Zeteo's New Media Newsletter 'Ragebait'

Fox News ignores Project 2025, Newsmax is in trouble, and a new Trump tracker to follow

First, a note from Mehdi about Zeteo’s new newsletter:
I am writing to introduce Zeteo’s new media newsletter called ‘Ragebait’, written by Justin Baragona, a great media critic and journalist. You should look out for Justin’s take on the right-wing media’s latest manufactured outrage, what mainstream media is ignoring or getting wrong, original reporting and much more, in his uncompromising and fresh style. Whatever it is, you’ll read it here first. While this week’s newsletter is being sent to everyone, you will need to specifically opt-in for notifications here if you want to receive it going forward. And if you’re not yet a subscriber to Zeteo, what are you waiting for?

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Hey there! I’m Justin Baragona. As a longtime St. Louis, Missouri native who had a whole other career in mortgage banking, I decided to make journalism a full-time profession after covering the Ferguson protests. Eventually, this led to my obsession with the way our political media operates and covers the news, especially the right-wing press. Since then, whether it’s through enterprise reporting, in-depth analysis, or just mocking the latest dumb moment of cable news punditry, I’ve devoted myself to shedding light on the propagandistic nature of this industry, including at the Daily Beast where I was their senior media reporter. It is not only important for news consumers to be exposed to this information, but it is imperative to understand how it impacts our politics and culture as a whole. 

(Protestor outside Trump Tower in Manhattan. Photo by Erik McGregor/Sipa US via Reuters.)

Why Is Fox News Ignoring Project 2025?

While much of the media’s attention these past two weeks has centered squarely on President Joe Biden’s dismal debate performance and the growing calls for him to drop out, another major story impacting the presidential race bubbled up in recent days. And though it has drawn a fair amount of attention from the mainstream and liberal press, viewers of conservative cable giant Fox News have barely been made aware of it.

Taking to his Truth Social platform last Friday, Donald Trump incredulously asserted that he knew “nothing about Project 2025,” the Heritage Foundation’s multi-pronged blueprint for a second Trump administration that would overhaul the executive branch and initiate far-right policy changes. “I have no idea who is behind it,” Trump added. “I disagree with some of the things they’re saying, and some of the things they’re saying are absolutely ridiculous and abysmal.”

Of course, what makes the former president’s claims ludicrous is that the 900-page MAGA playbook is authored largely by Trump’s inner circle. “All told, of the 38 people responsible for writing and editing Project 2025, 31 were appointed or nominated to positions in the Trump administration and transition,” Popular Information’s Judd Legum noted. 

Trump’s hand appeared to be forced, however, when Heritage Foundation president Kevin Roberts appeared on Steve Bannon’s “War Room” podcast last week and boasted that we’re in a “second American Revolution” that “will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be.” Meanwhile, despite Trump now claiming he doesn’t know who’s behind Project 2025, back in 2022, he praised Roberts as “so incredible” while speaking at a Heritage Foundation conference.

Those comments, alongside Democrats’ increased efforts to tie the extremist agenda to Trump, prompted the former president’s reaction. In the end, though, it only “made this into a bigger deal,” according to The New York Times’ Maggie Haberman.

While it was a “bigger deal” on CNN and MSNBC, that hasn’t been the case on Fox News, which serves as the de facto communication arm of the GOP and Trump. Since Trump attempted to publicly back away from Project 2025, CNN has mentioned the plan at least 69 times as of Tuesday evening, according to media monitoring service TVEyes. MSNBC has flooded its airwaves with coverage of the conservative blueprint and Trump’s ties to it, discussing the topic over 240 times.

Fox News, on the other hand, has all but turned a blind eye to the story. Between Friday and Tuesday morning, Project 2025 was only mentioned on Fox’s airwaves three times, and only in a passing manner. One instance featured Laura Ingraham merely airing a clip of MSNBC host Joy Reid referencing the blueprint as the reason why she was sticking with Biden. Additionally, Project 2025 was brought up by a Democratic congressman during a Sunday interview and resident “liberal” panelist Harold Ford Jr. on Monday’s The Five. His conservative colleagues generally ignored Ford’s brief mention.

