Every day, I wake up, check my phone and learn about another one of Donald Trump’s insane decisions as president: banning transgender women from sports, ICE raids, pulling funding from USAID, slashing the budget from the Department of Education, etc. Now, not only will Trump affect the policies that uphold our nation, he will affect how we receive news about it.
Feb. 1, the Pentagon announced a new media rotation program under the Trump administration — meaning news sources such as The New York Times, NBC, Politico and NPR have lost their dedicated media offices in the Pentagon — making space for news organizations such as the New York Post, Breitbart News, One America News and HuffPost. This “rotation” is the first time a president’s administration has had this amount of authority over the press that reports directly to the Pentagon.
Harvard Research made a graphic showing news media across the political spectrum and how left or right politically a specific source may skew. For comparison, sources like The New York Times and NPR skew more left on the scale, while sources like the New York Post and Breitbart News show a strong skew to the right. Politico and NBC lean to the left but are deemed more centrist.
It is rumored that this media rotation has stemmed out of negative portrayal of Trump’s allies, such as Pete Hegseth, who the Senate confirmed as the Defense Secretary just seven days before the decision. His confirmation hearings consisted of weeks of press about his alcohol consumption and misogynistic behavior towards women.
The motivation behind this media rotation is clear: President Trump’s administration is opting for right-leaning news organizations to be the main reporters in the Pentagon so his decisions look more educated and approved and so his followers in the government can look better. All of those people who were undecided about Trump during the 2024 election will not understand the sinister nature of his new policies, because the news we will receive from the Pentagon will all be right-wing. These right-wing sources will further the narrative that Trump has America’s best interests in mind without space for critique.
Trump’s next four years will prove to be detrimental for journalism. Journalism has already had its blatant struggles as the increase of intense polarization separates our nation. Social media has contributed to the spread of false information, and it spreads at a rate far faster than any newspaper could generate new stories. It seems as though the stories people care about right now are the ones that will make them angry, and they get pigeonholed into an algorithm that justifies their fears and doesn’t show them any other side. Trump has a history of fear mongering, and his supporters are showing up for him. But without proper reporting on Trump’s new actions, the dangers of this new administration can be easily overlooked by the public. As the past decade has furthered polarization and fake news, accurate and unbiased reporting on our national government will be more important than ever.
Certain parts of our news industry will have to change in order to ensure journalism remains accessible during this administration. A good start would be removing paywalls entirely. While news sites must make money in order to function, paywalls over important information are the last place they should start in order to do so. While researching why paywalls exist, I came across an article from The Atlantic called Democracy Dies Behind Paywalls, which I could read for a few grafs until — you guessed it — a paywall stopped me from continuing. We will never learn how to build a stronger system if our information has a financial incentive.
The pressure is not entirely on the news companies. The general public must be more cognizant of the media they are consuming and understanding where fallacies lie. With Elon Musk in charge of X (formerly Twitter) and Mark Zuckerberg in charge of Meta (Instagram and Facebook), their support for Trump will inevitably impact social media content — and it already has. NBC wrote how Musk’s control of X has turned it into an echo chamber for Trump supporters, working with the Trump campaign during the election and promoting AI-powered conspiracy theories. There’s responsibility on the consumer to take a critical eye to everything they see online — no matter how much it aligns with one’s views.
News organizations like The New York Times, The Washington Post and CNN will not go away. Trump’s move simply doesn’t give them a desk to report from in the Pentagon. Sure, his move may be symbolic, but it illustrates a larger issue — Trump will not be afraid to take control of the media by any means necessary. And, with billionaires and right-wing media on his side, there’s no clear sign of stopping.
Contact Eliana Joftus at joftus@oxy.edu
