#msnbc.com

Pritzker "trump is defunding the police."

A groundbreaking study that was sponsored by the International Olympic Committee and released late last week sought to compare a range of athletic abilities between trans athletes and their cisgender counterparts. The finding that trans women athletes are at a relative disadvantage in many key physical areas relating to athletic ability and perform worse on cardiovascular tests than their cisgender counterparts could be the first step in fighting back against the conventional wisdom conservatives have spread that trans women’s participation is inherently unfair. Over the last several years, few anti-LGBTQ policies have taken off as quickly within mainstream politics as those banning trans women and girls from women’s and girls’ sports. Prompted by the success of trans college swimmer Lia Thomas, who won a national championship during her senior year, dozens of conservative states and sports administrators rushed headlong into outright bans on trans women’s rights to participate equally in sports. The political argument seemed simple; natural, even. We all know men are superior athletes to women, conservatives argued, so allowing trans women to compete with women would be inherently unfair. Because it  felt like common sense to a lot of people, it made for a compelling political argument. But the study that the IOC commissioned, and the University of Brighton conducted, found that while trans women are stronger in some respects, like grip strength, cis women have stronger lower bodies. The study also found that trans women have a similar bone density as their cis women counterparts, which rebuts a frequent refrain from conservatives who’ve argued otherwise to justify banning trans girls and women from sports. All the participants in this study participated in competitive sports or took part in physical training at least three times a week. The 35 trans athletes had to have completed at least one consecutive year of hormone replacement therapy. It’s just one study, so we should avoid drawing grand conclusions from it, but, at the very least, the study shows that the bodies of trans women who’ve been on at least one year of hormone replacement therapy are very, very different from cis men’s bodies. In their conclusion, researchers cautioned against hurdling into blanket bans on trans women’s participation in women’s sports and declared that using data comparing cis men and cis women’s bodies to justify these bans is wrong. It has become commonplace for anti-trans campaigners to make arguments against trans participation in sports by citing the difference between cis men’s and cis women’s bodies; in other words, pretending that trans women’s bodies are identical to those of cis men’s. [...] Then again, the trans athlete debate has never really been about fairness or safety in women’s sports. It’s always been about putting laws on the books that legally define trans women as men as a precedent for passing more anti-trans laws unrelated to sports. So this research will likely not make a difference in red state legislatures.

Fox News hosts elevated Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to help return President Donald Trump to the White House. They then greased the skids for Kennedy’s confirmation as secretary of health and human services. But as he works to demolish American health care research, they are nowhere to be found. Kennedy, a prominent vaccine skeptic who once described Covid-19 shots as “the deadliest vaccine ever made,” announced on Tuesday that he is terminating nearly $500 million in federal contracts supporting the development of next-generation vaccines and other treatments based on mRNA technology. “After reviewing the science and consulting top experts at NIH and FDA, HHS has determined that mRNA technology poses more risks than benefits for these respiratory viruses,” he said in a video posted online. But Kennedy’s announcement drew harsh criticism from infectious disease experts and other scientists. They warned that the cuts could stall treatments for everything from respiratory illnesses to cancer, leave the nation more exposed to pandemics, undermine public trust in vaccines and threaten U.S. global leadership in medical advances. [...] Fox News may not want to claim credit for Kennedy as he stifles crucial medical research, but it certainly deserves it. You can’t explain the evolution from Trump’s first administration, which fast-tracked the development of mRNA vaccines for Covid-19 through Operation Warp Speed, to the second term’s anti-vax, “Make America Healthy Again” schtick without talking about the network’s role in turning the GOP base against vaccines and toward conspiracy theorists like Kennedy. [...] Led by its then-prime-time star Tucker Carlson, the network incessantly promoted misleading and false claims about safe, effective vaccines with the potential to save their viewers’ lives — day after day, month after month, year after year. The network uplifted conspiracy theories, gave airtime to conspiracy theorists and culture war vaccine opponents, demagogued against efforts to get more people to receive these lifesaving shots, and propped up ineffective cures as potential substitutes. Fox News continued to broadcast these segments even as more Republican parts of the country, with lower vaccination rates, suffered higher Covid-19 death tolls, as The New York Times’ David Leonhardt detailed. Before the pandemic, Kennedy, the scion of a Democratic dynasty who once called for a boycott of Fox News host Sean Hannity and described him as a fascist, was not a natural fit for the Fox audience. But with the Covid-19 vaccine campaign underway, his decades of work undermining vaccines and his attacks on the new mRNA vaccines in particular suddenly made him attractive to the right. When he began his presidential campaign in March 2023 — with Carlson’s show as his launchpad — MAGA media stalwarts saw an opportunity. They treated Kennedy’s bid, first in the Democratic primary and then as an independent candidate, as a potent spoiler candidacy to boost Trump’s return to power. Kennedy became a constant presence on the programs of pro-Trump commentators. Fox provided him with more airtime than many would-be Republican standard-bearers received. All of the fawning attention on Kennedy from the right — alongside mainstream news coverage of his bizarre history, such as his claim that a parasite in his brain had triggered memory loss — had the impact one would expect: Kennedy became more popular with Republicans than Democrats. As polls increasingly showed that he was pulling support from Trump, though, MAGA media figures like Hannity abruptly turned on Kennedy. After Carlson reportedly helped to facilitate Kennedy’s decision to drop out and endorse the once-and-future president, Fox hosts resumed showering the anti-vax champion with praise.

