the more Donald Trump gets away with, if

he is allowed to pardon people and

there's not enough uproar about it and

nothing happens and he's going to um

pick he's going to arrest people without

due process on the streets or detain

them uh even if they're American

citizens.

>> Hi everyone, this is Pivot from New York

Magazine and the Fox Media Podcast

Network. I'm Cara Swisser

>> and I'm Scott Galloway.

>> Uh again Scott, we have to do an

emergency episode. This is getting kind

of ridiculous. uh we had to jump in here

to talk uh to our audience about what's

happening right now with journalists and

our friend Don Lemon right now. He was

recently on the show uh as a guest host

while you were away. Um but he was

arrested by authorities in Los Angeles

Thursday night where he was covering the

Grammy Awards um accused of violating

federal law tied to a protest he covered

as a journalist at a Minnesota church

earlier this month. Lemon and three

other journalists were arrested in

connection with with this uh this event

at the city's church in St. Paul,

Minnesota. Attorney General Pam Bondi

said she ordered the arrest of Don and

three others citing a connection to a

coordinated attack on the church. Don

has repeatedly said he was there as a

journalist, not a protester. And if you

watch what he did there, that's what he

was doing, including interviewing the

pastor and others. A magistrate judge

rejected an earlier attempt by the DOJ

to bring charges against Don uh and

other protesters. And the DOJ petitioned

a federal appeals court to force the

judge to issue an additional warrants

only to be denied. But the DOJ went

ahead anyway even though courts and

prosecutors within those offices in Los

Angeles and Minnesota are resisting

this. Lemon's lawyers called the attack

uh the arrest an attack on the First

Amendment obviously and says Lemon will

fight the case in court. He's supposed

to be uh arraigned uh today in Los

Angeles. Obviously, Don's a friend of

ours, a friend of mine. Um he's been uh

been reaching uh reaching out Pat when

he when he was fired from CNN. He and I

got to know each other because I helped

him sort of mount what he was doing,

which was independent journalism. And

I've been very proud of him what he's

been doing. He's doing a lot of street

journalism, taking his his uh microphone

to people, asking them questions. He's

built a big following on YouTube. I

think he crossed a million subscribers

recently. But what's what he's doing is

really amazing. He's doing these things

and what he does, he's a man on the

street essentially. And so he went into

this church while this event was taking

place and um and was doing reporting and

which a lot of reporters should do. You

know, I think he's found a new life in

doing it as an independent journalist.

And it's pretty um pretty amazing all

the stuff he's been doing. very varied

and talking to all kinds of people, not

just liberals and but conservatives. He

goes in places other journalists don't

go. Um, and I think it's a real value

what he's doing. And so he was doing

this here. Um, he was then it was the

Grammys. I mean, it's very varied where

he goes. Uh, he was in New Orleans for

New Year's and stuff. And so what he was

doing here was journalism. And because,

you know, he's had a target on him by

the Trump administration who never liked

him when he was at CNN. And uh and so

this is what they're doing. And they're

getting what they were getting is a lot

of pressure from church groups for this

group going into a church. And you can

debate whether they should have gone in

that church, but a journalist certainly

could follow a group of people in there.

He did not coordinate the attacks.

They're going to try to allege he did

that he was part of it. Um, but it's

really again part of this uh what I said

on in today's episode that just aired

was they're going to keep escalating

because they're desperate and they're

losing the public case. Um, and so part

of their their their uh handbook here,

the fascist handbook, is to attack

journalists. It's happened in Turkey.

It's happened in all manner of the

authoritarian countries. And this is

what you do. And uh and so doing these

high-profile cases, even though judges

and lawyers do not want to do this and

say it's full of which it is, um

is really frightening. Um and it's meant

to frighten. And what we have to do is

push back. We have to fight it. But the

fact is they will keep doing this and

they will not back out. They will not

deescalate. This is part of the the this

is part of the problem is you all think

you can work with these people and you

cannot. Uh any thoughts you have? I I'm

it makes me nervous. I have a lot of

people who have have been threatening to

me and uh it makes every journalist

who's doing any kind of speaking out um

really uh really at at risk I would say.

>> Yeah. I think it's important to

distinguish that this wasn't uh you know

50 people refusing to leave an area and

they get arrested one by one for

trespassing. This was our attorney

general, the federal government,

>> specifically targeting specific

journalists and essentially

>> deciding to criminalize journalism,

which

>> at the end of the day, it converts

politics into policing. And also,

>> this really should be a cause for alarm

be

>> well, it's the first step in state

capture of truth. They

>> they arrest journalists. That's kind of

the first step towards mass repression.

And it's not usually just journalists

that go after loud critics, polarizing

figures,

>> people that the public quite frankly are

already split on. So Don Lemon is a

controversial figure. A lot of people

don't like him and will celebrate this.

