Gulf of Fear

In China, Taiwan doesn’t exist—at least not as a country. On official maps, it’s a province. The government enforces strict language about Taiwan’s status, shaping how its people—and the rest of the world—talk about it. The goal, of course, is far more significant than the name on a map. It's not about semantics. It’s about wielding influence and asserting dominance. Controlling the language people use, particularly in relation to global geography, is a powerful capability to possess.

In the United States, that kind of top-down dictation might feel like a distant threat, the kind of thing that happens in authoritarian regimes or dystopian novels like "1984," not in a country built on free speech safeguarded by the First Amendment. Americans tend to believe our press is too independent and and too proud to ever bow to government pressure. We assume that if a president ever tried to dictate language, the Fourth Estate would resist. We assume that we’re immune from such pressures.

But an important segment of the press—the television news media—over the past week quietly demonstrated that it is far less adversarial and far more compliant than the breathless promos these networks air hyping themselves as fearless truth-tellers. When the eyes of the world fixated on the stranded NASA astronauts being rescued and touching down back on Earth, every channel danced around what precisely to call the body of water they splashed into. A review of transcripts, courtesy of SnapStream, revealed an alarming reality: not one of the outlets could muster up the courage to simply refer to it as the Gulf of Mexico, the water feature’s name since the 16th century.

Instead, television news organizations tied themselves in knots, performing linguistic gymnastics to stay out of Donald Trump’s crosshairs, while also tiptoeing around audiences who would have surely been incensed to see them bend the knee and call it the "Gulf of America." On ABC News, "World News Tonight" anchor David Muir referred to "spectacular images from off the coast of Florida." On the "NBC Nightly news," anchor Lester Holt spoke about the astronauts "splashing down off the Florida Gulf coast." On the "CBS Evening News," it was referred to simply as "the Gulf." And on CNN, anchor Jake Tapper tried to seemingly have it both ways, noting the U.S. government refers to it as the "Gulf of America," but the rest of the world calls it the Gulf of Mexico.

In fact, I could only one find instance on a television newscast where a journalist referred to the body of water as the Gulf of Mexico. During an appearance on MSNBC, NBC News correspondent Tom Costello used the term, but then quickly corrected himself, almost as if he had realized he was forbidden from doing so. “Six hours from right now, there will be a splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico,” he said, before backtracking. “Sorry, however you want to call the Gulf. It will be splashing down in the Gulf.”

Suffice to say, none of this was an accident. Television news organizations have standards departments that think hard about these sorts of issues and issue guidance about the network's positioning on them. In other words, each of the outlets made a willful decision to forgo referring to the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of Mexico. While it may have been performed in a subtle manner, make no mistake: It was still an act of submission.

Of course, it's not particularly hard to do the mathematics on this one. Trump made it clear that he will punish news organizations that do not fall in line on the matter when he banned The Associated Press from official White House events for refusing to bend the knee. Many news organizations—particularly the television networks which want their cameras at events and their correspondents broadcasting from the North Lawn—don't wish to risk losing access over the issue.

But it is an important one, particularly given how Trump has made his desire for land grabs no secret. In fact, Trump has openly talked about annexing Canada as the 51st state, seizing control of the Panama Canal, taking Greenland, and even perhaps claiming the Gaza Strip. Renaming the Gulf of Mexico may just be an early testing of the waters for him. What will news organizations do if he declares Greenland or the Panama Canal to be U.S. territory and mandates it be referred to as such? It might sound like a far-fetched example, but is it? All the reporting from these organizations has indicated that Trump is quite serious about taking land.

Executives at television news organizations may believe that avoiding a term like Gulf of Mexico is a fairly harmless concession. But there is no such thing when dealing with language. When the battle is over what words are permitted to be used, cute linguistic gymnastics amount to a surrender. Words are the front lines of truth, and once they’re ceded, it becomes far easier for strongmen like Trump to shape reality.

It can be uncomfortable to acknowledge, but authoritarianism can creep in slowly and quietly through softened language and adjusted maps. If American journalists flinch at merely calling a centuries-old body of water what it has always been known as, what will they flinch at next? History is full of regimes that began by controlling what people could say. The fact that some news organizations are showing so much deference to the Trump administration on such an important issue is significant. It may seem like a small choice—one name on a map—but capitulating on the issue is a crack in the Fourth Estate's foundation. And cracks, well, they have a way of spreading.

• What free speech? Elon Musk's X suspended the accounts of several opposition figures in Turkey amid unrest. [POLITICO]

  • Musk also said a "lawsuit" is "inbound" after former New York Rep. Jamaal Bowman referred to him as a "Nazi" on CNN. [Mediaite]

  • Meanwhile, Musk is set to “profit off billions in new government contracts,” per new reporting from Eric Lipton. It’s as if DOGE’s jurisdiction ends where Musk’s business interests begin. [NYT]

• Six Voice of America journalists sued Kari Lake and the Trump administration, alleging their First Amendment rights have been violated. [NPR]

• Dan Bongino's podcast saw a surge in viewership in February, before he exited to become deputy director of the FBI, per new data. [Radio Ink]

• Bill Maher revealed that he plans to meet Trump at the White House, a visit organized by Kid Rock. [Daily Beast]

• Rosie O'Donnell revealed she apologized to the Irish prime minister after Trump's "very, very surreal" Oval Office jab. [THR]

• RIP: Max Frankel, the celebrated journalist who served as executive editor of The NYT, died at his home. He was 94. [NYT]

• Graydon Carter, whose memoir hits shelves Tuesday, spoke to Jane Pauley on "Sunday Morning" about his career during the golden age of magazines—and what he’s been up to since exiting Vanity Fair. [CBS News]

• “Sesame Street” is “confronting what executives have described as a ‘perfect storm’ of problems,” with the program losing its HBO contract and Trump cutting grant money, John Koblin reported. [NYT]

• Jennifer Coolidge said she is "praying" Mike White and "The White Lotus" team offer "justice for Tanya," adding that Greg "needs to go down." [Deadline]

• Amanda Seyfried said "Jennifer's Body" was a "perfect" movie that was ruined by marketing that "sucked" and "cheapened" it. [Variety]

• Not a fairytale ending: Disney’s remake of “Snow White,” which has been widely-panned by critics and ensnared in controversy, opened to a sleepy $43 million in the U.S. [LAT]

  • As a reminder, updated projections—which reflected a dip in interest—put the film in the $45 million to $55 million range.

• Elsewhere, “Black Bag” took home $4.4 million; “Captain America” $4.1 million; “Mickey 17” $3.9 million; “Novocaine” $3.8 million; and “The Alto Knights” $3.2 million. [Box Office Mojo]

• In related news, Nicole Sperling noted how if Netflix’s “The Electric State,” the pricey action/adventure film from the Russo brothers, opened in theaters, it “would almost certainly” have been “declared a giant disappointment.” [NYT]