By late Tuesday morning, the right-wing network did begin running news reports from correspondent Bryan Llenas, who noted that Democrats purchased billboards tying Trump to the far-right blueprint. “Democrats say this playbook lays out Trump’s dangerous plans. Trump says he has nothing to do with Project 2025,” Llenas reported.

On Wednesday afternoon, a day after Ragebait first reached out to the network for comment on their silence about Project 2025, Fox News anchor Sandra Smith finally acknowledged on air that the conservative playbook has “drawn controversy and unusual political distance” from Trump. She then brought on Fox News Sunday host Shannon Bream, who said she’d “been digging around on this” before delivering a report that noted that while many former Trump staffers are linked to the project, the Heritage Foundation claims it is merely proposing “suggestions” and the RNC says the party’s platform and Agenda 47 are “the only ones endorsed by Trump.”

Fox having buried news that reflect poorly on Trump or the Republican Party is hardly a new phenomenon. Media Matters senior fellow Matt Gertz told Zeteo’s Ragebait that the network does this because it acts solely as a “Trumpist propaganda outlet” now.

“It is primarily focused on the political success of Donald Trump, and to a somewhat lesser extent, of the Republican Party as a whole, and as such, the network's hosts and contributors are just not focused at all on anything resembling policy nuance or policy debates and disputes within the right,” he said.

“You have much of the coverage focusing around broad culture war fights or immigration or crime, where the notion is that somehow Donald Trump will solve the problem, but not really a focus on how specifically that will happen,” Gertz added. “And I think Project 2025 is really just that phenomenon writ large. They're not focused on Project 2025 because they don't think that a focus on policy helps Donald Trump, and so they simply don't provide that kind of coverage.”

Fox News did not respond to a request for comment.

Doing A 180

Up is down, black is white, and yes, we are truly in the Upside Down.

In the aftermath of The Debate, Trump has all but disappeared from the public eye, seemingly content to enlist Biden’s so-called “basement strategy” as the president desperately attempts to keep his presidential campaign alive. Meanwhile, Biden has seamlessly adopted his opponent’s arrogant and defiant swagger, digging in his heels while imposing his will on nervous Democrats who fear that the race may now be a lost cause. 

The two presidential hopefuls’ 180-degree shift was fully laid bare on Monday. With his high-stakes primetime ABC News interview doing nothing to calm the nerves of liberal lawmakers or big-money donors, Biden decided to go on offense. Congressional Democrats returning to Capitol Hill on Monday were greeted with an open letter from Biden telling them in no uncertain terms that he’s “not going anywhere.” His campaign also sent out a memo highlighting Biden’s dozen-plus campaign and media appearances since the debate, along with his upcoming schedule.

Taking a page from Trump’s playbook, Biden followed all that up by calling into his favorite cable news program to deliver this emphatic message to potentially wayward Democrats: Get on board the Biden train or shut the hell up! Challenging his party’s anxious “elites” and “big names” to take him on at the convention, Biden placed himself firmly in the anti-establishment camp – a head-scratching move from a man who has spent over 50-plus years in Washington. More so considering he was saying all this on Morning Joe, a show made by and for Beltway insiders whose hosts double as Biden advisers.

Biden’s aggressive and rambling Morning Joe appearance led more than a few reporters to draw comparisons to Trump’s frequent Fox & Friends call-ins during his time in office. “For a politician whose most salient pitch to voters is not being Donald Trump, Biden is starting to act a lot like him,” investigative journalist Ken Klippenstein noted. 