But once you normalize

>> criminalizing journalism from whatever

political spectrum,

>> the enforcement widens really fast. And

just some historical context,

>> this happened in Turkey in 2013. The

initial arrests were seen as quote

unquote law enforcement and within 5

years Turkey became the world's largest

jailer of journalists. Russia in the

2000s early cases targeted quote unquote

controversial reporters and the result

now is that Russia now ranks in the

bottom 10% globally for press freedom.

The other the you know I always go to

the money here. When a society starts

doing this, it almost always uh predates

economic collapse. Whether it's Egypt,

whether it's Hungary, this isn't a good

move for the economy because what

happens here is it's not the censorship

itself,

>> but it creates an environment of

selfcensorship where people stop

>> start spiking stories etc. And this

isn't also this line t

>> this the last thing I'll say this line

>> tends to be a difficult line

>> to cross back easily once you start

normalizing they did it in thear

republic they did it in Hong Kong once

you start normalizing the arrests of

journalists and controversial figures

it's it's a fast hill down and a slow

hill uh back

>> yeah I would agree I mean one of the

things that's really disturbing is it's

not just this arrest which is the

explicit version of it is what we're

talking about is the capture by these

tech billionaires of these institutions

that are sort of soft pedalling. Now,

there's one thing for Fox News. We know

they feel like a state propaganda arm

most of the time. Not always, but most

of the time, you know, I talked to a lot

of people, they call uh Fox News

entertainment, but it's actually

propaganda and and everyone kind of

expects it. In this case, there's this

sort of this slow burn whether it's Jeff

Bezos, you know, uh, you know, deepixing

the Kla Harris um, endorsement or ma or

or making changes or gutting out the

Washington Post, whether you have Larry

Ellison um, at through Oracle owning a

big chunk of Tik Tok and also changing

CBS News into this bothsiderism kind of

situation. Um it's it's that too, the

sort of soft grab of of press power

which happens in these places and then

this very hard grab which is to arrest

journalists. And you're right, they're

picking someone who they've had a beef

with for a long time who the you know

it's in a church. So it creates that

kind of like how dare he go in a church.

But this is where journalists go

everybody. I'm sorry. You can have your

you can this should be litigated through

the courts with the protesters whether

they trespassed or not, whether they

were on private property, but Don

Lemon's a journalist and he followed

them in there. And so, and frankly, more

journalists should have followed him in

there. The fact that he was one of the

few, there was just a few of them there.

And so when you're covering these

protests, often journalists get caught

up in um in the they don't get caught up

in the protests, but they're there when

there's um you know, say tear gas or

whatever. And they're often pushed to

the ground. They're often abused. I have

years ago I was in a there was a protest

at at a neo-Nazi rally in Germany and I

got hit with all kinds of things and it

was it's such a melee kind of stuff and

but John was if you go and watch it he

was interviewing people including people

at the church and while they may have

been offended by the fact that he was

there interviewing them he's allowed to

do that under the first amendment and it

let me just say the first amendment says

government shall make no law this is the

government acting

Um, again, it's it's really frightening.

And of course, Pam Bondi, the Justice

Department has been an arm of Donald

Trump, not the independent body. It is

it has long previously had been in terms

of of relationships with president. She

is a lackey. She all these people are

lackey um to to this authoritarian

experiment. And let me let me stress

Donald Trump's uh poll numbers are

tanking like tanking like astonishingly.

Everyone is worse and worse among all

kinds of groups of people. And so what

they have to do is this. And therefore

next week in Ohio, they're going to

they're going to make a spectacle of uh

Haitian immigrants there, try to get rid

of them because they lose their ability

to stay there. Then they're going to be

doing that. They're going to send ice in

with mass goons all over the place.

they're going to they go to Georgia and

do the election thing. This is not this

is all of one piece and journalists

attacking journalists is is is part of

it and they will they will double down

and double down and double down until

the midterms. And if they can stop those

midterms, they most certainly will. I

don't believe they can, but they will do

everything in their power to create

a a situation where they'll be able to

pull the Insures Act or whatever they

want to do so that they can suppress.

And the only good thing that you have

here is everybody is speaking out

against this. And secondly, um uh that

this is a big country. It's a little

harder to control this country. And as

you could see from what's happened in

Minneapolis, that is the kind of

reaction that you're going to get. These

those protests uh were largely peaceful.

People standing up, average citizens.

They can't keep pretending everybody is

a paid agitator. It's one of their

tricks. And it shows weakness, but it

also shows brutality and a kind of

strength that should be frightening to

all Americans. Um, I'm not going to get

on high of journalists and first

amendment, but hello, it's the first

amendment. We have a right to all the

amendments, all of all the bill of

rights, and slowly uh the Trump

administration is trying to take away

your constitutional rights. Uh, and

definitely just did that to Don Lemon

today.

