Year four of Ukraine war was 'the grimmest yet'
This week marks the fourth anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
For Ukraine’s investigative journalists, the fourth year “was the grimmest yet,” the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project says in this new report.
“Many journalists describe finding comfort in solidarity, texting each other late into the night as they brace for Russian rockets to land,” Ilya Lozovsky writes. “Others take antidepressants or religiously attend therapy. But sometimes none of it is enough; and the breaking point can come at unexpected moments.” I highly recommend reading the whole thing.
CNN’s Clarissa Ward, who interviewed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv this week, said on “CNN News Central” that he was “quite emotional at times. There’s no question that this war has taken a huge toll on its people, and you can really feel it right now. There’s a palpable difference. The morale is the lowest I have ever seen it. President Zelensky says that he feels it acutely and he feels a strong responsibility to try to end the war.” Read/watch some of the interview here…
As Bianna Golodryga noted on “Amanpour” yesterday, “It’s not just soldiers and civilians caught up in this deadly war. More than 20 journalists and media workers have been killed in Ukraine, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.” This week Reporters Without Borders filed a fresh complaint against the Kremlin “based on the grounds of crimes against humanity — notably persecution — against journalists in Ukraine, who are being targeted due to their work.” Golodryga interviewed the makers of a new documentary short, “Armed Only With a Camera,” about the life and death of Brent Renaud, who was killed in an ambush shortly after the war began. The 39-minute film is streaming on HBO Max. Juan Arredondo, who was shot in the same attack, produced the film and told Golodryga that the past few years have made him “more convinced that what we do matters.” “You know, we have to be present. I think Brent understood that,” he said. Journalists know “that we won’t stop violence, but we’ll make denial much harder, and it will create a record. What we hope to accomplish with our work is to create a record so it won’t be easily erased.” |
I noticed The Washington Post’s Ukraine bureau chief Siobhán O’Grady sharing her piece pegged to the anniversary — “As invasion enters fifth year, the children of Ukraine learn to fight back” — along with this note: “This is one of my last articles for The Washington Post. The incredible photography is by Carolyn Van Houten, who was also laid off. No full-time staff who were in Kyiv on Feb. 24, 2022 for The Post are still with the paper.” Ukraine correspondent Lizzie Johnson was also laid off. The Post has a small team of local hires still working in the country, I’m told. |
‘Record’ # of press killed worldwide |
Liam Reilly writes: A new report from the Committee to Protect Journalists, out this morning, shows that “a record 129 journalists and media workers were killed worldwide in 2025,” with Israel accounting for over two-thirds of those deaths. CPJ’s report also found that the number of journalists killed by drones has risen, going from two in 2023 to 39 in 2025. >> “In Ukraine, four journalists were killed by Russian military drones, the highest annual number of journalist deaths in the war since 15 were killed in 2022,” CPJ says. |
Long speech, short impact? |
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Every political junkie has a “take” on last night’s record-long State of the Union speech, so I’ll just highlight Ariel Edwards-Levy and Jennifer Agiesta’s point in their story about CNN’s poll of speech watchers: “While State of the Union addresses have long been seen as a chance for the president to shift public perception of his efforts, history suggests that the speech is unlikely to have much effect on Trump’s standing with Americans. Annual presidential addresses rarely lead to significant shifts in presidential approval among the broader US public, particularly in recent years.” It was less a speech than a performance, as Abby Phillip observed afterward: “They had planned the speech to be an interactive experience between him and the audience,” with announcements, surprises, and “emotional moments.” “From a fact-check perspective,” CNN’s Daniel Dale wrote, there was “less lying than in a totally-off-script Trump speech, but still a lot of lying. The economy was the single subject with the largest number of false and misleading claims.” Here’s his recap. >> As a Reliable reader pointed out, Turner Classic Movies ran “Gaslight” at the same time Trump delivered his address. “Coincidental? Intentional? Whatever the case IMO it’s spot on,” the reader wrote. |
Judge blocks DOJ’s WaPo device search |
Yesterday, a federal judge ruled that the Justice Department may not search through Washington Post reporter Hannah Natanson’s devices. And the judge “was highly critical of the government’s approach in the case,” CNN’s Devan Cole reports. Read Cole’s full summary of the ruling here. “The court had a choice between carefully protecting a reporter’s confidential sources and simply letting the government riffle through Natanson’s devices. It made the right call — and the constitutionally appropriate one – by taking it upon itself to review the material and in ordering that information unrelated to the underlying investigation will be returned to Natanson,” Gabe Rottman of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press told me. |
Are other outlets hesitant to publish leaks? |
Seth Stern of the Freedom of the Press Foundation said last night, “The government’s alarming raid of Natanson’s home and seizure of terabytes of data stopped countless important stories from being told, both by Natanson herself and the news outlets that likely hesitated to publish important leaks after seeing what happened to her.” |
Paramount ups offer, puts ball in Netflix’s court |