The Trump-era similarities only grew during Monday’s White House press briefing, which became extremely contentious when press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre – suddenly finding her press office under a credibility crisis – refused to answer whether a neurologist’s frequent White House visits were for the president. Hours after she scolded reporters for pressing her on the issue, the White House released a memo explaining the specialist had seen Biden during his physical exams – prompting Biden-friendly media figures to lambaste the “grotesque behavioral overreaction” of the press corps. 

While Biden engages in a public relations blitz to stem the tide of Democratic defectors, Trump has appeared satisfied to hang out at his golf course and stay out of the spotlight. Outside of a leaked video of him mocking Vice President Kamala Harris from a golf cart, Trump wasn’t seen publicly for 11 days until Tuesday night’s rally at his Florida golf resort. Even his much-ballyhooed Monday night Fox News interview, a pre-taped affair with confidant Sean Hannity that was billed as the former president’s first post-debate TV appearance, turned out to just be a phoner that only lasted 18 minutes – four minutes less than Biden’s sitdown with ABC. 

In the end, the same MAGA mouthpieces who mocked Biden’s 2020 campaign strategy as proof of his lack of stamina are now praising the 78-year-old former president for doing the exact same thing. “I have a lot of respect for Donald Trump for going to the basement. That was really smart,” Fox News host Jesse Watters gushed on Monday.

Exclusive: Newsmax In Trouble?

(Signage for the Newsmax conservative television broadcasting network. Photo by PATRICK T. FALLON/AFP via Getty Images)

Exclusive: Newsmax In Trouble?

Newsmax CEO Chris Ruddy has claimed that his network is now “profitable” during recent media appearances—although an investment memo shows a net loss for the past two years. He has also pitched viewers and “low-info investors” to buy shares in Newsmax at $5,000 a pop as part of a “private stock offering,” all while promising the stock would be more valuable when he went public in the future.

Last month, the MAGA cable news channel announced that it was raising upwards of $225 million from investors with hopes of launching an IPO in the near future. With the network currently staring down billion-dollar defamation lawsuits from voting software firms Smartmatic and Dominion over its promotion of Trump’s 2020 election lies, sources told Mediaite that Ruddy is trying to raise cash fast because he’s “worried about an existential threat” if he has to settle one of the cases. “They can’t even afford a $15 million settlement,” one source said. (In a similar lawsuit, Fox News settled with Dominion last year for $787.5 million.)

In its prospectus to potential investors, Newsmax acknowledges that it is “subject to unfavorable litigation that could require it to pay significant amounts, lead to onerous operating procedures or have a material adverse effect on the Company’s financial position,” pointing to the two lawsuits. 

In addition, the network also reveals that it “entered into a settlement agreement with a commercial counterparty” last year for $41.3 million, of which it has paid less than $2 million. If that wasn’t enough, the disclosure also shows that Newsmax hasn’t turned a profit since 2021, having lost nearly $20 million in 2022 and $41.8 million last year. Total net revenues for the past two years have hovered around $135 million.

Yet, despite the mysterious multi-million dollar settlement payout and a public market downturn for media companies at large, Ruddy has confidently declared that his network is on pace to earn $180 million this year and turn a profit. In doing so, he has asserted that the company is not only currently profitable but was also in the black last year.

“The company ended last year profitable, and it is continuing that profitability,” Ruddy told conservative radio host John Fredericks last month. “We expect it to be profitable this year.”

In a separate appearance on The Daily Signal podcast, he once again noted that “we are a profitable company this year,” claiming that “it’s not like we’re desperate for the capital” and that it was merely an “opportunity to share a piece of our company in exchange for us to build an even bigger company.” 

“We are doing well, we are profitable!” Ruddy exclaimed on Richmond’s Morning News with John Reid. He also compared Newsmax to Trump’s Truth Social, seemingly positioning his network as a safer bet for “MAGA meme stock” aficionados. 

“His app he put out there in a public offering, he did $4 million in business last year, and the company is trading over $5 billion in market cap on the stock market,” Ruddy added. “We’re gonna do $180 million or more, maybe as much as $200 million this year in revenue.”

