Brian Stelter and Jonathan V. Last: Worst Case Scenario

Summary

The Bulwark Podcast

Episode: Brian Stelter & Jonathan V. Last: Worst Case Scenario
Date: September 18, 2025
Host: Tim Miller
Guests: Brian Stelter (CNN Chief Media Analyst), Jonathan V. Last (Bulwark Editor)

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Overview

This episode dives deep into the shocking and highly politicized suspension of Jimmy Kimmel by ABC/Disney under apparent government pressure. Tim Miller brings on media analyst Brian Stelter and Bulwark editor Jonathan V. Last (JVL) to break down:

• The facts of the Kimmel situation
• The intersection of government coercion, free press, and corporate interest
• Broader patterns of media intimidation and democratic backsliding in the U.S.
• The disparate standards in media and politics (asymmetry)
• Parallels to international authoritarianism and what this all portends for the American media landscape

The episode is blunt and urgent, packed with context, history, and a few moments of dark humor, as the Bulwark team tries to gauge just how dire the present moment is for freedom of speech and press in America.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Jimmy Kimmel Suspension: Facts & Fallout

[02:38–09:53]

• Disney (ABC) suspended Jimmy Kimmel “indefinitely” after pressure from the Trump administration and FCC head Brendan Carr over a joke referencing the Charlie Kirk assassination and MAGA reactions.
• Key context: Kimmel’s joke (“This is how a four year old mourns a goldfish”) about MAGA’s response was made before shooter motive texts were public; the outrage was, according to Miller and Stelter, manufactured.
• FCC head Brendan Carr openly stated on Benny Johnson’s show that broadcasters “can find ways to change conduct, to take action—frankly—on Kimmel, or there’s going to be additional work for the FCC… We can do this the easy way or the hard way,” implying license threats ([08:29]).

Tim Miller:

“This is the government pressuring once again… a corporation that wants a merger approved to stifle any opposition speech in order to get in the good graces of the leader.” ([09:21])

• Brian Stelter compares the transparency and speed of this coercion to earlier, murkier cases like Colbert’s cancellation, calling it “Occam’s Razor”—the facts are what they look like, a clear abuse of governmental authority for political ends.

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2. FCC as Enforcer: Brendan Carr’s New Role

[13:12–17:58]

• Brendan Carr, previously a free speech defender and even a Trump critic, now acts as a highly effective enforcer of Trumpist media animus, using public statements and back-channel pressure, leaking letters to media, and even texting Stelter with celebratory memes about Kimmel’s removal.

• Carr frames his threats as “acting in the public interest,” but Miller notes his language now echoes that of “a Chinese government regulator… cracking down on images of Chairman Xi as Winnie the Pooh.”

• Stelter contextualizes this as a continuation of a pattern—starting with a December 2024 $15M settlement between ABC and Trump—of media companies capitulating incrementally to government pressure.

Brian Stelter:

“He is trying to use the press in this battle against the press… publicizing his letters, launching probes, and then telling Newsmax… This has continued to happen over and over again.” ([15:13])

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3. Corporate & Partisan Media Response

[17:58–22:01]

• Sinclair (conservative affiliate group) demands Kimmel apologize/donate to Kirk’s family and replace his timeslot with a tribute, turning news coverage into direct, partisan propaganda.
• Nexstar and Sinclair are racing to please Trump/Carr for pending business deals, highlighting the “kleptocracy/oligarchy” side of the story, not just free speech.

Brian Stelter:

“It seems to me… Nexstar and Sinclair are almost competing about who can slather more affection onto Trump and Carr right now. It’s a game of one-upmanship…” ([20:40])

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4. Is This Orbanism or Russia-Level Authoritarianism?

[24:47–28:03]

• Stelter draws detailed parallels between Trump’s tactics and Viktor Orbán’s playbook in Hungary: undercut public broadcasting, use regulatory power to pressure/consolidate private media, punish opponents, and reward loyalists.
• However, Stelter notes, the U.S. media system is more robust, with new platforms and an “explosion of freedom” in podcasts, YouTube, and Substack—if old media companies can't withstand pressure, talent will migrate.

Brian Stelter:

“What President Trump has done is… the kind of behavior we saw out of this strongman in Hungary. Now we know what happened there—democratic backsliding, authoritarianism. But there’s also tremendous freedom in new media here in the U.S.” ([26:15])

• Both Miller and Stelter express cautious optimism: backlash or creative realignment may emerge from overreach.

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5. Corporate Calculus and Chilling Effects

[29:29–35:56]

• Discussion of Disney’s (Iger’s) logic: get out of broadcast TV if regulation and pressure become too great; but Miller notes that government tentacles reach into every corner of U.S. corporate life now.
• Ominous short-term acquiescence could embolden longer-term assaults on corporate independence and artistic speech.
• Debate about growing “chilling effect,” where journalists and execs self-censor or over-caveat out of fear, not just principle.

Brian Stelter:

“The air temperature has changed, but it’s not so dramatic that we need to put on a coat. It’s a change of degrees, not a total transformation—at least not yet.” ([34:33])

Stelter’s Maxim:

“You’ve got to use your rights or you lose your rights. That’s where we are. That’s where guys like Kimmel are.” ([35:37])

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6. JVL: Why This Is “A Bigger Deal Than People Realize”

[38:21–41:24]

• JVL identifies “governmental coercion” as the Rubicon-crossing issue—bold, open government pressure on media, not cancel culture but state repression in plain sight.

JVL:

“The key point… is governmental coercion. The head of the FCC telling people with mergers before his board what they will have to do—saying, ‘We want the affiliates to act in this way,’ telling ABC they can do this the easy way or the hard way. That’s just a crazy thing to say out loud.” ([39:53])

• The suspension is happening openly, not in the shadows, which is both “helpful” in that it’s obvious and dangerous in illustrating how far things have slipped.

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7. Asymmetry, Bad Faith, and Created Stories

[41:24–54:58]

• JVL and Miller discuss the double standard: right-wing figures (like VP J.D. Vance) get away with open fabrication (“creating stories”) while any minor misstep or edge-case by liberals is seized upon.
• Vance, on Fox News, claims “Joe Biden’s FBI was investigating Charlie Kirk” and hints that “the networks that motivated, inspired, and maybe even funded Kirk’s murder” should have been investigated instead, with no evidence or pushback ([48:06]).
• Meanwhile, the media environment treats MAGA lies as “just politics” but laser-focuses on “lefty” influencers’ transgressions, perpetuating the imbalance.

JVL:

“Regular order has broken down… The media keeps acting as if things like J.D. Vance’s open admissions don’t need to be baked into every story, but they are willingly being manipulated.” ([46:28])

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8. Dark Thoughts: Should the Pro-Democracy Side Counterfight Dirty?

[56:16–61:16]

• Should liberals counter with their own misinformation or asymmetric warfare, given the rewards conservatives reap for the tactic? Both agree, on principle, to tell the truth, but recognize that the “market” does not punish right-wing fabrication and does punish liberal misstatements.

Tim Miller:

“Let the lie into the world, but not through me. I need that for sleeping at night… Still, if a bunch of people are running around muddying the water, what if that’s actually helpful politically?” ([57:25])

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9. Notes of Optimism: Backlash and Shifting Norms

[63:14–65:45]

• Miller relates a barstool podcast clip where even conservative-adjacent hosts mock MAGA overreach. JVL finds the possibility of a cultural backlash “a reasonably positive indicator.”

