Don Lemon: ‘People are now paying attention to who controls the media’
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The former CNN anchor tells The News Agents about the concerning influence white billionaires have on the media, and how Trump used the changing news landscape to his advantage.
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In brief…
- Don Lemon says that following the US election, people are paying attention to how the media works to influence politics.
- Emily Maitlis suggests this has always been the case, but in the social media age, this is now being done “in the open”.
- Lemon also attributes some of Donald Trump’s success with US voters to how he was able to harness new media opportunities and reach previously untapped audiences.
Who controls the media?
Don Lemon is a man who knows more than most about how the media works.
After nine years as a CNN host, he moved to Twitter/X to work exclusively on Elon Musk’s social media platform – but his role was terminated before his first interview was even broadcast.
That first interview was with Musk.
Lemon tells The News Agents that since Musk’s appointment to a role advising Donald Trump’s new US administration, people are now “paying attention” to who controls the media and the information we see online.
“I think there's a concern overall, beyond Twitter or X or whatever you want to call it, about the influence private citizens have over our media,” he says.
“You have these really wealthy people controlling our corporate media and who are controlling our social media. Americans should be aware, and it should be a concern to everyone.
"It's just a small group of mostly billionaire white men who are in control of the media."
Lemon names Larry Ellison of Oracle Software, David Zaslav of Warner Bros. Discovery, billionaire businessman John Malone, Rupert Murdoch of News Corp, Mark Zuckerberg of Meta – along with Musk – as some of those influential billionaires.
Don Lemon on how media helped Trump win the election
What’s new about Musk’s relationship with the next US administration?
Lemon says Musk's new role as co-head of Trump's Department of Government Efficiency would be like Rupert Murdoch working for the UK government.
But, Emily Maitlis says that Murdoch, the News Corp media mogul, has always "wooed" the UK Prime Minister. She suggests these media titans are now simply trying to exert influence "in the open air".
"There are figures throughout history who have made an art of cozying up to power and benefiting from it, not just Elon Musk,” Lemon says.
“Social media adds another layer on top of that, because you can set that algorithm to whatever you want.”
“You can boost or throttle whatever content that you want to be elevated or amplified, or content that you want to squash.”
During the 2024 election campaign, Musk shared disinformation with his 200 million Twitter/X followers, appeared with Trump at rallies, donated millions to the Republican campaign and gave away millions to voters who supported a political petition he was involved in.
How has Donald Trump harnessed the changing media landscape?
But the change in the media landscape hasn't just benefitted the men running it, Lemon argues. He believes one of the big successes of Donald Trump's election campaign was how it harnessed new platforms and voices to reach new audiences.
"Trump amplified new folks through social media, through digital media, through podcasts, through streamers and influencers," Lemon says.
"I believe that the Democrats were preaching to the choir. They were going on MSNBC, CNN, ABC and CBS and all of those things, with constituents that were already in their camp, people who were 65 and older who were already going to vote for them.
"And I think that Donald Trump discovered a new audience and a new part of the electorate by speaking with controversial figures in streaming, the Joe Rogans of the world."
While Trump reached huge numbers of potential voters by appearing on less conventional platforms, Kamala Harris's campaign instead focused on celebrity supporters – including Beyonce, Lady Gaga, Katy Perry and more at her rallies – despite this tactic having previously failed Hillary Clinton in 2016.
Harris appeared on the Call Her Daddy podcast, but was mostly seen campaigning on the ground or on traditional media outlets. Lemon suggests this was in part due to the lack of podcasts and other outlets with the same reach on the left as the likes of Joe Rogan has on the right.
"There are barely any figures on the left who have that much influence on social and on digital," he says.
"These sort of conservative, right-wing bros were pioneers to the space, and they have really garnered the biggest slice of the pie, created a huge audience and have a huge influence in a way that centrists or liberals have not been able to.
"Donald Trump was very aware of that."
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