President Donald Trump’s allies at Fox News — and other major MAGA media figures — are obeying his marching orders to stop talking about Jeffrey Epstein, the disgraced financier who was awaiting trial on charges that he sexually abused dozens of underage girls when he died by suicide in jail in 2019. Prominent MAGA voices were in near-open rebellion last week after the Justice Department and Federal Bureau of Investigation issued in an unsigned July 6 memo stating that there was no “credible evidence found that Epstein blackmailed prominent individuals as part of his actions,” and that investigators “concluded that Jeffrey Epstein committed suicide in his cell.” Those conclusions contradicted dogmas pushed by Trumpist talking heads — including FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino. Within days, many MAGA diehards were calling for Attorney General Pam Bondi’s resignation or firing. By Sunday, the simmering discontent seemed primed to boil over, as Fox News anchors and prominent pro-Trump speakers at a summit organized by Charlie Kirk’s Turning Point USA warned that if Trump didn’t listen to his base, he risked losing them. But the president instead issued a statement that evening in which he stood by Bondi and demanded that his allies “not waste Time and Energy” on the Epstein saga. Trump’s statement put to the test the MAGA pundits and influencers who had told their audiences for years that wealthy elites, corrupt officials and the mainstream press were covering up for Epstein. And most of them, particularly Fox’s anchors and hosts, promptly bent the knee. [...] Outside the Fox News portion of the MAGA ecosystem, there’s been somewhat more debate about the Justice Department memo. Some MAGA influencers pointed out the absurdity of Trump’s new narrative. “Barack Obama wrote the Epstein files? LOL. This is outright embarrassing,” commented Candace Owens on X. Benny Johnson, responding on a livestream Sunday, mentioned Trump’s theory and remarked, “What?” Others were even more critical, at times even implicating Trump himself. [...] But those cases seem like the exceptions — in general, MAGA commentators have either gone silent like Fox News or are publicly championing the Trump line. [...] Cracks keep forming in the coalition that united around a shared hatred of the left and put Trump in office. Those fractures will almost certainly continue as his administration’s actions anger its various factions, and they may even come to threaten Trump’s cultlike hold over the MAGA movement and the largely sycophantic right-wing media. But we’re not there yet.

After actress Blake Lively sued director Justin Baldoni in December, saying he had retaliated against her for reporting sexual harassment on a film set, an unusual group of online talkers dove into this Hollywood dispute. Right-wing personality Candace Owens — who split from The Daily Wire last year amid conflicts over her antisemitic rhetoric — was not previously known for covering celebrity litigation. But she has become one of Baldoni’s loudest defenders online, helping propel the feud and gaining new audiences for herself along the way. [...] Other right-wing hosts like Brett Cooper and former Fox News and NBC personality Megyn Kelly have also tried to reel in new audiences, mentioning Lively or Baldoni at least 440 times on their online shows since the beginning of the year. After Kelly interviewed Baldoni’s lawyer (who she says is also her lawyer), Kelly told her audience: “The thing that stood out to me was, I don’t understand this, because she’s the one in the power position here. It’s Blake Lively and some guy who pretty much nobody knows.” She added: “I’m neck-deep in this weird industry that I really want nothing to do with, but it’s the case everyone’s been talking about.” [...] Owens has also tried capturing true crime fans with a series in which she “transvestigates” the first lady of France and another about Hollywood producer and convicted sex offender Harvey Weinstein that she says will include an interview with him. In just two months, she has added 1.75 million followers to her social media accounts. Kelly’s TikTok video of her interview with Baldoni’s lawyer is one of her most-viewed, with 9.1 million views. For decades, the right has built a massive media ecosystem to prop up right-wing narratives and politicians. In recent years, they’ve successfully expanded beyond print and television media into talk radio, social media and now podcasts, streams and other online shows. Some, like Owens and Kelly, are now drawing even bigger audiences by stretching outside their comfort zones. Meanwhile, right-wing narratives have been seeping into supposedly nonpolitical shows, like those of Joe Rogan at Theo Von. Those shifts have impacts. For instance, you may have heard about how Trump’s appearances on popular podcasts brought young men into his winning coalition. But just how bad is the disparity between audiences of these right-leaning versus left-leaning shows? A new Media Matters study assessing popular online shows found that the right’s online audiences are five times larger than those of progressives. And many of those shows don’t present themselves as political at all. In fact, 72% of the shows we examined that describe themselves as focused on topics like sports, pop culture or comedy were actually right-leaning in terms of their content or guests. Some of the top online shows — like those of Rogan, Von, Andrew Schulz and the Nelk Boys — fall in this category. That means that their tens of millions of followers are hearing not just from celebrity guests like Timothée Chalamet but also from Trump, his allies and right-wing media personalities. Many of these shows’ hosts are also spreading right-wing narratives themselves, such as praising and bolstering Trump’s actions and policies. [...] The right’s expansive online ecosystem plays into a fundamental aspect of the current online environment: Outrage and fearmongering garner more attention and engagement than facts. And right-wing media figures have leaned into pop culture to garner more audiences for their content, while comedians, sports commentators and entertainers are pushing right-wing content. The result is that right-wing narratives are seemingly everywhere. And this environment allows Trump and his allies to easily spread propaganda to wide swaths of Americans.