JVL:

“The fact that some of the non-politically aligned, but culturally conservative people… are like, ‘Jeez, that’s not what I’m into.’ That’s a reasonably positive indicator.” ([65:45])

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Brendan Carr, FCC head, on Benny Johnson Show:
  “We can do this the easy way or the hard way. Companies can… take action on Kimmel, or… there’s going to be additional work for the FCC… We license broadcasters, and they risk fines or license revocations if they keep running content that’s a pattern of news distortion.” ([08:29])
• Brian Stelter:
  “Carr is trying to use the press in this battle against the press… He’s trying to use government powers in new ways to probe, to some would say harass, media companies Trump doesn’t like.” ([13:28])
• Tim Miller:
  “This is not cancel culture—it’s state repression. It’s an order from the government.” ([40:27])
• JVL:
  “The key point is governmental coercion… None of this is behind closed doors. It’s all just open. Which, in a way, is helpful, but also shows how far down the path we are.” ([39:53])
• Brian Stelter:
  “You’ve got to use your rights or you lose your rights.” ([35:37])
• Jonathan V. Last:
  “Regular order has broken down… Media keeps acting like all is normal, but it’s not. We’re being manipulated.” ([46:28])
• Miller, on possible backlash:
  “Some of this stuff is so clownish that there’s going to be a backlash… it’s so hackish. These big media companies might just be speed running their own decline, which is already happening.” ([28:03])

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Suspension & Media Pressure Facts – 02:38–09:53
• Brendan Carr/FCC Pressure Campaign – 13:12–17:58
• Sinclair & Nexstar Response, Corruption – 17:58–22:01
• Orbanism & Democratic Backsliding – 24:47–28:03
• Chilling Effects & Media Corporate Dynamics – 29:29–35:56
• JVL Segment: State Repression, Asymmetry – 38:21–41:24
• FAKE/Misinfo Double Standard – 41:24–54:58
• Should Pro-Democracy Folks “Fight Dirty” Too? – 56:16–61:16
• Optimism and Backlash Signs – 63:14–65:45

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Conclusion

This episode of The Bulwark Podcast presents a stark warning about the open, government-driven repression of dissenting media, using the Kimmel suspension as a vivid inflection point. It contextualizes the threat historically and comparatively, and debates just how long independent media—legacy or new—can hold out under such pressure. While the mood is largely grave, hosts and guests acknowledge areas of resilience and hope: creative outmigration, potential cultural backlash, and a determination not to match lies with lies.

A must-listen for anyone concerned about American democracy and the perilous state of free speech in a rising illiberal era.

Transcript

[Tim Miller]

You're listening to Leaffilter Radio and the guru of gutter protection himself, Chris Counahan is here to take your most pressing leaf related questions. Hey everybody, Chris here. I understand we have Ron on the line.

[JVL]

Ron, where are you calling from?

[Tim Miller]

Uh oh Ron, are you calling from a ladder?

[Brian Stelter]

Well I was, I wanted to ask Chris what I need to do to get my gutters ready to have leaffilter installed.

[JVL]

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[Brian Stelter]

So I didn't need to get on this ladder.

[JVL]

Ron, Leaffilter trusted pros are in your neighborhood and ready to help. Just visit leaffilter.comday to schedule your free gutter inspection and get up to 30% off.

[Brian Stelter]

Thank goodness.

[Tim Miller]

What was that site? That's leaffilter.com day for your free gutter inspection today. See representative for warranty details. Promotion is 20% off plus a 10% senior or military discount. One discount per household. Hey everybody, it's Tim. We had a little change of calendar today. Had a, a funny lefty that I wanted to chat with that hopefully we'll be back on soon, you know, to bring a little balance to Joe Manchin. What a sweet. I mean he's frustrating, I get it but I don't know, 78 year old white guy wanting to go with me to knock on the door of a guy with a confederate flag outside. I don't know. I'll take him up on that. Maybe that we should do Tim and Tim and Joe on the road. I don't know, we'll see how the ratings are for that. So instead we had big news with the Jimmy Kimmel firing. Chilling news and we have a little double header for you. I wanted to get Brian Stelter on because he's the best sourced person on all this media reporter at cnn. So he's up first and we're going to talk about what he's hearing from sources as well as the implications of the Kimmel suspension. I guess right now it's an indefinite suspension so we'll see. And then in segment two, JVL wrote a banger of a newsletter late, late last night on this and I want to talk to him about some of the kind of broader implications of the firing. So it is going to be a good one. Stick around for both. Up next, Brian Stelter. Hello and welcome to the Bulwark Podcast I'm your host, Tim Miller. Delighted to welcome back chief media analyst at cnn. His books include Network of Lies and Top of the Morning. It's br. How you doing, Brian?

[Brian Stelter]

Other than a lack of sleep, I'm doing well.

[Tim Miller]

Okay. I was wondering. So we brought you in, obviously, because of the big news yesterday with Disney folding to pressure from the administration and suspending Jimmy Kimmel and his show indefinitely over a joke that we can get into, whether or not it was even factual or inappropriate at all. But just the fact that this pressure is happening, I think is the biggest news.

[Brian Stelter]

Yes.

[Tim Miller]

Before we get into all the details, I'm just kind of wondering what your top line reactions are. What's happening in your inbox? How chilling is this to people?

[Brian Stelter]

This feels like the worst case scenario to a lot of people. Yes, to comedians like Jimmy Kimmel, but also to other entertainers, other forms of media stars out there in the ecosystem, and then separating Kimmel the comedian from the free press. This is also very chilling to many journalists who work at abc, who work at other companies who are feeling that pressure indirectly from the Trump administration. So in some ways, Tim, I feel like we're talking about a situation. If you imagine a building, we're in an elevator and we're going down floors, we're going down floor by floor. And maybe back in December when ABC settled with Trump and made that lawsuit go away by paying his future presidential library, we were several floors higher than we are today. This elevator continues to move downward pretty rapidly.

[Tim Miller]

I want to get more into the meta stuff, but just for folks who haven't followed this minute by minute, I just want to get into the facts here of what happened. First, the joke that sparked all of this, it sparked the pushback from MAGA world, it sparked the pushback from the head of the fcc, Brendan Carr was Jimmy Kimmel on Monday night talking about the MAGA reaction to the Kirk assassination. I just want to play a clip from it. We had some new lows over the.

[JVL]

Weekend with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and doing everything they can to score political points from it. In between the finger pointing, there was grieving.

[Tim Miller]

On Friday, the White House flew the.

[JVL]

Flags at half staff, which got some criticism. But on a human level, you can.

[Tim Miller]

See how hard the President is taking this. My condolences on the loss of your friend Charlie Kirk. May I ask, sir, personally, how are you holding up over the last day.

[Brian Stelter]

And a half, Sir?

[Tim Miller]

I think very good. And by the way right there you.

[Brian Stelter]

See all the trucks. They've just started construction of the new.

[Tim Miller]

Ballroom for the White House, which is.

[Brian Stelter]

Something they've been trying to get, as you know, for about 150 years.

[Tim Miller]

And it's going to be a beauty.

[JVL]

Yes, he's at the fourth stage of grief.

[Tim Miller]

Construction, demolition, construction.

[JVL]

This is not how an adult grieves the murderer of someone he called a friend.

[Tim Miller]

This is how a four year old mourns a goldfish. Now what you see from Carr and for a bunch of others on the right is, is them claiming that, that Kimmel was blaming the assassination on MAGA or saying that the shooter was maga. I don't really hear it that way. And also, again, it's important to say this. This came out Monday night. So it was before the text messages have come out that kind of gave us a little bit more insight into what the shooter's motivations are. I've been very anti people putting out false information about what we know about Utah. I don't even really think this qualifies as that. What do you make of just like the actual merits of the complaint?

[Brian Stelter]

The video clip also sounds different than the text. So if you read the words that are, that are, you know, in an article, you might think that Kimmel was out on a limb a little bit. When you listen to the clip that you just played, it's pretty clear that he was making a straightforward observation about the political environment. It is true that MAGA media figures were out there in recent days basically saying, he's not one of us, he's not one of us. That's true. And the facts have also pointed toward that reality. Although Kimmel was speaking on Monday night before the documents came out and the text messages came out on Tuesday. So there's a lot to that. But I almost think that's beside the point.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, same.