>> I don't have a background in journalism.

you you immediately texted this morning,

you're obviously very rattled and upset

by this and I understand,

>> but as someone who's watching the whole

thing, but doesn't I don't have a lot of

familiarity with the First Amendment or

or a background in journalism, but what

I do perceive as the following, and that

is, let's be let's just call this what

what it is. The attorney general

appointed by the president isn't

arresting journalists to enforce laws.

She's arresting journalists to shape

reality. And once the state,

the way I see it, once the state decides

who may safely speak, politics stops

being a debate and it becomes a

permission structure. And also, as

someone who spends a lot of time

thinking and studying World War II and

20th century conflict history,

history around this around arresting

journalists is brutally consistent.

Countries that start arresting

journalists in targeted ways, they don't

become more stable. They don't become

more truthful or more democratic. They

become quieter. Then they become much

poorer

and then much angrier.

This is a cycle that repeats out

consistently. So if you want to be

poorer and you want to be angrier, you

let the immediate slide of targeted

arrested journalisms turn of journalists

turn into a chill and a quiet. If

there's not, history shows if there's

not immediate gag reflex push back that

forces the immediate rethinking and

withdrawal of targeted arrested

journalists. History is clear. It slides

fast. Selfcensorship

poor angrier.

>> Yep. And let me just say finally, do not

let them both sides this. Don't let

them. They're trying to do it with Alex

Pettit. They're trying to do it with

Renee Good. They're always trying to

find excuses for murder. They're trying

to find excuses for arresting

journalists. There aren't any here. Uh

and and our heart goes out to Don. I Don

Don's a friend. He's been a guest host

here. He's very brilliant. And he's

really working really hard to try to do

something different. And uh like him or

not, and I love him. uh you you really

have to be terrified for people

including and let me point out the

arrest the the ste the taking of the

Washington Post reporters uh file uh

computers and files without a word from

Jeff Bezos. I mean he's swanning around

Paris at fashion shows. This is where we

are folks and so pay attention.

>> Well just again I go to the economic

side of it. The fastest part of growing

part of our digital economy is a creator

economy. Yeah. And what does this mean

for all creators that you have some sort

of Orwellian environment where you can

only certain people can speak about

politics, politics

>> and and global issues whether it's

climate warming or the incel movement or

>> we're talking about you know free

speech. There's a wonderful

part of the economy developing where

people feel like they can express their

views.

>> Yep. And if somebody who leaves

traditional media and is successful in

the crater economy and ends up in jail

because of the viewpoint seems to be

crosshaird with the current

administration. I mean you can just see

how this begins immediately to start to

damage the economy and also what kind of

message does this send to young people

that you have the opportunity to speak

out and create your own content only if

it's the right type of content. There's

a basic tenant of democratic societies

and it's the following and it's simple

and it's you know but it's very

straightforward and that is the

following. Pretty much anybody should be

able to say pretty much anything about

pretty much anyone else. That's it. And

we have revered that and we have

protected it. And the moment the moment

that falls, it is really hard to put

Humpty Dumpty back together again.

>> Absolutely. I mean, I like that you're

actually focusing in on the on the on

the business part of it because it's

important, too. It's easy to get, you

know, a high dudge in here, which I

have, but you're right. It this is an

exciting part of the economy. And um and

and the fact that that they're doing

this is just typical. This is so we are

hungry. We're becoming hungry. We're

becoming, you know, this soft descent

into hungry. I don't know what else to

say. It's so ridiculous. and and and uh

fiction. I'm looking up just uh the

first amendment. I'm just going to read

it for people for goodness sake. Let me

uh I'm just going to do it. Cong. It's

very short, Scott. And it's first, so

it's super easy. Congress shall make no

law respecting the establishment of

religion or prohibiting the free

exercise thereof or abridging the

freedom of speech or of the press or of

the right of the people peaceibly to

assemble and to petition the government

for redress of grievances. Well, folks,

we're agrieved and we're going to

petition them for that. Anyway, Don,

we're thinking

>> we're going to continue to piece

peaceibly assemble.

>> Yes, and we are. You know why it's

first? Because it's best. Anyway, uh I

appreciate it, Scott. Thank you so much.

I was super rattled this morning. And my

good friend Scott uh as usual has some

amazing insights and it's really

important that we keep at this. And if I

get arrested, Scott, will you come and

get me? Will you come? I I'm literally

I'm proud to say and this goes for you.

I'm people's jail call. I always carry a

ton of cash and I'm a night person.

So I'll come down anywhere late at night

with a bunch of cash and all like that.

>> A lot of discretion, no questions asked.

I'm your call, Cara.

>> All right. Thanks, Scott.

>> There you go.

>> All right, everybody. Thank you very

much again. That's the Emergency Show.

Thanks for listening to Pivot. Be sure

to like and subscribe to our YouTube

channel. We'll be back with a full show

on Tuesday.