‘Steal This Story, Please!’: New doc highlights Amy Goodman’s journalism, telling truth to power

0:01 Today we recognize World Press Freedom Itomes at a moment

0:03 when press freedom is at a 25-year low, according to Reporters Without Borders.

0:06 Now at a moment when journalists face

0:08 intensifying threats and media consolidation ramps up,

0:11 a new documentary tells the story of journalist Amy Goodman,

0:14 the host of the independent daily news show, Democracy Now!,

0:17 who has spent the last three decades doggedly holding the powerful to account.

0:21 Here's a clip from the trailer of Steal This Story, Please.

0:28 IMPRESSIONS OF THE TAMING.

0:29 WHAT DID YOU SAY TO THOSE WHO SAY THAT YOU ARE A WAR CRIMINAL?

0:32 MAN, SHE DOESN'T CARE WHAT ANYBODY THINKS.

0:33 DON'T PUSH ME.

0:34 I'M A JOURNALIST HERE.

0:35 INDEPENDENT MEDIA IS THE OXYGEN OF A DEMOCRACY.

0:41 JOINS US NOW, SHE'S THE HOST AND EXECUTIVE PRODUCER OF DEMOCRACY NOW.

0:45 YOU JUST CELEBRATED 30 YEARS, AN INCREDIBLE MILESTONE,

0:48 AMY, FOR ANY JOURNALIST, LET ALONE INDEPENDENT JOURNALISTS.

0:51 BUT I WANT YOU TO KIND OF reflect on this moment

0:54 that we find ourselves in, having seen the past 30 years,

0:57 and whether or not it is more difficult now

1:00 to operate in an independent media environment or harder.

1:05 given the fact that you have a president

1:07 who's going after journalists and media organizations.

1:10 Right.

1:11 We have a president who calls the press the enemy of the people.

1:14 That is extremely dangerous.

1:17 There's a reason why freedom of the press

1:20 is enshrined in the First Amendment of the Constitution.

1:22 It is essential to the functioning of a democratic society.

1:26 And the flip side of that is the public's right to know.

1:30 That's why we are here.

1:32 And then people can make up their own minds.

1:34 But the idea that this is under assault is extremely dangerous for democracy.

1:42 And we have to take it extremely seriously.

1:44 But is it harder for you as an independent

1:46 journalist now over the past 30 years?

1:48 Or do you find it easier right now?

1:51 I don't know if easier is the right word,

1:52 but are you finding that there's more public support coming

1:54 from individuals and the way that democracy now is supported?

1:58 Well, democracy now supported by a global audience of readers,

2:02 listeners and viewers.

2:04 It's on 1500 public radio and television

2:05 stations around the world, but also online.

2:09 But, you know, the The Trump administration

2:12 has zeroed out the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

2:17 And as this film, Steal This Story, Please, has come out,

2:20 we go around the country and do the Q &As afterwards,

2:24 but hold fundraisers for public television and public radio.

2:29 Especially the poorest stations and Native American reservations on rural areas.

2:36 I am really concerned that these stations are going to close.

2:39 There's a reason why the CPB was set up.

2:43 In the 1960s, you had Johnson.

2:46 Bill Moyers was in the White House.

2:49 And the media activists said, with the hyper-commercialization of the media,

2:53 we need to protect an educational public space.

2:57 And now they have just eviscerated that.

3:00 It's really serious.

3:02 Well, at the same time that public media has been defunded and is under attack,

3:08 you've also seen the proliferation of a lot

3:11 of citizen journalists and sort of like micro pro-journalistic organizations,

3:17 people who are influencers on platforms like TikTok or Instagram.

3:21 How do you think that has changed journalism as an industry or the kinds

3:27 of information that Americans are able to or in fact seek out?

3:32 I mean, we could never have predicted the way

3:36 the social media platforms have come into being.

3:40 And there THERE IS A LOT GOOD, I THINK, IN THIS.

3:43 YOU KNOW, AT DEMOCRACY NOW IT'S 8 TO 9 EVERY

3:45 MORNING AND CLASSES COME IN FROM AROUND NEW YORK CITY,

3:48 MAYBE HIGH SCHOOLERS, JOURNALISM STUDENTS,

3:51 MID-YEAR JOURNALISTS FROM AROUND the world.