[Brian Stelter]

This is not actually about anything Kimmel said about Charlie Kirk's alleged killer.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah. And frankly, even if it was a lie, like even was the lie. Right. Like the government should not be in the business of bullying corporations into firing people because they said something non factual about their boss. I mean like there's been plenty of examples of this throughout, throughout history. Plenty of the right. It's not as if there's no right wings. Greg Gutfeld has never said something inaccurate about Joe Biden. Biden or about Barack Obama. Right. As the inverse was true. There would be outrage if they were pressuring him to fire him. So I want to go through, I think the other fact pattern here that's important, which is like the underlying corruption angle here and what the real motivations are here. To your point, obviously, Trump has been on his high horse about going after these late night comedians because he's 79 years old. So he's in the demographic of caring about what the late night network comedians say. He's been going after all of them for a while now. And then in addition to that, there has also been another merger case. This is very similar to what we saw with cbs. I'm going to run through this. This breakdown actually come from your colleague Jake Tapper. So shout out to Jake. But the nexstar Media Group, which is the owner of the local TV stations, owner of a bunch of local TV stations that air abc, they have an intention to purchase their biggest rival, Tegna, which owns a bunch of other local stations. It's a $6.2 billion deal. The problem is there's a cap on the percentage of stations that that one company can own. Right. And this would take them over the cap. Carr had said, the FCC had said to be open to approve the merger even though it's over the cap. And then yesterday, head of the fcc, Brendan Carr went on Benny Johnson show and criticized Kimmel's comments about the Kirk assassination. Let's play that. I mean, look, we can do this the easy way or the hard way. These companies can find ways to change conduct, to take action, frankly, on Kimmel or, you know, there's going to be additional work for the fcc. Again, there's actions that we can take on licensed broadcasters. And frankly, I think that it's really sort of past time that a lot of these licensed broadcasters themselves push back on Comcast and Disney and say, listen, we are going to preempt, we are not going to run Kimmel anymore until you straighten this out. Because we, we licensed broadcaster are running the possibility of fines or license revocations from the FCC if we continue to run content that ends up being a pattern of news distortion. All right, so there he is. He's laying it all out. He's saying that these local individual stations should speak out. Nexstar did that hours later. Then ABC suspends Kimmel and then Brenda Carr emails you with a gif celebrating. So, like that's the rundown. When you play it out like that, it's very clear what is happening here. This is the government pressuring once again, just like the CBS case, the government pressuring a corporation that wants a merger approved to stifle any opposition speech in order to get in the good graces of the leader. Right.

[Brian Stelter]

And this is easier and cleaner than let's say the Stephen Colbert cancellation, you know, because over the summer when CBS canceled the Late show, it said there were financial pressures and, and it wasn't about political pressure. A lot of Colbert fans doubt that and they're right to be skeptical. But there was a real backstory about the financial situation of late night tv and there wasn't something so explicit and so sudden from the FCC tournament. But in this case, because we have Carr on tape saying we can do this the easy way or the hard way. And then within a matter of hours, ABC doing the easy thing and pulling Kimmel's show. It is a very clear case. It's a little bit of an Occam's Razor situation. We can make more complex and talk about more of the backstory. But I think as Americans read about this and they process it, the fact pattern is what it is. And that's what maybe makes this so newsworthy and so notable to so many people.

[Tim Miller]

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[Brian Stelter]

The office.

[Tim Miller]

Every time. I have like a millennial brain warp where I always invert those things on this fucking show. Anyway, in the office he sends you them doing the raise the roof thing. So you've got a Jeff relations talk to us about this guy.

[Brian Stelter]

Yeah, I'll go back in time a little bit. That's what I love about being able to talk with you and have more than just a few minutes of TV airtime to break this down. I've known Carr for about a year. I met him at a dinner. We exchanged numbers. He was just the lonely conservative on the FCC during the Biden administration when Jessica Rosenwortzel was the FCC chairwoman. And Rosenwerzel, just like all of her predecessors, she ran the FCC talking about net neutrality and open Internet and trying to erase digital divide and expand broadband. That's the FCC's focus normally. But once Trump was reelected and Carr was handpicked by Trump as the chairman, Carr really changed. He became a very clear MAGA media star. He signaled that he wanted to use the FCC's power in new ways. He basically aligned himself with Trump's anti media rhetoric and has repeatedly used the powers of the fcc, which are quite limited, but use the powers of the FCC to investigate, to probe to some would say even harass media companies that Trump doesn't like. Now, of course, he would frame it very differently and he has said this to me, it's about the public interest. He is trying to use the FCC's powers to review the public airwaves and make sure stations are operating in the public interest. That's his framing. But I want to take you back to last December, because last December is when ABC settled with Trump, right? The $15 million payment. That was arguably the first example of media capitulation. And all the rest has followed since. That settlement was the sign of what was going to come. And then a week later, what did Carr do? It was right before Christmas. And I remember he called me or he texted me one or the other, and he had a letter that he wanted to share with me. It was a letter to Disney CEO Bob Iger. He had decided he wanted to put some pressure on Iger over. I'm looking at the article now because I don't remember exactly what it was about. It was about a battle between the ABC network and some of its affiliates. And he wanted to use that very narrow battle to advance some broad points about the state of the industry and to signal that he was going to wield a heavy hand. So think about this, right? He's not only sending the letter to Iger, he's also leaking it basically to cnn, making sure that it gets publicity. And I wanna recognize the role of media reporters like yours truly in this. He is trying to use the press in this battle against the press. And he's done that very effectively. He's done that repeatedly by publicizing his letters, by launching probes, and then telling Newsmax about the probes. This has continued to happen over and over again. And when it comes to his gift from the office, he was texting me about nexstar, the big station group deciding to yank Kimmel. And I said, well, you know, ABC has yanked him nationwide now. And so his response was to send that gift from the office.

[Tim Miller]

And you've dealt with a lot of government officials in these sorts of stories as a media reporter, regulators, et cetera, over the years. And he's tweeting yesterday, jimmy, Blackface Kimmel's behavior is the problem. And he's sending you razor roof gifts. And it's like he is not really, I don't think, even trying to, to. A lot of times in the past, if you had government officials that were going after organizations that were of different political ideologies, right? Organizations that were against what administration might put forth, they would cloak it in some kind of broader principle or some ideological motivation. He doesn't really even seem to be doing that. This is just pure power politics. And he's trying to intimidate, I think.

[Brian Stelter]

He would say, you know, just to play devil's advocate Just for fun.

[Tim Miller]

No, please, no, please.

[Brian Stelter]

Let me read his post from Thursday morning here. From this morning, he said, I'm glad to see that many broadcasters are responding to their viewers as intended. Broadcasters have always had the right to not air national programs they believe are inconsistent with the public interest. So he is using government language. He's dressing up Trump's war with socialist government language in government legalese and saying, well, we're the fcc. We license local stations to be in the public interest. So he is cloaking it, at least in a way that sounds like a government regulator. And maybe that was what makes him so effective. You know, President Trump just posts on Truth Social about hating Comcast and wanting its licenses revoked. Comcast doesn't actually have most of the NBC's Asian licenses. They're owned by other companies. Brennan Carr gets all the nuance. He gets how the system actually works.

[Tim Miller]

And he sounds kind of like a Chinese government regulator when he's talking about that. A little bit like cracking down on images of Chairman Xi as Winnie the Pooh or something. But it is a big change. Another, we've been following Sinclair for quite a while, but I'm sure some listeners are familiar with that. But if you're not, Sinclair is another one of these owners of a lot of local networks. Their response to this yesterday was truly like batshit insane. As from another planet, Sinclair puts out a press release saying that Kimmel's suspension is not enough. They called upon Kimmel to issue a direct apology to the Kirk family. They called on Kimmel to make a meaningful personal donation to the family and to Turning Point usa. They announced that on during the Jimmy Kimmel time slot, they're going to air a special remembrance of Charlie Kirk. I mean, this is, this is batshit. I did that. I may have dozens of stations across the country and if you have nexstar, one of the other biggest local TV affiliates, clearly sidling up to the administration and then you have Sinclair doing like Newsmax style propaganda. This is a pretty alarming state of affairs as far as local TV news is concerned.