Donald Trump’s war on DEI policies has caused a number of major corporations to bend the knee. [...] Costco is receiving some online praise, for example, after more than 98% of shareholders recently rejected a shareholder proposal for a report on any risks posed by the company’s DEI policies. JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon and Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon have faced similar activist proposals at their companies, but speaking at this week’s World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, both said they remain committed to seeking out diverse talent despite the right-wing crusade. Asked in a CNBC interview about the anti-DEI push among investors, Dimon said: “Bring them on.” A number of other CEOs at Davos, including Pinterest CEO Bill Ready, Vista Equity Partners CEO Robert Smith and Cisco CEO Chuck Robbins, all vowed that their companies will remain committed to prioritizing diversity even as they navigate the new legal terrain under Trump. And good on them for that. Let’s hope they follow through, because doing so makes good business sense. DEI programs help foster work environments that studies have shown are more productive than ones where diversity isn’t emphasized.

Prominent right-wing influencers Dave Rubin, Benny Johnson and Tim Pool have huge followings on YouTube and a fondness for the Trumpist talking point that allegations of Russian interference in the 2016 election on the former president’s behalf are a “hoax.” That’s not all they have in common: They also reportedly enjoyed lucrative deals with a content creation company that was a front for Russian propagandists. The Justice Department indicted two employees of the Russian propaganda outlet RT on Wednesday, charging them with laundering almost $10 million through foreign shell companies and violating the Foreign Agents Registration Act. The DOJ alleges this was done “to covertly fund and direct” a media company that produced videos whose content and subject matter were “often consistent with the Government of Russia’s interest in amplifying U.S. domestic divisions in order to weaken U.S. opposition to core Government of Russia interests.” The company’s description matches that of Tenet Media, a Tennessee-based firm co-founded by Lauren Chen, a creator for Glenn Beck’s Blaze TV (which fired Chen on Thursday) and a contributor to Charlie Kirk’s Turning Point USA. Tenet Media publishes content by Rubin, Johnson, Pool and other less-prominent influencers. According to the indictment, the production companies of three unnamed commentators were paid $8.7 million through the scheme. The indictment states two of the commentators were deceived about the source of the funding; the trio all described themselves as unwitting “victims” of the operation in separate statements on social media. But the Tenet Media saga demonstrates once again that Russian election interference is not, as these commentators and their allies have insisted, a “hoax.” It is a fact, a deliberate and ongoing operation by the Kremlin to sway U.S. politics. And the Trumpist right’s yearslong quest to rebut that reality have ended up ensuring that their entire information ecosystem is honeycombed with Russian propaganda. Special counsel Robert Mueller’s 2019 final report conclusively documented the Russian government’s systematic effort to influence the 2016 presidential election in order to help Trump and the many ways Trump’s associates participated in that endeavor. This was an inconvenient finding for Trump and his political and media allies, who had spent years fabricating a complex alternate reality in which claims of Russian election interference or corrupt ties between Russia and Trump and his associates were “deep state” lies. They responded by falsely claiming Mueller’s report had found “no collusion” between Trump and Russia, and used that lie to brand the entirety of the probe as a “hoax.” [...] No one on the right has done more to push pro-Russia talking points than former Fox News host Tucker Carlson, a longtime defender of Russian president Vladimir Putin and opponent of U.S. support for Ukraine. Russian propaganda channels sought to gin up Western support for its 2022 invasion by highlighting Carlson’s nightly screeds against U.S. aid to Ukraine, and in turn served as a source for Carlson’s program. A Russian state TV host even suggested on-air that Carlson take a job at his network after Fox dropped him the following year. [...] But Russia-friendly narratives about the country’s invasion of Ukraine ultimately spread far beyond Carlson. It became widely accepted orthodoxy on the MAGA right that sending military aid to Ukraine is a waste of money, that the United States is responsible for Russia’s invasion, and that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is the real villain of the conflict. [...] Russian interests and Kremlin-connected sources also fueled the right’s obsession with Hunter Biden’s business interests and the absurd related allegation that Joe Biden accepted a bribe from a Ukrainian oligarch — both of which right-wing media and politicians treated as major stories, with House Republicans making it the heart of their impeachment case against the president..