast. I think were in a great place because i think im hearing anecdotally that young people are inspired to become journalists. Im hearing people expressing an appreciation for what we do in a way that ive never encountered before in 20 years of being a journalist. I feel good about journalism nd just think we all need to stay in shape and cut down on our sugars and our liquor and make sure we can wake up in the morning and do our job. Martin i think Walter Cronkite would be happy to see his profession thriving in that way. If thats the case. Two final thoughts. One is, there was a vanity fair 60 minutes poll that came out the other day asking people, what is the most accurate or honest news source and the one that came in at number one is tv news. The one that came in last was the president. The other thought is that, katy, you provided perfect segue to what were about to do, which is to also honor the people in local news who, dealing with exactly those constrained budgets and limited resources, do phenomenal journalism and were thrilled to be able to shine a spotlight on them too. Please join me in thanking this amazing panel. [applause] martin lunch is served. [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2017] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org]