[Brian Stelter]

It's also red America's TV news versus blue America's TV news. You know, Sinclair has been well known to have conservative owners, to have Republican owners. You know, that's always been clear back to my days growing up going to school in Baltimore at Towson University. Sinclair was right up the road. And there was a controversy, you know, 20 years ago about what Sinclair was or was not airing on its local stations about the war in Iraq. So this does go way back back in 2016, I remember Sinclair's chairman had a meeting with Trump and he says, he said to Trump then, we are here to deliver your message. So that infamous quote kind of betrays Sinclair's agenda. Yes, it does have a pro Trump bent. Even though there's lots of journalists working at local Sinclair stations just trying to report the news. I think it is fair for listeners and viewers to wonder about the objectivity of Sinclair stations and nexstar stations, given what we are seeing play out in real time. But you know, these are mostly stations that operate, that exist in smaller communities, in smaller cities, most of the bigger markets, the big CITIES in the U.S. the bluer areas, you know, they are stations that are actually owned by Disney or Comcast or other big, bigger companies. So I do think we're seeing this red blue divide in some of the reactions here in terms of how the station owners are reacting. But most importantly, Tim, this does have to do with Sinclair and nexstar having business before the government. Right nextar, as we talked about, as you described from from Tapper's thread, nexstar is desperate to get a deal done with Tegna. It needs Brendan Carr's blessing. It actually needs Brendan Carr to rewrite the regulations altogether to allow it to grow as big as it wants to grow. This is no ordinary mega mer the SEC to rewrite the rules. So it seems to me as an observer, nexstar and Sinclair are almost competing about who can slather more affection onto Trump and Carr. Right now. It's like they're trying to one up each other. Nexstar was the first to announce that it condemned Kimmel. Then Sinclair said, that's not enough. We want Kimmel to donate money to tpusa. You know, it's almost like a game of one upsmanship who can curry the most favor with Trump and Carr.

[Tim Miller]

I mean, we're just, I guess we're on a space race to see who can be Sputnik, the TV channel faster in Russia. I mean, like really, I mean, covering the Charlie Kirk funeral, sure, of course it's a news event like do airing a tribute to Charlie Kirk in place of normal programming to like troll Jimmy Kimmel and to troll the left. And that is crazy. Like that is just straight propaganda.

[Brian Stelter]

I don't think Ariana tributed Kirk is crazy. I think putting it in Kimmel's time slot on a Friday night is the troll, right? That is the tell. That's the tell right there. Replacing Kimmel's show with the tribute is the tell.

[Tim Miller]

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[Brian Stelter]

Well, first, what's different? The US Is a much bigger, more prosperous country than Hungary. You know, we're not a landlocked Eastern European country. But that said, when Viktor Orban came to power in 2010, he consolidated control over the media in Hungary. He muzzled independent media voices. He started and I've talked with scholars who lived at firsthand. I talked with a member of the Hungarian Parliament about this in order to understand what the playbook was, because I think it's very similar to what we're seeing now in the US and it started with weakening public broadcasting. Of course, we know PBS and NPR have been defunded here in the US So the parallels start right there. First, go after public broadcasting, take the teeth out of public broadcasting. But beyond that, there was an effort in Hungary to weaponize the levers of government for party gain, to pressure privately owned media companies to toe the line, in some cases to take over those privately owned media companies, to have friends and allies of Orban become the owners of those companies, and then to punish the owners who still resisted with investigations, with tax penalties, et cetera. At the same time, you reward the ones who acquiesce. And that's a big part of what we've seen in the US Celebrating and cheering for Fox News, for example, putting lots of guests onto Fox and giving Fox every advantage is something we've seen out of the Trump White House. So the parallels, they are plentiful and frankly, there's more of them as time goes on. There are more parallels here between Hungary and the US and the media control than there were three or six months ago. I talked to a Hungarian member of parliament, former member of Parliament, overnight, and he said personally targeted campaigns and character assassinations were the lifeblood of Orban's. Regime. They demonstratively raised the cost of speaking up and speaking out. Now what does that sound like? That sounds like targeting Jimmy Kimmel, hoping he would be fired. Everything President Trump has done through social is the kind of behavior we saw out of this strongman in Hungary. Now we know what happened in Hungary. Democratic backsliding, a much more authoritarian form of government. But, but I think we should also recognize how incredibly free the American media is. Like here we are talking on these new platforms and here's what my gut says, Tim. And I admit I'm only on a few hours of sleep. I have not fully processed the Kimmel news yet.

[Tim Miller]

Great, let's do it. Let's do optimism.

[Brian Stelter]

If these old fashioned, old line media companies cannot stand a bit of pressure from the President, then talent's gonna leave, journalists are gonna go launch startups, they're gonna create more substacks and they're gonna start more YouTube live streams. You know, the likes of Jimmy Kimmel are go out and probably become even wealthier and more popular with new products. And that's thanks to the miracle of the Internet. You know, right now we do not see, we are not in an environment where what you and I are doing right now is threatened. What we do see threatened are broadcast stations. We see the threats are real. I'm not claiming they're not, right? President Trump suing the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. There are real threats against these old line media companies, including the one I work for. But I'm struck by the amount of that exists in that startup world, on the live streams, in the podcasting space. And I think for every moment, like a Kimmel suspension, more of that energy moves to new platforms. Do you think I'm wrong?

[Tim Miller]

No. It's funny you say that because I was thinking this last night and I was like, I have a strange optimism. I mean, look, I'll just do the dark first. Garry Kasparov, on the Russia flag side of things, tweeted an early Putin sign of despotism was having the puppet show Kukli shut down. So it's not as if there isn't some press precedent for, for this. And, and I think that I like you. The threats are real. It is, it is aspiring fascism and authoritarianism. I just do wonder, like, the backlash. One of my friends sent me a, a flyer that was being posted around la. There's a picture of Jimmy Kimmel and kind of like one of the old Doge meme formats with like the little, little quotes around him where it's like really this guy, like the guy with the corny dad jokes, you're scared of him, you know, and I don't, I don't know. And we'll see kind of what happens in bro podcaster world. But this is so mockable and I think it's really, it's scary. The Sinclair stuff really scares me. The ability to crack down on local media really scares me. But I do kind of think that there's going to be a backlash to this. I really do. And it's so hackish. And I think that there is a little bit of a silver lining here. And like you said, these big media companies might just be speed running their own decline, which is already happening. And we're right here, we're not scared. I'm not scared. Plenty of people are not scared. You can subscribe right here on our very YouTube feed. And for now, I don't know, I think that you can see pushback forming for sure.

[Brian Stelter]

I was really struck by something LA Times media reporter Steven Battaglio said on Anderson Cooper show last night. He said, maybe these media companies just gonna have to get out of the broadcast TV business. And at first I said, what are you talking about? And then I thought, oh, that is exactly the right take at this moment. Because if you're Disney and you own theme parks and cruise lines and all the rest of it and your future is Disney, not your local stations, sell it. Then if you're facing this pressure from the Trump administration, spin it off, get out of the broadcast business. And I won't be shocked if we see more of those moves. If you view this, it's helpful to view this from the desk of Bob Iger, right? The Disney CEO who once wanted to run for president, who would have run as a Democrat. He's not a Trumper. What is he thinking? Why did he do this? Why is ABC doing this? Well, he does have short term business considerations. Obviously he's trying to find a path forward. I don't know if he can find it to bring Kimmel back. We'll see. But there is a logic to what he's done here, given the, you know, the monstrosity that is Disney. I mean, by the way, I'm planning my next Disney trip. You know, like most people, I have an affection for the brand. But I'm looking at this and I'm thinking, what are the upsides to owning ABC stations?

