Trump Won, Mainstream Media Lost

A broken business model exacerbated by a collapse in influence has the Fourth Estate entering another Donald Trump term in trouble

- CARLO VERSANO

LAST MONTH, THE ENTREPRENEUR PATRICK Bet-David had President-elect Donald Trump on his podcast, where he congratulated him for "killing the mainstream media."

"I did. I'm very proud of it, too," Trump responded.

It was classic Trump bombast that carried with it more than a kernel of truth. While the Trump may not have personally ended the media, defined for the purposes of this story as newspapers, TV, radio and the like—including the outlet you're reading—the press as a whole comes out of the election a far diminished force.

Elon Musk—the billionaire to whom Trump entrusted digital campaigning, evidently with success—broadened the point on Tuesday night when he also declared the media all but dead. "You are the media now," he told his 200 million followers on X.

On CNN, political commentator Scott Jennings, a former aide to President George W. Bush, outlined where he said the media had erred in the final weeks of the campaign.

"We have been sitting around for the last couple of weeks and the story that was portrayed was not true," he said. "We were told Puerto Rico was going to change the election. Liz Cheney, Nikki Haley voters, women lying to their husbands. Before that it was Tim Walz and the camo hats. Night after night after night we were told all these things and gimmicks were going to somehow push Harris over the line."

The path of traditional media's institutional collapse is really two intertwining stories: a breakdown of its business model exacerbated by a breakdown of influence, the extent of which became clear this campaign cycle. Behind it all lies a growing sense among Americans that the media cannot be trusted to tell them the news they believe is fair.