Dear John,

I’ve seen a lot of really bad news coverage over the last 50 years of American politics.

But after the news coverage of the last few months, this conclusion has become inescapable to me: The mainstream media is actively helping Donald Trump win this election.

The false equivalence between Trump and President Biden, claiming that Biden’s political handicap is his age, while Trump’s corresponding handicap is his criminal indictments. The phony objectivity, in which every move by Trump toward fascism is balanced off with a story about Hunter Biden, as if these were somehow comparable issues.

This isn’t just bad journalism. It’s actively paving the way for an authoritarian assault on our democracy.

If the corporate media won’t do its job of alerting the public, then we must. That’s why, in the coming months, Inequality Media Civic Action will be using our massive following across social media to reach millions of Americans with proven-effective video explainers and other content — and your donations are critical to help us reach the key swing voters who will decide this election.

Will you make a donation to help alert the public and warn voters about Donald Trump’s plans to end democracy?

The mainstream media’s addiction to false equivalence and phony balance leads voters to the false conclusion that all of politics is rotten. Case in point: a recent Washington Post article had this headline: “In a swing Wisconsin county, everyone is tired of politics.”

Inevitably, voters who are turned off by politics are less aware of Biden’s accomplishments — and the media is hardly reporting on them. As one person interviewed by the Post admitted, “I can’t really speak to anything [Biden] has done because I’ve tuned it out, like a lot of people have. We’re so tired of the us-against-them politics.”

I can’t blame the voter for feeling disgusted, but it’s the media’s failure that both sides seem equally to blame when one party no longer accepts the rule of law, the norms of liberal democracy, the legitimacy of the opposing party, or the premise that governing requires negotiation and compromise.

And of course, blaming both sides for chaos in Washington plays into Trump’s and his allies’ goal of wanting Americans to believe the nation has become ungovernable, so it needs a “strongman.”

The 2024 election is not simply “Democrats vs. Republicans.” Or “Left vs. Right.” It’s a struggle between democracy and fascism. And if the corporate media won’t sound the alarm, then we must.

Will you make a donation to help alert the public and warn voters about Donald Trump’s plans to end democracy?

Thank you for standing up for democracy,

Robert Reich
Inequality Media Civic Action