[Tim Miller]

Guy Brian, I have. This is, oh, I am, I actually.

[Brian Stelter]

Really want to go on a cruise.

[Tim Miller]

Oh no, that is my hell. The Hell is a dish Disney cruise. I'm trying to repent and be a good person in life so that in death I don't have to be on a, on an eternal Disney cruise. Okay, just really quick on the Iger thing. And then I have one other thing. And I know you're just so busy right now, but from I hear you on the executive, on what an executive perspective is here, and it's like, maybe, maybe, maybe we get out of the news business altogether. The problem is, man, this Trump administration, they're creeping into, they got tentacles going into all of your business, right? And like they're in Intel's business on chips. If I'm Disney and you're like, okay, we're pivoting to Disney, what if we launch a new Disney show that has a Trump spoof or has a black non binary mermaid or whatever, whatever it could be that would get the administration upset. That is why to me, I just think it's such a short term thinking to fold on something this stupid because they could come for something. Is that voice anywhere in media circles when you're talking to executive sources or is anybody saying, man, I feel like we're being too cowardly here. And it's, and it's opening, it's showing weakness and it's opening the door to even more pain.

[Brian Stelter]

Those sources are all over the place. Those executives are all over the place. They are privately struggling with this, although ultimately it's only a handful of people making the final decision. And that makes me think about Paramount, right? It makes me think about the CBS settlement by Shari Redstone's Paramount and now David Ellison's control of the new Paramount Skydance. You know what's been airing on Paramount that annoys President Trump? It's South Park. You know, south park was supposed to air last night. It's gonna be pushed back a week. But that says it's apparently the show's decision. They're running late getting the show episode ready. But David Ellison told me he loves South Park. He loves the show, he loves the creators. And so here's a guy who has been accused of capitulating to the President already, who may or may not have struck a secret side deal with Trump for public service announcements. And yet his network and streaming service continues to air south park, which is some of the most biting satire of Trump anywhere in America. So these are the push and pulls that exist. And I think all eyes are on figures like Ellison and Iger. Now. It really is a handful of these men, and they are mostly Men who are making these calls.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah. And Ellison hired a ombudsman who has no history in the media, who is nominated to be the Trump ambassador. It's very concerning. And I guess this is my last question for you because I think that, that there was a tweet from Julia Yaffe yesterday and it was a story about a Moscow newspaper and it was like, where's the line here? And they had a meeting early in the Putin era and they're like, how do we know what the line is? And how do we know how to avoid the line? And in the meeting, somebody said to the editor of the line, zigzag. So you don't know where it is. And the zigzagging line leads to this chilling effect. Right. Where people don't know what to do or say and they start to, they start to fold before pressure is even applied. And I just am wondering what your sense is on that whole, how widespread that chilling effect is now. Because one thing that comes to mind is I feel this way when I'm going on cable. I know you do. I see more now of reporters and anchors and people doing caveats that they don't really need to do. Trump's name is in the Epstein files. And then they say something like, now, that doesn't mean there's any wrongdoing. And I'm like, would they have said that a year or two ago or is that a CYA caveat? Right. Because Trump has been accused of wrongdoing in the absentee files. Doesn't mean he did it. But he has been accused. Right. And to me, I just, I feel like I see a chilling effect across the board. And I'm wondering if you're seeing that.

[Brian Stelter]

I think the temperature, the air temperature has changed, but it has not changed so dramatically that we suddenly need to put on a coat. I think it's a change of degrees. It's not, thankfully, as dramatic as that, at least not yet. Yes, I do notice some of the same behavior that you do. At the same time, precision is valuable and especially for journalists on television, being fair minded is critical. But as long as we see tough minded coverage as well, then we're still delivering what the audience needs and expects. And, and ultimately this is about the audience, Tim. Right. The audience has an expectation and obviously Sean Hannity's fans have a different expectation than yours. But majority of the country wants to actually be informed about what's going on with the administration. They want to actually be informed and not just spun. So I come down on a day like today to that old line about how we've got to use your rights or you lose your rights. That's where we are. That's where guys like Kimmel are right now. You use your rights or you lose your rights. I doubt he'll be back on abc, but I'm hopeful that there will be many other possible homes for him. Hopeful, but I'm not sure. I mean, that's one of the questions I asked in my newsletter this morning. Will streamers like Netflix take a risk on someone like Colbert or Kimmel in this political environment? And my gut says yes, but I don't know. I don't think any of us know.

[Tim Miller]

Well, Jimmy, I can't pay Disney money, but you're welcome on the bulwark YouTube anytime. All right, so give me a call.

[JVL]

There it is.

[Tim Miller]

A couple of your friends got my number. Brian Stelter, you gotta go. Thank you for jumping on on a busy morning. Appreciate it.

[Brian Stelter]

Thank you. Thanks.

[Tim Miller]

Hey, everybody. We are going on the road this fall and I want to see you. Sadly, our Toronto tickets have already sold out, so I'm plotting a return to Canada. You guys just wait on that. But there's still tick left for our events in Washington, D.C. and New York City in October. Come join me, Sarah jvl, for two nights of camaraderie and joy and resistance and podcasting and maybe some special guests at the D.C. event. We might give a big middle finger to the masked agents of Donald Trump that are roaming the city's free streets. And we'll be back in New York a couple times later. First time we've been in New York in ages. The last time we had a live New York event, it was, I can remember because it was during the Nuggets title run. And me and a handful of the folks who came out went and watched Jamal Murray, like, put up 40, I think on the Lakers after the podcast was quite enjoyable. Maybe we'll have a similar night. We'll see. And if you really want more time with us and you don't want to just place a bet that you'll end up at the same bar with me after. Because you never know. You could pay for VIP tickets. They're included in the sale. It'll give you earlier entry into the show and you can hang with us for an intimate Q and A. You can check out all the details and get [e-mail] events. For more, that's thebullwerk.com events. See you all on the East Coast. Hey, everybody. We are back with a Bulwark editor, author of the triad newsletter jvl. Sign up for his fucking newsletter. If you haven't, My God, go to the bulwark.com subscribe. It's the best one in the business. And he wrote one last night, late night. I was in bed. I'm, I'm an hour behind you and I was already asleep before it published. So, you know, you were just working. Burning the midnight oil. It's titled first they came for Jimmy Kimmel. You posted on the substack notes. This is a bigger deal than people realize. We just kind of went through all the particulars of Brian Stelter, but give us contextualize this for us. Why is this a bigger deal than people realize in your view?

[JVL]

Well, this is somebody on one of the social platforms just a couple days after Trump, Trump was sworn in said, you know, a pretty good barometer of our slide will be whether or not late night comedians who are critical of Trump are still on the air. Like, well, two of the three are down. We're nine months and two of the three are down.

[Tim Miller]

Some blues. I've done some blue sky slander on this very podcast over the, over the weeks and months, so credit where due. Shout out to anonymous blue sky user for nailing it center bullseye.

[JVL]

So although I suppose you, you could say that it's only half because there are still both Seth Meyers and Jimmy Fallon left.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah.

[JVL]

So maybe it's only 50% of 66% and Greg Gutfeld. So that's not great. The key point of this is governmental coercion. Right. And that, that is what, you know, I, I would say during the great cancel culture freakout. I would, you were typically, I would think on the, the like, you know, hey, free speech. We got to stop this. You didn't like this. And I was just like, I don't know, this is like social shame stuff happening. And like there.

[Tim Miller]

You love social shame. See, this is the difference between us and our status as Catholics. You know, both cradle Catholics. You stuck around a little longer than I did because the shame part appeals. I get it.

[JVL]

I love it. It's one of my kinks.

[Tim Miller]

I like a little social stigma. It's just, it kind of went a little overboard for me. You know, balance in all things for me.