What will Netflix do now? Yesterday afternoon, Warner Bros. Discovery said Paramount’s latest bid came in at $31 per share and contained some significant sweeteners, like a “$7 billion regulatory termination fee.” WBD’s board said the bid might be better than Netflix’s, so it is extending the window with Paramount. “Clearly, WBD has been told or is inferring Paramount’s $31/share offer is still not the company’s ‘best and final’ offer,” CNBC’s Alex Sherman concluded. And/but the $31 bid news barely moved WBD’s stock, which is hovering around $29, suggesting a lack of investor consensus that Paramount will prevail. >> Here’s the other key thing: Netflix doesn’t have to wait for another statement from WBD to come in and match Paramount. It could theoretically revise its bid at any time. Full story here… |
David Ellison’s SOTU cameo |
Rather than inviting a hometown hero or local activist to the SOTU, Sen. Lindsey Graham invited Paramount CEO David Ellison, which got many media tongues wagging. Playbook lumped him in with some interesting names this morning: “Conservative media stars were all around. Fox News’ Maria Bartiromo and YouTuber Nick Shirley both got seats in the visitors’ gallery, while Paramount boss David Ellison landed a seat in the front row.” As you know, Ellison has been seeking support in DC as Paramount asserts that its bid will win regulator approval while the Netflix deal will struggle. Netflix rejects that argument. 🔌: I’m on this week’s episode of “Channels with Peter Kafka” podcast assessing “the Trump Media Shakedown Era…” |
👀 What will Anthropic do? |
CNN’s Hadas Gold with one of the most important stories of the year: “Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth gave Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei a Friday deadline to comply with demands to peel back safeguards on its AI model or risk losing a Pentagon contract. He also threatened to put the AI company on what could amount to a government blacklist.” A source tells Gold that Anthropic has no plans to budge on their red lines… |
The news brand “is launching in Australia later this year, hoping to carve out a niche for political obsessives and insiders in Canberra the way the publication has taken hold in global centers like Washington and Brussels,” Semafor’s Max Tani reports. >> Speaking of… “Politico’s leadership said the news organization has not seen federal government subscriptions return in a ‘meaningful way’ after DOGE pressure forced many agencies to cancel their Politico Pro subscriptions,” Tani tweeted. >> One of the many remarkable things about last night’s SOTU: No mention of DOGE at all. |
Checking the FCC’s mailbox… |
It’s always insightful when a reporter uses the Freedom of Information Act to check out the feedback the FCC is receiving. The Hill’s Judy Kurtz culled through the 1,645 complaints related to Kimmelgate last year, and found that the “vast majority” were critical of Brendan Carr and the FCC, “accusing them of bowing to Trump.” Here’s a sampling of the comments. Interesting twist: The Hill is owned by Nexstar, which helped trigger the entire episode… |
>> “MAGA YouTuber Nick Shirley went to California to find voter fraud and all he got was a lousy community note on X for putting out a totally misleading video about it,” Matt Cohen says. (Democracy Docket) >> A churchgoer has sued Don Lemon and a group of protesters “for ‘severe emotional distress’ following the January ‘ICE Out’ protest inside a Minneapolis church,” Tess Patton reports. (TheWrap) >> “Rep. Jasmine Crockett is taking a harder line on the political journalists covering her Texas Senate campaign,” including allegedly ejecting an Atlantic reporter from a recent event, the aforementioned Max Tani reports. (Semafor) >> “Just over four months after inking a two-year contract extension, Kristina Schake is exiting as Disney’s chief communications officer” at the same time as CEO Bob Iger. (Deadline) |
More of today’s tech talk |
>> South Korea’s three major terrestrial broadcasters — KBS, MBC and SBS — have “filed a lawsuit against OpenAI.” (Korea Herald) >> “YouTube is expanding its more affordable, $7.99 per month Premium Lite subscription service with new features, including the ability to download videos for offline access and watch videos in the background.” (TechCrunch) >> Roku’s “push into advertising and subscription services has helped the streaming platform return to full-year profitability for the first time since the days when pandemic lockdowns gave its business a boost.” (WSJ) >> “Apple is launching new tools to comply with the growing number of age-verification laws both in the U.S. and abroad.” (TechCrunch) >> Discord, meanwhile, “is postponing its controversial age verification policy after receiving swift backlash from users with concerns about their privacy.” (AP) |
BBC could have ‘worked harder’ to stop N-word broadcast |
John Davidson, the Tourette’s syndrome activist who shouted the N-word during Sunday’s BAFTA awards, told Variety’s Clayton Davis the BBC could have “worked harder to prevent anything that I said … from being included in the broadcast.” In an exclusive interview, Davidson said that “the awards were, in all honesty, just a heightened version of my everyday life and are the reason why, for many periods in my life, I have been fearful of leaving the house.” Read the full interview here… |
A few Hollywood headlines |
>> Bob Iger isn’t interested in leading the LA28 Olympics committee if Casey Wasserman steps down, nor has he been officially approached, Ben Lindsay and Sharon Waxman report. (TheWrap) >> Phil Lord and Christopher Miller’s “Project Hail Mary” is being hailed as the “first great blockbuster of 2026.” Jeff Bezos, whose Amazon MGM Studios is distributing the film domestically, of course, fully agrees. (Variety) >> “Sony Pictures chairman and CEO Tom Rothman confirms the studio is planning a ‘fresh reboot’ to the Spider-Man extended universe after the franchise’s string of box office disappointments.” (THR) |