. >> i want to bring into our conversation marty baron. ington post won a pulitzer prize for its coverage of russia's interference in america's elections. marty, it's an honor to have you here. i just want to read some of the headlines of the stories that were submitted for the for the pulitzer that the washington post won. national security adviser mike flynn discussed sanctions with russian ambassador, despite denials. pete sessions, then the attorney general, met with russian envoy twice last year, encounters he later did not disclose. trump asked intelligence chiefs to push back against fbi collusion probe after comey revealed its existence. doubting the intel, trump pursues putin and leaves the russia threat unchecked. all those stories. groundbreaking at the time, sort of a stop. whatever we were talking about when they when they broke. and still true and still very much animating everything donald trump does in that oval office, including to today when he said, quote, vladimir putin and i, we went through the hoax together, still cal

marty baron, thank you so much for being with us. we so greatly appreciate it. vandehei, you you also worked at the washington post. tell me about your thoughts about what happened yesterday when you saw the directive, and expand that out a little bit and talk about these conglomerates, you know, like, for instance, the possibility that paramount may settle a deal on 60 minutes lawsuit when 60 minutes stands by its story, but they've got a deal that they want to get through. so, you know, there's been some talk that that they might do that. talk about how all of this plays into blurred lines in the age of trump. >> listen, i come at this as someone who worked at the post 20 years ago, someone who, you know, helped co-found politico and axios. so i also think about it from like the ownership perspective. one, i think you have a lot of owners of media companies who are buckling to pressure. it's indisputable. you can't really debate it. i think the institutions themselves are still doing good journalism, but owners are buckling. it is it is what it is. and we have

under marty baron for years. he was not an anti jeff bezos person. in fact, they worked extremely closely together. here's what he said to the daily beast today. he said there is no doubt in my mind that he is doing this out of fear of the consequences for his other business interests. amazon, the source of his wealth, and blue origin, which represents his lifelong passion for space exploration. he has prioritized those commercial interests over the post, and he is betraying the post's long standing principles to do so. you can't not take that seriously as a possibility here. >> no. of course. i mean, this is what's going on. billionaires have too much control over our media and are bringing their business concerns into our media. he can, as far as the human right of an owner to do what? but this is an incredible responsibility. or at least we used to think about it that way to own a important piece of the media, a legacy piece of media. to treat it this way is to. use it to. >> well, it's a commodity. it's anoth

marty baron, former executive editor, famed former executive editor of the washington post, joins me e's the author of the book collision of power trump, bezos, and the washington post. marty, you worked at the post for nearly a decade. some of the most important successful years. you once praised jeff bezos for how he stood up for the post during your tenure. what do you make of what's happening right now? yesterday's move? >> well, i'm very concerned about it because of what it represents. you know. jeff talked about standing for personal liberties. i actually don't know any columns that ran in the washington post that were against personal liberties. but the personal liberties that i often think about is one that's embedded in the first amendment, and that is free expression. and one of the ways that news organizations honored free expression and promoted public debate was to have a wide variety of opinions on their opinion pages. >> and now. >> jeff bezos is. saying there will be a limited set of opinions on the opinion pages. in fact, it will be limited to opinions that are in li

. >> editor marty baron spoke out today, saying he believes. >> bezos is prioritizing his own business. >> interests at amazon and blue origin. >> ahead of the post. baron calls this. >> a betrayal. other post veterans. are also speaking out. >> today. >> saying they believe. >> bezos is. >> trying to appeal. >> to president trump and. >> the trump administration. >> after all, the administration can. >> either. help or hurt. >> bezos businesses a lot based on the decisions the. >> administration makes interesting. the white house on another media issue announced this week it will no longer allow an independently chosen press pool to cover the president, and will instead include which journalists are granted access. the white house correspondents association released a statement about this change, saying, and i'm quoting now, this move tears at the independence of a free press in the united states. it suggests the government will choose the journalists who cover the president in a free country, leaders must not be able to choose their own press corps. so, brian, how do you think this c

and we're talking to marty baron about this yesterday, which is for you and for your colleagues in the. what does this mean for you when you sit down to write a column today, for example, you're writing about elon musk and a rebellion that he has created within the trump administration already among some cabinet officials. does that fit into personal liberties and free markets? in other words, is your job changing? >> i look, i wrote that column earlier this week before this, before this dropped. so i have literally no idea. i don't know who's going to run be running the section after today. today is david shipley's last day. as of last night, as of the last time i checked my phone, we had not been informed what any sort of interim arrangement is for running the opinion section, so i have no idea. and let me put one other thing out there, because we like to keep it real on morning joe. i mean, many readers are taking this this move by jeff as another step in a process of trying to get on the right side of donald trump, of, of, of essentially shifting our page to the right in order to c