[JVL]

Right. But so, you know, here you have the fcc, as you and Sam pointed out last night, night, you know, the head of the FCC going out and telling people who have mergers before his board what they will have to do, you know, saying, we want the people who are the affiliates? The local affiliates, which sounds like a mom and pop franchise, but isn't. But are large corporations. We want them to act in this way, telling ABC that they could either do this the easy way or the hard way. Which, again, is just a crazy thing to say out loud.

[Tim Miller]

David Frum put this, I think, quite well last night to your point that a lot of people are out there talking about, is this cancel culture? Like the barstool guy was talking. This isn't really. It isn't. Right. It's not comparing. We shouldn't be comparing it to cancel culture. Regardless of what your views were on this from. Put it this way, this is not cancel culture because it's not culture. It's state repression. It's an order from the government. Yeah. And that's really. And that, I guess, is the stakes here.

[JVL]

Here's the other thing. It's an open order. It's. None of this is being done behind closed doors. Right.

[Tim Miller]

It's.

[JVL]

It's not as if the FCC is saying we are totally fair and balanced and we are not going to put our thumbs and then quietly saying, fire Kimmel. Fire Kimmel. Fire Kimmel. Fire Kimmel. That's not happening. It's. It's just open. Which in a way is helpful to us, I think, but also shows how much further down the. The path we are. And that's why I said I think this is pretty dark stuff because, like, I just. I don't know how you wind up going back from this sort of thing.

[Tim Miller]

We'll get to that at the end on whether we can go back from it or not. The other thing you got into in your newsletter is the asymmetry, one of your favorite topics and you know, the different standards that are being set and whether, you know, you should even take critics coming from the MAGA right on this sort of stuff in good faith at all, like whether we should even consider their arguments. Right. And I got into this with Brian. But like, like in this case in particular, even on the merits, he didn't even say anything untrue. I wouldn't even say that he said anything inappropriate. Actually, I should bring this up. I didn't have time to get to it. But I do want to read this for folks. Here was Kimmel the night after the Kirk assassination. He said this. I've seen a lot of extraordinarily vile responses to this from both sides of the political spectrum. Some people are cheering this, which is something I won't ever understand. We had another school shooting yesterday in Colorado, the hundredth one of the year, with all these terrible things happening, you would think that our president would at least make an attempt to bring us together. So when he was doing his earnest bit, that's where he was. He was doing exactly what the right wing shamers wanted people to do. Right. Which is tamp down the rhetoric. And then in this joke, he's kind of technically accurate. Right. So in this case, obviously it's not good for faith. But. But you make the point that like even in the other efforts to try to tamp down speech around Kirk, even in the cases where, where the person did say something wrong, it's like, why should we listen to these critics based on what, How MAGA has acted and how the President and the Vice President have acted.

[JVL]

Yeah, I mean, so. So the legal system is grappling with the fact that regular order has broken down, which means that basically, if you are a judge and a lawyer who is an officer of the court represents something to you, you can take their word for it because they're a sworn officer of the court. They can't walk into your chambers and say, sir, yes, we got your order and we complied with it when they secretly haven't complied with it.

[Tim Miller]

Right.

[JVL]

Because. And the reason you have regular order is because if the judge has to independently verify every representation made to him by both counsels, every case would take a million years. Right. So regular order is breaking down because the government can no longer be trusted. And this has happened a bunch of times in a bunch of different cases, most famously in Kilmar Abrego Garcia case where the government has come in and said one thing to be true and it's just been a lie.

[Tim Miller]

A knowing lie.

[JVL]

A knowing lie. A knowing lie. Right. Not a mistake. And that's the difference. Right. It isn't like, you know, oh, the government said something but was wrong. They said, we filed it, but then they forgot to file it. That's not, not. That's not what we're talking about. So that same thing has happened in the media, and the media doesn't understand it. Like regular order has broken down. And so, you know, the places like CNN and NBC, they're just like, you know, and here's J.D. vance says, X as if you can trust what J.D. vance says. And I just don't understand that. I, I went back, I got real talked up about this last night because I was thinking about the eating of the cats and the dogs in Springfield Field. And if you remember this almost exactly a year ago, actually, this all happened in September of 2024.

[Tim Miller]

That cannot be true. Yeah, it's only been a year.

[JVL]

A year and a week. A year and a week old. Literally a year and a week. Okay, so, you know, so Trump is at the debate with Kamala Harris and he is by the moderator, David Moir. He is asked to basically set up like, hey, you said this thing about people eating cats and dogs and it's not true. Do you want to do cleanup on it? And Trump of course, just doubles down because that's what he does. And then we're fact checked him, then we got all that. And then a week later we get J.D. vance, who sits down with Dana Bash on CNN and he is asked about this and he's like, this is.

[Tim Miller]

We got the audio actually.

[JVL]

Oh, you do? Let's hear, let's hear our vice president. The American media totally ignored this stuff until Donald Trump and I started talking about cat memes if I have to.

[Brian Stelter]

But it wasn't just a meme.

[JVL]

Created stories so that the American media actually pays attention to the suffering of the American people. Then that's what I'm gonna do.

[Tim Miller]

Wow.

[JVL]

So like, I don't understand why this isn't the critical context for every single thing out of this guy's mouth. He said it, he admitted it. He said that he created stories and he is willing to create stories and that's what he's going to do. So, like, this is what I don't understand. Right. If you are, if you are NBC or Politico or anybody else who's, who's running a story and you include something by J.D. vance, talking about, you know, the terrible things that are happening isn't the necessary context. Oh, and this is a guy who has created false lies knowingly and has admitted to doing such and promised to do it again in the future. So we should all recognize that he's doing it again in order to work.

[Tim Miller]

You, in order to work the refs, in order to work the media, that was his rationale for doing it. Right. Like, I'm going to make up stories to manipulate you. And so if you are on the side that he's stated that he's trying to manipulate, you feel like you might need to at least not just accept the manipulation you might need to point that into context, you'd think, but that's.

[JVL]

Not a lot happening again. This is everybody's connection continuing to act as if regular order is still in effect. And it's just not. And you see it with what he said yesterday, right?

[Tim Miller]

Yeah. I have this too. So this is the prime example of this when it comes to creating stories in the context of Kirk. Right. And thinking about the fact that Kimmel is fired for this joke about the way that MAGA has reacted to Kirk. It's technically accurate. Maybe contextually wasn't as clear as it could have been, but it was a joke. Then you have the Vice President going on to Fox News in an interview with Jesse Waters, talking about the Kirk assassination and similar fallout. And I'm about to play this clip, but I think the important thing that I just want to bring up to your point of how we're not in regular order and how people are being manipulated. This clip we're about to play our guys who are working their ass off behind the scenes, by the way, Brenda and Jared at the Bulwark who are doing a lot of rapid response stuff for us and providing videos. They caught this and posted it. I haven't seen anybody else post it. And when you put it in the newsletter and I went back and looked at it, it had like 18 retweets like this. This is. The Vice President makes this statement about to play. It has no attention as compared to the whirlwind around the Jimmy Kimmel joke. No one is talking about this. Let's play it.

[JVL]

We know Joe Biden's FBI was investigating Charlie Kirk. Maybe they should have been investigating the.

[Tim Miller]

Networks that motivated, inspired, and maybe even.

[JVL]

Funded Charlie Kirk's murder. If they had, Charlie Kirk might be alive today.

[Tim Miller]

Charlie Kirk might be alive if Joe Biden's FBI had investigated the networks that inspired and maybe even funded his murder. I mean, there is no evidence for this. This is a created story. Like the Haitian cats and dogs. He's creating a story. This is pulled out of thin air. Like the idea that somebody maybe even funded Charlie Kirk's murder. That doesn't even make any sense. This guy is living in a small town in Utah with his transgender girlfriend, roommate in an apartment like, where's the money? He's using a single bolt action rifle. Like, what are you even talking about? Somebody funded this murder. This is a single person. And you have the evidence. You're the Vice President. You guys have the investigation. You're just fabricating a story to create division and to get people upset and to get people and to make an excuse for going after your political foes. That's what you're doing. You're doing it on a news program. And that is like, not even. That is so much worse, exponentially worse than what we saw out of Jimmy Kimmel, and it's happening from the Vice President.

