Friend,

Over the past few days, Trump has taken to his favorite social network to threaten to destroy Persian civilization and brag about his willingness to commit war crimes on a global scale.

U.S. bombers were en route to Iran before Trump called off the attack, declaring that his loudmouth posturing had brought Iranian leadership to their knees, despite evidence to the contrary.

There’s one thing that can be said about Truth Social — the Trump-owned platform that is the president’s preferred megaphone: It has done more than any other outlet to reveal the moral rot festering at the core of the most powerful man on Earth.

The president’s astounding rhetoric echoes that of past fascist leaders — dictators who led their countries to commit genocidal crimes and provoke world wars that cost tens of millions of lives.

But, sadly, many mainstream media outlets routinely normalize the most unhinged language and actions emanating from this administration.

“Americans — especially journalists — should resist becoming inured to fascist rhetoric,” wrote Tom Nichols in this month's issue of The Atlantic.¹ “No one should rely on euphemisms about ‘extreme’ comments or ‘fiery’ speeches. Call it what it is: Nazi-like behavior.”

The concentration of the media in the hands of billionaires — including the likes of the Murdochs, the Ellisons and Jeff Bezos — poses a fundamental threat to our democracy. The interests of these owners are so deeply entangled with those of this authoritarian-minded White House that their news outlets tend to downplay or normalize the administration’s most disturbing and deadly behavior.

Another favorite tactic of Trump-enabling media is to attempt to balance the Trump administration’s violent actions against some imagined transgressions committed by the president’s political foes.

Such both-sides framing is typical “of a corporate media terrified of being honest about anything lest it cost them ad revenues, access, or the favor of (usually) right-wing ownership,” tech writer and media critic Karl Bode wrote earlier this week. “Corporate media can’t be honest about fascism because it would cost them money.”²

How many more lives will this president put in peril before the media correctly labels this behavior fascism and holds Donald Trump accountable for his crimes?

To ensure democracy survives this era of Trumpist aggression, we need to repair a media system that has allowed far too much control over information to fall into the hands of far too few of his loyalists.

The media’s job should be to call out this administration’s ceaseless and blatant criminality — not because they’re duty-bound to present both sides of a story in the service of some deeply skewed notion of balance. But because U.S. journalism must play a humane and illuminating role in even the darkest times.

The structural changes necessary to make this a reality aren’t going to happen overnight, but we can’t stop fighting for a better media system, as the lives of so many people still hang in the balance across Iran and the Middle East.

Thank you,

Tim and the rest of us at Free Press

1. “The Republican Party Has a Nazi Problem,” The Atlantic, Feb. 23, 2026

2. “Tim Cook Is an Embarrassing Coward,” The Fine Print, April 6, 2026