S&P 500 rises 0.9 percent as major players including Apple and Tesla see gains.
The US stock market has hit a record high after a string of downbeat trading sessions.
All three leading stock indexes rose on Wednesday, ending a three-day lull.
The S&P 500, which tracks the performance of 500 of the largest US companies, finished up 0.9 percent on Wednesday, surpassing last week’s record.
The rise leaves the benchmark index up more than 10 percent so far in 2024.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average and Nasdaq Composite rose 1.22 percent and 0.51 percent, respectively.
Among the big corporate players, Apple and Tesla climbed 2.12 percent and 1.22 percent, respectively, while semiconductor company Nvidia Corp declined 2.5 percent.
Pharmaceutical giant Merck climbed 5 percent after announcing that the US Food and Drug Administration had approved its drug Winrevair to treat pulmonary arterial hypertension.
Cruise line Carnival rose 1 percent after the company raised key earnings and revenue projections and revised its costs downward.
Cintas, an office supplies company, surged 8.2 percent after reporting a better-than-expected profit for the latest quarter.
Trump Media & Technology Group, former US President Donald Trump’s social media company, rose 14.2 percent, continuing its rally after surging 16 percent in its market debut the previous day.
Investors are anticipating the release of key US economic data this week, including updated figures on jobless claims, gross domestic product and consumer sentiment.
Young fans of self-styled “manfluencers” like Andrew Tate, currently facing charges including rape in a Romanian court, are increasingly bringing misogynist views into Australian schools, leaving other children, teachers and parents searching for answers.
In response, the Australian government is offering 3.5 million Australian dollars ($2.3m) in grants in a trial aimed at tackling “harmful gender stereotypes perpetuated online”.
The manosphere’s reach into Australian schools has gotten so bad that some Australian teachers are quitting their jobs, according to a recent study published by Monash University in Melbourne.
The Monash researchers found that students were openly expressing “male supremacist” views in class.
One teacher says a student told her “I hate women”, while another said boys as young as 13 were made “sexual moaning noises” in her class.
“People are crying out for what to do,” Naomi Barnes, a senior lecturer in the School of Teacher Education and Leadership at the Queensland University of Technology, told Al Jazeera.
A former teacher who now lectures aspiring teachers, Barnes says that teachers and parents have come to her asking what to do about the ideas peddled by people like Tate, and how to discuss them with their children,
Drawing on her research on how misinformation from bad faith actors spreads, Barnes developed guidelines she’s used in her own classrooms.
But she acknowledges it is not easy.
“Andrew Tate has already given them all the comebacks,” she said, noting how Tate tries to use arguments of free speech in response to critics, even when what is being said is not true, and potentially harmful.
She encourages parents and teachers to be prepared to listen and to try to understand what a child is trying to say.
Young people may be more likely to respond when a conversation is brought up by a trusted adult, Barnes adds, including on questions like what it “means to be a part of a fair and just society”.
In her classrooms, she tries to “open up a space where students feel comfortable to tell me what they’re really thinking”.
Instead of telling students their ideas are wrong, she asks them to explain their thinking.
“Be careful. Think through what you said,” she advises, as well as telling them, “You’ve taken a group of people’s humanity away.”
‘He has your children’
Currently facing charges of rape, human trafficking and being part of an organised crime group, Tate’s particular brand of toxic masculinity has attracted some 9 million followers on X, and billions of views on TikTok and YouTube.
A former kickboxer, Tate gained notoriety after he was removed from the United Kingdom’s version of the Big Brother reality television show after a video showing him attacking a woman emerged. He then turned his attention to social media, where bans from major platforms have done little to dampen his popularity.
“You can listen to 20 hours of Andrew Tate, and not hear anything misogynistic. But his fans listen to hundreds of hours. And these things cohere together into a narrative that he’ll never say in one soundbite,” explained author and senior lecturer Tyson Yunkaporta.
Yunkaporta’s most recent book Right Story, Wrong Story delves into the spread of disinformation during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Speaking to high school students late last year he says he asked them to “put your hands up, who’s into Andrew Tate?”