[JVL]

Yeah. And here's the thing. I want to parse these things very, very finely, right. Nothing Jimmy Kimmel said was factually untrue.

[Tim Miller]

Right?

[JVL]

You just go back and go word by word like it, you know, it may have been misleading. It may not have been fully. You transparently context or theologically contextually accurate.

[Tim Miller]

Right.

[JVL]

But, but whatever. Like it was just true. If you're, if you're reading it like in a black letter here. J.D. vance, he does say maybe even funded. So he has given him some wiggle, right? He's just asking questions. But he does say the networks that motivated and inspired. So he is, he is stating as fact that there are networks which presumably he can identify then which did motivate and inspire the killer. That's just a lie. That isn't even like him making inferences to try to guide people. That's not like seeding conspiracy theories in the way that maybe even funded is. He is stating as facts fact that there are specific networks that motivated and inspired the guy. Okay, where, where are those? A lot of those in Utah, right? At his, at his, his, his technical college where there are a lot of.

[Tim Miller]

St. George, you know, I mean, liberal.

[JVL]

Bastions in, in the, the video game discords. Was that, is that those things that.

[Tim Miller]

Apparently he was in for like 2, 600 hours last year.

[JVL]

So again, the, the Vice President United States is, is doing the actual thing that MAGA and all the other people are insisting that all everybody else is doing, right? They're. They're doing the, the lying and making up. This is, I mean, it's not blood libel, but it's, it's pretty bad. I mean, it's near incitement.

[Tim Miller]

It's definitely incitement. Is it near incitement and what. Right. I mean, it's.

[JVL]

I don't know. I mean, incitement's a legal, a legal term. There's probably a legal definition for it.

[Tim Miller]

I mean, he's trying. Okay, maybe let's, let's get to. Right. I mean, he is trying to create a rationale for going after political foes, right? Like that's what he's doing. He's trying to create a story. He's fabricating a story to create a rationale to target political foes based on Charlie Kirk's assassination. That's what he's doing. Which is kind of what just kind of, by the way, what Jimmy Kimmel lists was making a joke that MAGA was doing. Honestly, like he's doing it anyway.

[JVL]

True.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah.

[JVL]

Two things I don't understand. The first is. So when I talk about asymmetry, how Republicans are allowed to get away with certain things and Democrats aren't allowed, when I say by allow, like, who's doing the allowing? And the. The answer is two groups, but the most important of which is voters, like just your normal people who are not partisans, like that soft 30% in the middle. They don't punish Republicans for any of like the. This sort of thing. They don't punish Republicans for eating the cats and dogs or you ought to inject yourself with bleach or any of that stuff. But they absolutely punish Democrats for so and so on. Blue sky said this terrible thing and they're a liberal. So I guess liberal cancel culture is really dangerous. Like, these are just the beliefs that are out there in the world, but you can't change. Like, I don't know how to change that. I don't know how to address that. Like, it. That just seems to be a fact of the world we live in. But the other is like the elites who are supposedly calling balls and strikes, you know, like just normal, normal actors in the media, they have really given in on all this stuff where just like. Well, I mean, Republicans just. That's just what they are, right? You know, they're. That's like. That's like complaining about a tornado. The tornado doesn't care. I mean, I'm not gonna.

[Tim Miller]

It is what it is.

[JVL]

Everybody understands that. That's, you know, tornado is going to tornado. But boy, you know, why. Why have Democrats have been doing some terrible things. Look at these array of screenshots from random people with names we can't identify from Twitter saying horrible, vile things about Charlie Kerry. It's like I, you know, the media is treating all this shit as if it's the same.

[Tim Miller]

Worse, worse. Here's the thing. Thing. Giving more attention to the rando lefties than to what the vice president is saying. Like I said, I mean, maybe we could challenge me. Somebody could send this in. Maybe somebody covered this clip somewhere on the nightly news. But I don't understand why this isn't a massive news story, why people aren't giving this more attention. And the vice President of the United States fabricated a rationale for the assassination of Charlie Carter with the intent of creating a pretext for going after his political foes. Like, that's what he did. It's as clear as day. He just created a fake story about what the motivations were of this assassination. And I don't think Anybody knows about that.

[JVL]

And he had previously admitted that he creates stories. That's the other. Like, again, if he hadn't already said, yeah, I created stories and I'll do it again. Like, then you could say, like, well, we're just trying to prove that he knowingly created, you know, then you could say like, oh, but we are caught in a world where he has, has admitted to. He's already copped to it and nobody cares.

[Tim Miller]

I care.

[JVL]

Nobody cares.

[Tim Miller]

I care.

[JVL]

You, you should bully. But I think people need to be.

[Tim Miller]

Bullied into covering this.

[JVL]

You see, you tell me if you see anybody anywhere else in the media mentioning J.D. vance's quote about if I have to create stories so that the American media actually pays attention to the suffering of the American people, then that's what I'm going to do. You tell me if you see that quote anywhere else, anywhere in the media.

[Tim Miller]

Today, or the quote about how he suggested the killer of Charlie Kirk might be funded by the left and there is no lefty politician that has said anything to that effect. Right. Like I think about the widespread outrage and by the way, way, I want the truth to be out there. So like we did this on the next level. I'm among the people who are like saying to like lefty influencers, please stop saying that this person, that these texts are fake or this person is maga. Like that is not true. And that's fine to say if that is not true, but he is. What JD Vance is saying is more irresponsible than the most crazed left wing influencer out there. I mean, he's literally from the power and from the perch of the vice presidency. See, suggesting that this assassin was a cog in some scheme by progressive groups.

[JVL]

Do you want to go to the bad place?

[Tim Miller]

Oh yeah, because I'm going to end in the good place.

[JVL]

Okay, so I sort of said this on Next level yesterday and I was like, I have some dark thoughts, but we were running out of time.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, great. Some of our fans had messaged me about this. They were upset, they wanted a follow up, so let's just do it for them.

[JVL]

Okay, well, here it is. Because I agree that we ought to be doing truthful things and saying the true things. That's what I do. That's how I want the world to work. But as an analytical matter, are we certain that it is politically advantageous to operate in that way? Which is to say, if a bunch of people are running around doing false flag theories and creating their own conspiracy theories and muddying the water, what if that's actually helpful politically. Again, not advocating. I'm just trying to look at it from an analytical perspective and say, what if the world we are living in right now actually punishes the side who is trying to be real strict about blah, blah, blah, and helps the side that has people in it who are muddying the waters and creating conspiracy theories?

[Tim Miller]

I hear that. If we're going to go here, I have a lot of thoughts about this, so I'm with you. I know you're just throwing that out there because. And there are various different layers. Like, on the one hand, I just, from a personal level, I'm in the let the lie into the world, but not through me. I need that for sleeping at night. And the reason that I am doing what I'm doing is because of this. We already ranted about this and it's very important to me. So I'm not going to do it. It's not.

[JVL]

Yeah, if you were going to live that way, you just would have gone maga.

