Why Should Legacy Media Burst Trump's Balloon When It Can Feed Oxygen to its Favorite Foil?

Is the report in today’s Los Angeles Times on a fundraiser for Donald Trump in Silicon Valley another case of mindless stenography masquerading as journalism? Or one more clue that nobody wants MAGA back more than “progressive” media outlets in need of cyber meat??

“A gathering of tech’s conservative cohort enjoyed a visit from former President Trump on Thursday evening at a tony fundraiser held at venture capitalist David Sacks’ San Francisco home. The estate, nestled on Billionaires’ Row in Pacific Heights, welcomed about 80 elites to the sold-out event. Cost of admission: up to $300,000 per person and $500,000 per couple, according to an invitation obtained by The Times.”

What’s the problem? This seems to be a just-the-facts approach to a significant event with direct bearing on the upcoming presidential election.

The problem starts after the introduction of a woman named Harmeet Dhillon, whose Trumpian hyperbole was passed along to readers with an Orwellian description of her duties as an “official legal surrogate of the Trump campaign.”

Dhillon managed to set the tone of a big night for Trump by emphasizing details that are generally routine and obvious on the political fundraising scene. She cited the event’s “high-quality networking” (hey, L.A. Times reporters and editors, you had that at “80 elites”). There was her notation of the “very beautiful private home” (Give some over-the-top details or simply let “Billionaires Row” speak for itself). Then Dhillon really played the “legal surrogate,” doling out the observation that the fundraiser was “totally packed” (That’s a claim that is inherently dependent on the size of the room, by the way—and I’m guessing that some space at any mansion on any Billionaires Row could be configured to make a crowd of any size look like a full house).

All of that gives me the sneaking suspicion that no one from the L.A. Times was in the room—I can't tell for certain because there is no such disclosure in the story, nor is it contextually obvious from the report. In any case, the piece reads as though the publication had a reporter outside watching arrivals but counted on Trump’s “official legal surrogate” for details of the actual event.

First Concerns First

That’s a secondary concern at this point, though. The primary concern comes in the next sentence:

“The gathering raised $12 million, Dhillon added.

Here’s some basic math: 80 people at the $300,000 price of admission would come to $24 million. If couples who paid $500,000 accounted for the whole crowd it would come to $20 million.

That’s a long way from $12 million.

Please bear this in mind as you consider that gap: Donald Trump has a well-documented record of twisting the truth in ways that range from sloppy to uncouth. He also, however, has a parallel record of peppering his communications with key words or phrases that set up escape clauses of plausible deniability or squeeze benefits out of narrow, technical truths wrapped in misleading context.

The media in general has been vocal about Trump’s slippery communications for years now. There’s no reason for any journalistic organization to be unaware.

That is especially true in this instance, because the L.A. Times put four reporters on the story about the San Francisco fundraiser and still missed Trump’s trick.

Trumpian Escape Clause

The key phrase deployed by Trump this time was “up to”—check this sentence again:

“Cost of admission: up to $300,000 per person and $500,000 per couple, according to an invitation obtained by The Times.”

“Up to” makes for plausible deniability. Trump set out to create the impression of big money on the basis of ticket prices of $300,000 and more. Then he doubled down with the $12 million total.

A $300,000 ticket and a one-night haul of $12 million both sound big to the vast majority of Americans.

?The bit about “up to” makes it all technically correct.

It’s not necessarily accurate by context or fact, though, and a reporter in the room might have discovered that there were a lot of freebies in the mix. That might have led to a story that burst Trump’s bubble instead of giving him more oxygen.

What if the L.A. Times has written this:

Donald Trump pulled $12 million in campaign donations out of Silicon Valley, about halfway to the high hopes he apparently pinned on a posse of tech heavyweights gathered at a mansion on Billionaires Row in San Franciso.?????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????

Invitations to the event listed ticket prices of “up to $300,000 for individuals and $500,000 for couples.” Harmeet Dhillon, a local attorney and Republican Party insider with ties to the Trump campaign, said there were about 80 people at the event—a crowd that would have accounted for somewhere between $20 million and $24 million at the ticket prices listed.

Dhillon confirmed the $12 million total take for the event.

Now consider some questions that should follow, with answers placed in proper context:

• Is $12 million still a lot of money?
• How does President Joe Biden’s recent fundraising from Big Tech compare?
• Have the political needs or desires of traditionally Democratic Big Tech and Silicon Valley changed sufficiently to realign its politics?

All of those are fair—but none was addressed clearly in the story.

Instead we got Trump, dollar signs and a Big Tech scene served up neatly by a surrogate of the former president.

How accurate any of the story is—in fact or context—remains unknown.

Failure of Journalism or Faltering Business Model?

That leads us back to the questions we started with: Is this a failure of journalistic effort and skill? Or does it reflect just how badly some faltering legacy media outlets seem to need Trump as part of last-ditch hopes of selling subscriptions?

Keep this in mind the next time a roundtable of journalists and political operatives keep scratching their heads while parsing the Trump phenomenon. Such mental meanderings no longer qualify as political analysis—just cheap content.

That helps explain why Trump still exists as a political force.

And why so many legacy media outfits are fading fast.

Chicken-and-egg?

More like a couple of chickens at this point.