The 2025 Media Fail Awards
The biggest news disasters fueling lies and hatred, and endangering democracy
Welcome to the 2025 Media Fail Awards! Big legacy media spread lies every day. This is your chance to vote for the worst of the worst.
Learn all about the nominees in the new episode.
How were the nominees chosen? Based on responses from listeners and readers. Looking back, I found that certain topics generated the most reactions from you through: messages and comments from paid subscribers here on Substack; messages through the form at my website; comments on podcast platforms; and comments via social platforms.
See last year’s winners — er, losers — here.
Category 1: Big lies from the right
(Dis)honoring media fails that help Trump and his team.
Nominee 1: Immigration
There is broad consensus in America that actions should be taken against illegal immigration and porous borders. (That includes addressing the ways in which our economic system encourages people to come here illegally.) But the media keeps letting Trump and his surrogates lie about immigration. He even used the National Guard shooting to push these kinds of lies, with the media’s help.
When the media repeats fear-mongering rhetoric without fact-checking, they stop being journalists and start being a free PR firm for a campaign of misinformation. Listen to Episode 48:
Nominee 2: The federal workforce
There’s nothing wrong with wanting to cut the size of government or improve efficiency. But that’s very much not what Trump and his administration have been doing. Instead, they’ve been destroying essential functions that Americans count on and pay for with our tax dollars. The media allowed Trump and his surrogates to claim all sorts of nonsense, uncorrected.
By failing to differentiate between cutting waste and gutting vital services, the media helps camouflage a wrecking ball as a scalpel. Listen:
Nominee 3: The economy
The economy is usually the single biggest driving force in American politics. The media pushes the electorate to the political right based on a myth that today’s GOP is “fiscally conservative.” In reality, Republican administrations routinely spend more than Democratic ones, and rack up more debt.
By pretending these GOP “deficit hawks” exist, the media isn't reporting — it’s gifting lawmakers a brand they haven't earned.
Listen:
Nominee 4: Russia-Ukraine
Some people believe Trump’s abandonment of Ukraine is his biggest anti-democratic action to date. Democracies are under threat around the globe. As former President Biden explained, “Hamas and Putin represent different threats, but they share this in common: They both want to completely annihilate a neighboring democracy.” The media is failing to tell Americans this. CBS interviewed a top Russian official and never mentioned the “D-word.” Shockingly, the network even took guidance from Russia on how to conduct the interview.
When news agencies let authoritarian regimes set the terms of an interview, they provide a platform for anti-democratic propaganda. Listen:
Which was the worst? Or do you have another in mind? Time to vote:
Category 2: Big lies from the left
Legacy media do, at least sometimes, call out lies from the Trump administration. But they virtually never call out lies from the left. In fact, it’s worse. They don’t just platform these lies; they report them as truth.
Nominee 1: Mamdani
He has openly threatened to violate the Constitution and carry out an illegal arrest straight out of the dictator’s playbook, while hypocdritically condemning Trump for extrajudicial arrests. But the New York Times and other big media ran cover for New York City mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, even burying his avowed “love” for convicted funders of terrorism. When Asian women were killed, big media linked the attack to Trump’s remarks. When Jewish people are killed, the same news agencies wouldn’t dream of challenging Mamdani and other left-wing hate mongers in government for their vicious lies.
By presenting Mamdani’s campaign as a "historic milestone" to celebrate, the media helped him gain power and threaten democracy.
Nominee 2: Left-wing radicalization
Big mainstream media have long warned about the dangers of far-right firebrands, and how their words can fuel violence. News agencies dissected the words of Charlie Kirk before and after his assassination. But they’ve downplayed or ignored dangerous radicals on the left, even as studies show people on the left are more apt to support political violence. In Episode 75, I shared the vile, demented rhetoric of Hasan Piker, a streamer adored by fawning media.
By treating right-wing rhetoric as a "call to arms" while dismissing left-wing vitriol as "new hope for Democrats,” the media fuels hatred and political violence.
Nominee 3: Hostages
In all other cases, the media has a template for covering hostages and rescue efforts. The one exception, of course, is Israel. Palestinian hostage-takers must be pitied, and the “civilians” — including so-called “journalists” — holding Israelis as slaves must be presented as proverbial good guys. Amazing stories of daring hostage rescues are buried under an onslaught of Hamas propaganda. And when Israel has to give up huge numbers of terrorists, child rapists, and other violent criminals, those prisoners are equated with the innocent Israeli hostages.
By inverting the victim-hero narrative, the media sanitizes Palestinian Islamist terrorism.
Nominee 4: So-called ‘genocide’
It’s the world’s biggest lie these days, and the media is responsible. In Episode 67, I explained how the New York Times violated its own rules in order to platform this backward accusation against Israel. Truth = facts + context. An op-ed actively ignored context, claiming Israeli leaders had said and secretly meant things they clearly never said or meant. The Times is not alone. New York Magazine, part of Vox Media, recently stated the genocide libel as fact. The former head of the International Court of Justice even used a BBC interview to call on the media to stop misreporting ICJ findings.
By abandoning basic journalistic standards to validate blood libel, the media actively incites global antisemitic hatred.
Time to vote!
Now two more quick questions.
Category 3: Biggest Underreported Story
What’s the media’s worst blindspot? Islamist terrorists’ genocidal attacks on Christians? Nations with actual famine? Nazism at so-called “pro-Palestinian” rallies? Gay rights groups endangering same-sex marriage? (This question is for paid subscribers, since you’re the first place I turn in deciding what to cover on this show.)
And finally…
Category 4: Worst news agency of the year
Which was worst of all? The BBC, which censured its own presenter for saying something true? The New York Times, where talking heads like Ezra Klein lie with reckless abandon? CNN, where Christiane Amanpour lies about Iranian intelligence and Israeli hostages? The AP, with thousands of headlines reporting Islamist terrorists’ claims as fact but zero acknowledging the existence of Islamist terrorists around the world?
To see what these disastrous news agencies have been up to in favor of big lies on both ends of the political spectrum, use the search tool at the top of this page (the magnifying glass icon). Type in the name of any news agency, and you’ll see examples of what I’ve reported about it.
Have at it! Vote, and send this to everyone you’ve ever met.
Paid subscribers: Your links to weigh in are below.
Thanks for an amazing year! Share your thoughts in the comments or messages.
Thanks for providing a great service, I hope you get lots of new paid subscribers.
Honestly, all of these media fails were so egregious it was hard to choose the worst in each category! In underreported stories I had to choose the Nazism at 'pro-Palestinian' rallies (even if journalists can't be bothered to have the Arabic translated for them, everyone knows what a swastika is)--but almost chose nations with real famines (if only journalists could report on Sudan from the comfort of a fantastic Israeli restaurant; maybe then they'd bother).
In worst news agencies, they're all great/terrible choices but I had to choose BBC just because they seem to have a pattern--every time they get caught (say, using a Hamas source as their poor afflicted civilian witness), they seem to go out of their way to post a particularly outrageous terrorist-supporting narrative as some kind of twisted compensation.
Okay, now it's clear why I don't usually comment. Too much to say, too hard to say it. Apologies for this muddle. Still, very grateful for this endeavor.