3:55 And I always say to them that on the one hand,

3:58 we can get more information, not from the traditional gatekeepers.

4:03 That's what the internet has provided and social media of platforms.

4:06 On the other hand, it can be a global rumor mill and we

4:10 all know with young people they can just get surrounded by silos of hate.

4:16 So how do you find TRUSTWORTHY INFORMATION.

4:20 DEMOCRACYNOW .ORG IS A GREAT WAY TO GO TO AS A KIND

4:24 OF GATEWAY FOR SEEING WHAT PEOPLE ARE DOING ALL OVER THE WORLD,

4:27 REPORTERS KNOW NO BORDERS.

4:29 WE ARE A GLOBAL NEWS ORGANIZATION, AND WHAT WE DO MOSTLY IS BRING OUT THE VOICES

4:36 OF PEOPLE AT THE GRASSROOTS WHO ARE CLOSEST TO THE STORY,

4:40 NOT YOUR TYPICAL PUNDITS WHO KNOW SO LITTLE ABOUT SO

4:43 much explaining the world to us and getting it so wrong,

4:46 but the people who are affected most.

4:49 And it's trying to figure out, as I say to these students,

4:54 you know what exactly you can trust,

4:57 and doing really just the tenets of good journalism, being fair and accurate.

5:04 When someone can't tell their own story, maybe their livelihood is threatened.

5:08 Maybe they have been disappeared.

5:10 Family member has been killed.

5:11 You find someone else who's close to that.

5:14 And, you know, I always talk about going to where the silence is.

5:20 That is our job as journalists and sometimes it's not so quiet.

5:25 It's raucous, it's rowdy, people are organizing but it doesn't hit the corporate

5:29 media radar screen and that's where we live.

5:32 You've been YOU HAVE BEEN REMARKABLY CONSISTENT OVER THE COURSE OF YOUR CAREER.

5:37 PEOPLE CAN TUNE INTO DEMOCRACY NOW AND THEY

5:40 KNOW WHAT TO EXPECT AND THEY KNOW HOW

5:43 YOU ARE YOU'RE GOING TO QUESTION AN INTERVIEW

5:45 OR THE PERSON YOU'RE INTERVIEWING WITHOUT FEAR OF FAVOR.

5:49 WHAT HAS DRIVEN YOU AND WHAT MOTIVATES YOU THROUGHOUT YOUR CAREER?

5:53 TO HOLD THOSE IN POWER TO ACCOUNT, THAT'S OUR JOB AS JOURNALISTS.

5:57 WE'RE NOT THERE TO WIN A POPULARITY CONTEST.

5:59 WE'RE NOT A PARTY TO THE PARTIES.

6:01 WHETHER I'M QUESTIONING FORMER THE LATE PRESIDENT GEORGE H .W.

6:07 BUSH OR PRESIDENT CLINTON, WHETHER WE ARE TALKING WITH PUBLIC OFFICIALS TODAY.

6:12 IT'S TO GET AT THE TRUTH OR IN MANY CASES THERE ARE TRUTHS.

6:17 I'M NOT TALKING ABOUT I DON'T KNOW ABOUT FACTS

6:20 THAT ARE JUST SOLID AND YOU REALLY CAN'T QUESTION THEM,

6:23 BUT but hearing how people perceive things.

6:27 And I think the most important thing is talking

6:30 to people at the target end of, in our case,

6:33 the most powerful country on earth, the United States, of foreign policy.

6:37 So when you have the U .S.-Israeli war in Iran,

6:40 you're talking to Iranians, Iranian professors, academics, poets,

6:43 when we're talking about the hundreds of journalists who've died in Gaza,

6:48 talking to people in Gaza,

6:50 Palestinians talking to Israeli peace activists going to the heart of the story.

6:56 That's why we call Democracy Now!

6:57 News with a heart, the exception to the rulers.

7:01 Amy Goodman, thanks so much, and congrats on the documentary.

7:04 Thank you.

7:05 coming up.