Meanwhile, on the network’s airwaves, viewers are bombarded with constant appeals from hosts to invest in Newsmax, letting them know they can even purchase shares via credit card. To that end, Newsmax pundit Dick Morris is being portrayed as a top Trump adviser while pitching the stock on air, suggesting Trump’s involvement in Newsmax will cause it to gain value because the channel will pass Fox News in popularity and viewership after the election. 

“He really appreciates the fact that Newsmax is the only station that covers his campaign rallies,” Morris said last week. “And as he saw in the debate, his views on issues are shaped by what he says in these rallies. And I think that he's going to be working very closely with Newsmax because he has no choice.”

In a statement to Ragebait, a Newsmax spokesman denied that Ruddy had said anything untruthful in his recent media appearances. “Mr. Ruddy’s statements are accurate and your claims as to his statements are false,” the spokesman said. “Media companies often lose money starting up new operations and that does not mean they will always lose money. Newsmax now receives significant revenue through cable license fees.”

Exclusive: Trump Loves RSBN

The Righting, a website that tracks conservative media and podcasts, gave Ragebait a sneak peek of its upcoming Trump Link Tracker. Howard Polskin, the site’s founder, launched the tracker last month as a way to show what news outlets the former president links to on his campaign website and Truth Social feed.

According to his preliminary findings for June, which will be released to the public early next week to coincide with the Republican National Convention, there has been a large spike in links to The New York Post. In fact, according to Polskin, links to the Murdoch-owned tabloid have increased by a factor of seven. (The Post had only received seven total links from Trump in May.)  In terms of far-right media, the former president continues to link to the streaming channel Right Side Broadcasting Network the most. RSBN, which covers all of Trump’s rallies in full, also carries a show hosted by Lara Trump, the former president’s daughter-in-law and Republican National Committee co-chair. 

Behind the Scenes 

More than a month after former Fox News star Eric Bolling abruptly left Newsmax, leaving a vacancy in the network’s primetime lineup, the competition between the channel’s hosts vying for the 8 p.m. time slot is growing fierce.

According to network insiders, the producers of the hour previously anchored by Bolling are pushing for afternoon host Bianca de la Garza to get the role. While network management floated giving de la Garza the show and moving former primetime host Jenn Pellegrino to daytime, a source with knowledge told Ragebait that content chief Elliot Jacobson had expressed reluctance over the move. 

Network chief Chris Ruddy, meanwhile, is keen on placing disgraced Fox News anchor Ed Henry in Bolling’s old hour. “The network really wants to put Ed Henry in that position, but there’s too much back and forth about his reputation igniting bad publicity,” the source said. “Ruddy believes if they placed Ed Henry in that slot close enough to the election, viewers might be too focused on Trump vs Biden for the move to get enough impactful attention.” Notably, Henry was supposed to anchor the network’s debate night coverage but was suddenly pulled in the wake of an unflattering report detailing a human resources complaint against him at his former channel.

While Jacobson has pushed for daytime host Bob Brooks to get the promotion, vice president of programming Chris Knowles wants 7 p.m. host Rob Schmitt to expand his show to two hours. Additionally, ex-WABC Radio host Lidia Curanaj “is actively campaigning for the slot,” according to the source with knowledge, adding that she is a long shot due to the network bosses finding her “off-putting to middle America with her tough, New York exterior.”

A spokesperson for Newsmax declined to comment on this story.

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Welcome to ‘Ragebait’, Zeteo’s biweekly media newsletter that focuses intently on the right-wing outrage-industrial complex and the intersection of our political and media landscapes. ‘Ragebait’ is written by Justin Baragona, a former senior media reporter for The Daily Beast and cable news correspondent for Mediaite. Make sure to subscribe to ‘Ragebait’ at Zeteo and send any tips here.