You’ve got to admire the legacy media’s commitment to pretending objectivity still exists—though not enough to believe it for a second. The bias is blatant, habitual, and well-earned, and it should be called out every time it rears its head.
Case in point: a Sunday morning story centered on a CBS interview conducted by Tony Dokoupil with Donald Trump:
The New York Times obtained audio from the moments that followed Trump’s interview with Dokoupil in Michigan on Tuesday, which included Leavitt warning, on behalf of the president, not to cut the tape.
“He said, ‘Make sure you guys don’t cut the tape, make sure the interview is out in full,” Leavitt said, according to the audio.
Dokoupil responded, according to recording obtained by The Times, “Yeah, we’re doing it, yeah.”
“He said, ‘If it’s not out in full, we’ll sue your a– off,'” Leavitt continued, according to the outlet.
JUST IN: White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt delivered a blunt warning straight from President Trump to CBS News anchor Tony Dokoupil and the network's team: Air the full, unedited 13-minute interview without cuts — or “we'll sue your a$$ off.” (Audio of the exchange… pic.twitter.com/9coIkKNJxd
— RedWave Press (@RedWave_Press) January 17, 2026
Okay, the Times did mention it was likely a joke:
The Times reported that some of the CBS staffers present believed the remarks were meant as a joke.
Dokoupil responded to Leavitt with humor and said, “He always says that!”
Kim Harvey, executive producer of “CBS Evening News,” was heard saying, “Oh, great, OK!”
CBS stated that they always planned to air the complete interview. However, the New York Times portrayed it as an attempt to control the media, suggesting that the outlet would be penalized if they “did not comply with her directives.”
It’s a ridiculous take, but that’s par for the course. They conveniently ignore CBS’s well-documented history of problematic editing, pretending concerns came out of thin air. Yes, there’s been a leadership change with Bari Weiss, but that doesn’t magically erase a record that made skepticism not only reasonable, but necessary.
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This is the same network that edited one of Kamala Harris’s trademark word salads during the campaign to make it more palatable for viewers. It’s also the same outlet whose 60 Minutes segment on the CECOT prison in El Salvador was set to air without including a current comment from the Trump administration—despite the administration having provided one. Weiss reportedly spiked the piece over that omission, though it still aired in Canada.
But the The New York Times’ spin only underscores how deep the bias still runs in parts of the media. If this is all supposedly a joke, why treat it like marching orders from a command center? And more to the point, why wouldn’t the full interview be shown? Shouldn’t transparency be the default—especially from outlets that never stop lecturing the public about it?
Karoline Leavitt has every right to insist the complete interview be released, just as CBS is right to make it available in full. Letting the public see everything and judge for themselves is called journalism—or at least, it used to be. That approach avoids selective edits, narrative massaging, and the kind of “context” that somehow always cuts in one ideological direction.
So what exactly is the problem with wanting the entire interview on the record? The objection itself is telling. Apparently, demanding full transparency is now framed as sinister—especially when it deprives media gatekeepers of the power to curate, sanitize, and spin. The truly bizarre take isn’t coming from the White House or CBS. It’s the idea that the public shouldn’t be allowed to see everything for themselves.
Donald Trump has demonstrated time and again that he isn’t afraid of interviews—even with openly hostile outlets. He shows up, answers questions, and lets the exchange speak for itself. That alone undercuts the tired narrative that transparency is somehow a threat to him.
So if The New York Times thought this angle would embarrass Trump or CBS, it completely misfired.