[Tim Miller]

I would have just gone maga. Would have been a lot easier. I'd have a boat by know, you know, or at least a beach house. I'm not going to do it. And I just, my little insides are too, you know, are wound a little too tight on all this stuff. Okay, so that's me. Now to the broader question. I was on a democracy panel in Florida recently. Like, you know, one of these, like, what does the pro democracy movement do now? And like, this topic came up, this, like, very topic came up. And I was kind of making the point you were making that like, there's some benefit to playing asymmetric warfare back at them now. I also think we have to be judicious about that a little bit. Right. Like the case I was making was I think this was happening right after the airplane crashed at Reagan. And I was like, why not blame Sean Duffy for that? That's not like really like a direct lie. That's just like playing their game, right? That it's like, okay, anything that bad happened during the Biden administration, Biden got blamed for by Trump. So why doesn't anything that bad happen in the world during this time? Trump get blamed for? I think that is defensible and probably smart politics, frankly. I think that you reach a point where there is potential blowback. I think that because Trump narrowly won this last election, there are some people out there that say Trump wasn't punished for any of his worst behavior. I'm open to hearing that argument. I don't really strategically Believe that. I think that Trump benefited from some of his bad behavior. And I think that some of Trump's bad behavior actually cost him and that given how terrible Joe Biden's approval ratings were, the state of what we see throughout the world with challenging parties and the fact that he lost in 2020, like, I think he did some self sabotage. Like, I don't know, I think that like, if there were certain ways where Trump had made himself more acceptable to polite society, like just on the edges, they might have 56 senators right now. I mean, like, you know what I mean? Like they could have won, he could have won even bigger. Right. I think that, like he lost some ground from some gettable people in the suburbs, from some of his behavior, I guess I would say. And so I do. So I think that in certain cases, I do think a little self policing is important because if you just sort of let everybody's darkest angels loose, you end up, well, both darkening your soul and also potentially doing yourself strategic harm. And I saw some of that around some of the Kirk reaction, to be frank. So anyway, it's a layered reaction. Personal, strategic and then not being, not going so far into the dark place that you become counter strategic. What do you think of all that? I can see that.

[JVL]

And again, I'm where you are. I'm not going to do any of this myself, but I do, honestly, it does make me feel like, I don't know, should I personally, I'm not going to lie about any of this stuff. I'm going to be truth. I'm not going to do conspiracy theories. But should I get really torqued up over people who do? Because, you know, the, the responsible people on manga don't get torqued up over their president and vice president doing this sort of thing. Right. And, and that has been a real help to them. I think it has been helpful to them to have both like a regular, you know, regular political warfare and asymmetric political warfare arm.

[Tim Miller]

I'll give you a genuine answer to that. Should you get torqued up. Whether you get torqued up as a personal opinion, I think that there's some obligation that we have to folks that are listening right like that. Like I feel this to be at least like, hey, then that's what I did. Just when we talked about the text messages yesterday. Like I had a lot of people, like real people, not fucking bots, like real people in my life. Like texting like this seems like it might be fake or can we really trust cash? And I felt like it is my Obligation to them. Them as somebody that is like the person providing opinions. To say just bluntly, like, no, you know, I don't know. It was in the mind of the shooter and his girlfriend when they're texting. But, like, it's real. I mean, it's not just cash fabricating this. Like, I actually got a DM after we taped this from somebody. I don't want to expose them, but, like, they know a person that works for the county attorney in that county. And like, that person had to put their name, you know, and that person. I'm not going to say anything about what their politics are, but you know what I mean? Like. Like there's a practical element to this that you should. I don't want to put the gas pedal and send other people into the crazy place. So that's why. I totally agree. Get a little. That's why I care about this, I guess, is what I'm saying.

[JVL]

Yeah, you and I are aligned on this, but I guess what I'm saying.

[Tim Miller]

Is you don't want to go out there going like this bad.

[JVL]

You know, I ain't going to put on the hair shirt first.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, I hear that.

[JVL]

You know, like, and I sure am not going to do it while the Vice President of the United States is out there creating stories as he has admitted he has done in the past and promised to do in the future. Future, you know, like, if I will say all the true things. And I want, you know, my mission is always with our audiences. I try to help people be smarter and see around corners. Like, that's what I'm here to do. So I'm not going to swallow the whistle or anything, but I'm also not gonna. Not gonna lose my mind and descend into finger wagging, you know, like, okay, totally.

[Tim Miller]

I get it.

[JVL]

You know, that's the thing that's happening. Great.

[Tim Miller]

All right, let's close with this. For me, it's good news. I assume you're going to put a dark spin on it because that's just the nature. So I'm playing the role of Sarah here and you can play the JVL role. I saw a clip right before we came on, and it's from one of these. I've been spending more time in the manosphere. Okay. Just because I'm curious, like, what's happening? Like, what the reaction is. Are this. Are they ignoring it? Are they swallowing the whistle? Are they whatever. And there's a show on barstool, Kirk Minahane show, show. And I forget what the topic was, but I started following it more closely because dude is obviously a conservative dude, just in temperament. And some of his terminology he uses, let's just put it like that. But he went at Trump over something, I forget what it was. And so I started following. Then I saw it again today and on this clip and I said this to Stelter. I'm like, I do wonder if some of this stuff is so clownish that there's a backlash, that people are just like, clown. Come on. Like Jimmy Kimmel. Like really, like this is the threat. And here was the Kirk Minahan show from this morning. Let's play. I always do the left.

[JVL]

No, right now in 2025 at 1006.

[Tim Miller]

On September 18, the extreme right are.

[JVL]

The biggest group of that has ever existed in America.

[Tim Miller]

A bunch of.

[JVL]

Because people with, with green hair at Starbucks and because once in a while guy swam against girls, you fucking pussies.

[Brian Stelter]

Have broken in half.

[Tim Miller]

He goes on to go and gets into some internal inter barstool strife that it's not relevant for the podcast, but he's writing that in context. The Starbucks cup is in the context of. Some people were mad because they were going to Starbucks saying write Charlie Kirk's name on the cup and they wouldn't do it. And he's also talking about the Kimmel stuff. And I like, I don't know, is that there's maybe something, some salience there maybe.

[JVL]

I gotta say, I'm pretty shocked by that. I am really shocked by that. And that would be. Yeah, pleasantly. Because that's obviously the case.

[Tim Miller]

Right?

[JVL]

And the fact that some, some of the non politically aligned, but only sort of culturally aligned people like the, you know, the guys who want to be able to watch porn and you know, and, and want to be able to say pussy and all that stuff. And who thought that they were with the Republicans. The fact that some of them are like, geez, that's not what I'm into. That's. That's a reasonably positive indicator.

[Tim Miller]

A reasonably positive. Let's stop right there. That's the end of the podcast. A reasonably positive indicator. That's Jonathan Vlas. We'll be back tomorrow for another edition of the Bulwark Podcast. We'll see you all then. Peace.

[Jimmy Kimmel]

I hope they cancel me so I can go be with my family. I hope they crucify me. I hope they put me down. I hope they euthanize me. I hope I never ever have to go on tv. Jimmy Kimmel does not want to meet me. I told my manager no more parties in Los Angeles. Last night I fell deeper than Brockhampton down a rabbit hole did so much I won't never find my appetite on my way home I crashed into a satellite that's why my phone was obsolete for half the night that's why my door was ringing baby as of right now my job is to lie down I hope they cancel me why So I can go be with my family so I can quit wearing this mask dog tell the people kiss my dog I hope they cancel me so I can go be with my family so I can quit wearing this mask dog telling people kiss my dog look after tour I broke up with my girlfriend to a bunch of bunch of that I couldn't back then and yeah that was cool but now I'm empty as my room I guess my answer keep me busy I got plenty things things to do But I told read no more to sell late last night keeps flashing and I can't take it One sec Shut that phone up before I break it hold up Take me home before I say it I hope they banish me I miss my family tree I was a family man and now I'm just a man to see if you can't pay your rent or be responsible financially they need you I hope I get me too I hope they cancel me why? So I can go be with my family so I quit wearing this mask dog tell the people kiss my dog I hope they cancel me so I can go be with my family so I can quit wearing this mask dog telling people.

[Tim Miller]

The Bulwark Podcast is produced by Katie Cooper with audio engineering and editing by Jason Brown.

[Brian Stelter]

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