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The Presidents vs. the Press
The Endless Battle between the White House and the Media—from the Founding Fathers to Fake News
1 of 1 copy available
“The FAKE NEWS media,” Donald Trump has tweeted, “is not my enemy, it is the enemy of the American People!” Has our free press ever faced as great a threat? Perhaps not—but the tension between presidents and journalists is as old as the republic itself.
Every president has been convinced of his own honesty and transparency; every reporter who has covered the White House beat has believed with equal fervency that his or her journalistic rigor protects the country from danger. Our first president, George Washington, was also the first to grouse about his treatment in the newspapers, although he kept his complaints private. Subsequent chiefs like John Adams, Abraham Lincoln, Woodrow Wilson, and Barack Obama were not so reticent, going so far as to wield executive power to overturn press freedoms, and even to prosecute journalists.
Theodore Roosevelt was the first president to actively manage the stable of reporters who followed him, doling out information, steering coverage, and squashing stories that interfered with his agenda. It was a strategy that galvanized TR’s public support, but the lesson was lost on Woodrow Wilson, who never accepted reporters into his inner circle. Franklin Roosevelt transformed media relations forever, holding more than a thousand presidential press conferences and harnessing the new power of radio, at times bypassing the press altogether. John F. Kennedy excelled on television and charmed reporters to hide his personal life, while Richard Nixon was the first to cast the press as a public enemy. From the days of newsprint and pamphlets to the rise of Facebook and Twitter, each president has harnessed the media, whether intentional or not, to imprint his own character on the office.
In this remarkable new history, acclaimed scholar Harold Holzer examines the dual rise of the American presidency and the media that shaped it. From Washington to Trump, he chronicles the disputes and distrust between these core institutions that define the United States of America, revealing that the essence of their confrontation is built into the fabric of the nation.
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Creators
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Publisher
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Release date
August 25, 2020 -
Formats
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OverDrive Listen audiobook
- ISBN: 9780593146651
- File size: 631036 KB
- Duration: 21:54:39
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Languages
- English
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Reviews
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March 30, 2020
Historian Holzer (Monument Man) documents the tensions between U.S. presidents and the press in this colorful but underwhelming survey. Starting with George Washington and his fellow founding fathers John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, then skipping ahead to Andrew Jackson, Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, and Franklin Roosevelt, before concluding with a rundown of every modern president from Kennedy through Trump, Holzer aims to “alert readers to historical traditions, original principles, and ominous trends.” He describes Washington’s battles with the journalist grandson of Benjamin Franklin; cites examples of FDR’s “manipulative charm” during press briefings, including the time he told a reporter inquiring about a potential third term to “put on your dunce cap and stand with your back to the crowd”; and notes Obama’s controversial use of the 1917 Espionage Act to jail reporters’ sources and stem the tide of intelligence community leaks. Evidence of Trump’s love-hate relationship with the press includes extensive TV coverage of his 2016 campaign rallies and the president’s “tweetstorms” attacking mainstream media as allegations of the Ukraine pressure campaign circulated. Holzer provides vivid historical vignettes, but little analysis of how the current moment compares to 18th- and 19th-century precedents. Readers will be more entertained than enlightened.
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