A Response to the Editor of the New York Times

The Executive Editor of the New York Times kinda, sorta asked for my opinion and misrepresented my critique

Last night, Semafor’s Ben Smith published an interview with Joe Kahn, the Executive Editor of the New York Times. Here’s the first question Ben asked Kahn:

Dan Pfeiffer, who used to work for Barack Obama, recently wrote of the Times: “They do not see their job as saving democracy or stopping an authoritarian from taking power.” Why don’t you see your job as: “We’ve got to stop Trump?” What about your job doesn’t let you think that way?

The quote comes from my recent post discussing the tension between the Biden White House and the Times over the President’s unwillingness to sit down for an interview. Ben asked the question provocatively and fairly (and I appreciate the mention/traffic), but Kahn is not a Message Box subscriber and almost certainly not a Pod Save America listener. Therefore, he missed my broader point and conflated my views on the New York Times with the general Internet critique of the paper.

Kahn’s answer is quite long. You should read the whole thing, but here are the key parts:

Good media is the Fourth Estate, it’s another pillar of democracy. One of the absolute necessities of democracy is having a free and fair and open election where people can compete for votes, and the role of the news media in that environment is not to skew your coverage towards one candidate or the other, but just to provide very good, hard-hitting, well-rounded coverage of both candidates, and informing voters. If you believe in democracy, I don’t see how we get past the essential role of quality media in informing people about their choice in a presidential election… It’s our job to cover the full range of issues that people have. At the moment, democracy is one of them. But it’s not the top one — immigration happens to be the top [of polls], and the economy and inflation is the second. Should we stop covering those things because they’re favorable to Trump and minimize them? I don’t even know how it’s supposed to work in the view of Dan Pfeiffer or the White House. We become an instrument of the Biden campaign? We turn ourselves into Xinhua News Agency or Pravda and put out a stream of stuff that’s very, very favorable to them and only write negative stories about the other side? And that would accomplish — what?

It’s not often the Executive Editor of the most influential media organ in the world asks my opinion (even sarcastically), so I will avail myself of an opportunity. Besides, now that my name is tangential to a raging online debate about the interview, I feel compelled to clarify my point of view on the New York Times.

1. The Point I Tried to Make

One of the main points Ben Smith quoted from my post was my attempt to level-set Democratic expectations about the media in general (and the New York Times in particular).

When Trump began attacking the media in a way no American politician had done before, Democrats jumped to the media’s defense. The idea of a free and independent press is integral to American democracy. Supporting and subscribing to the targets of Trump’s derision became an act of “resistance.” In the us vs. them politics of the Trump era, we viewed the press as “us.”

The media leaned into this notion in part to juice subscriptions. The Washington Post adopted the slogan “Democracy Dies in Darkness” and spent millions of dollars to run this Tom Hanks-voiced Super Bowl ad:

'Democracy Dies in Darkness': Super Bowl commercial (2019)

All of us who spent the last decade (And yes, it’s almost been a decade) pushing back against Trump and Trumpism view the struggle as a fight for democracy or, as President Biden would put it, “a battle for the soul of the nation.” Joe Kahn clarifies in the interview that the New York Times does not see it that way and they have no intention of picking a side in that fight. They view their job as reporting fairly on the race and then letting the chips fall where they may. We can debate whether they are meeting that standard. I have plenty of quibbles with various stories and journalistic choices. I remain frustrated that the Times and the rest of the media too often prioritize balance over accuracy. However, on the whole, I think the NYT does a pretty damn good job. They have done great work reporting on what a second Trump term would look like. They broke more big stories about Trump than anyone else; and I agree with Kahn’s contention that they have written much about Biden’s policy accomplishments. Would I like more coverage of the good that Biden and Democrats have done? Absolutely. Do I want even more tough coverage of Trump? Definitely. But the NYT is a large enterprise. Some of the stuff they do is great, some is bad, and the rest is fine.

While I will periodically pick this bone or that one with traditional media coverage (I am human, after all), I don’t think raging at the media is always a constructive use of our time. Working the refs can be effective. Every once in a while, they will change a story or a headline. They might cover a topic that we think isn’t getting enough coverage. I just think we can never win the war because they have no interest in being who we want them to be.

2. A Frustrating False Choice

I have one bone to pick with this particular part of Kahn’s response to my criticism:

I don’t even know how it’s supposed to work in the view of Dan Pfeiffer or the White House. We become an instrument of the Biden campaign? We turn ourselves into Xinhua News Agency or Pravda and put out a stream of stuff that’s very, very favorable to them and only write negative stories about the other side? And that would accomplish — what?

I haven’t argued that the New York Times or anyone stop covering negative stories about Biden or become a state-owned propaganda outlet (not that Kahn knows my argument). No one else has argued that either. What most people want is for the media to spend less time on the horserace and more time on the stakes of this election; and to specifically call out the threat that is a second Trump presidency. There have been a lot of very good stories, but there could always be more. In general — and this is a complaint I have had about the New York Times that is two decades old — I wish they would take good faith criticism from the Left with as much seriousness as they take bad faith criticism from the Right. 

3. Why Does This Matter?

Ultimately almost no one in this country cares about a fight between Biden and the New York Times and even fewer people care (My mom may not even care!) about how Joe Kahn responds to my critique. However, to divine some value from this ridiculously insular back and forth, I do think there are a few points worth noting.

First, instead of fuming at Kahn’s description of the New York Times’ role and responsibility, we should just take him at his word. They will not change their approach to covering Trump and that’s totally fine. They are not on our team. They don’t want to be on our team and that’s also fine. It’s not their role. If we just accepted that reality, we could find more constructive uses of our time.

Second, traditional media outlets like the NYT are the primary way most Democrats communicate with the electorate. This is a fundamental error. You cannot trust your message to entities that do not — and should not — share your interests. The Right has a large media apparatus that can tell their story on their terms to their voters. The proper response to the shortcomings of traditional media is not to scream; it’s to build a response. While Democrats have progressed in recent years, we need a massive investment in progressive media. Democratic voters and activists can help this effort by subscribing to or patronizing anti-Trump outlets like Crooked Media, Courier News, MeidasTouch, or The Bulwark and supporting independent creators like Brian Tyler Cohen, Mehdi Hasan, Kyle Tharp, Jessica Craven, Simon Rosenberg, Parker Molloy and so many others. And if you are not yet a paid subscriber to this newsletter, there is no time like the present.

There is an absolute need for an independent press like how Joe Kahn describes the New York Times, but there is also room for a robust pro-democracy media. We shouldn’t have to choose.