“Almost all of the boys. And surprisingly, more than half of the girls put their fists in the air [and] cheered,” Yunkaporta told Al Jazeera.
Yunkaporta says the English teachers he spoke to from the school were aware of Tate’s influence.
“English teachers are the best with staying on top of the problematic discourses that infect the world,” he said.
But he noted some of the other teachers had no idea who Tate was.
“He’s in the top five most influential people on the planet right now. And he has your children,” he told them.
But it is not only schools where followers of the manosphere are making themselves known.
Sharna Bremner, the founder of End Rape on Campus Australia, says similar ideas are now “flowing onto university campuses”.
Australian teachers say students are increasingly spreading ‘manosphere’ ideas inside their classes [File: Dan Peled/EPA-EFE]
And Bremner says it’s not just students who are sharing Tate’s views in class.
“It’s something that people are hearing from their classmates or sometimes even from their tutors,” she told Al Jazeera.
Homegrown misogyny
While much of the recent focus has been on Andrew Tate, who is currently awaiting trial in Romania and extradition to the United Kingdom, the ideas he is spreading are hardly new to Australia, which has long struggled with sexism and gendered violence.
“Manfluencers or manosphere-type” influencers “have been around forever”, said Barnes, who thinks Tate will inevitably be replaced by someone else.
In recent years, sexual abuse and domestic violence have attracted significant discussion in Australia, something Bremner attributes to the “Rosie Batty effect”.
Batty became a prominent advocate against domestic violence after her 11-year-old son Luke Batty was murdered by his father. She was named Australian of the Year in 2015.
But the problems have persisted, including in Australia’s parliament where reports of widespread sexism led to protests across the country in 2021 and efforts to address gender inequality in Australia continue to be met with resistance.
Last month, Australian senator Matt Canavan referenced Tate in response to new data on the gender wage gap in Australia. “I’m sick and tired of this bulls***,” Canavan, a member of the Nationals party, told reporters.
“Young men in particular feel like they are now being discriminated against and that’s why they are going to watch the likes of Andrew Tate.”
Minister for Families and Social Services Amanda Rishworth described Canavan’s comments as “dangerous”.
“Linking Australia’s first major report on the gender pay gap to influencers like Andrew Tate who glorify violence against women is unacceptable,” she said.
“By contrast, we’re investing 3.5 million [Australian dollars; $2.28m] to counter harmful gender stereotypes perpetuated online as part of our record funding to address family, domestic and sexual violence,” Rishworth, a member of the centre-left Labor government, added.
Linking Australia’s first major report on the gender pay gap to ‘influencers’ like Andrew Tate who glorify violence against women is unacceptable.
Bremner, whose campaigning has led to recent reforms in how Australian universities address sexual violence, says there are signs of improvement in government funding models.
After years of funding going to “awareness raising” morning teas, she says there is now “greater recognition in Australia of the need for evidence-based programmes”.
But, she says, there’s a long way to go.
“We haven’t yet got to a point where Australia is willing to have the really hard conversations that we need to have on the drivers of gendered violence,” she said.
“I also think there is an enormous amount of backlash, and Andrew Tate is almost the poster boy for that backlash,” she adds.
For Barnes, one place where these conversations should take place is in social studies classes like “civics and citizenship”.
But she notes this is also “one of the most under-resourced subject areas in the whole of the Australian curriculum”.
Barnes says such classes offer opportunities to talk through the “dangerous ideas” teenagers are often drawn to.
She acknowledges she herself regrets the Evangelical Christian preachers she followed in her teenage years.
Drawing on her experiences, Barnes encourages parents and teachers to help children think through what they’re saying fully, and help them find ways to express themselves that do not “render a whole group of people inhuman”.
A family statement said the four-term senator and vice presidential candidate died from complications after a fall.
Joe Lieberman, Al Gore’s running mate during the hotly contested 2000 presidential election, has died at age 82 after suffering complications from a fall.
United States media announced his death on Tuesday afternoon, citing a family statement.
One of the few high-profile independents in the US political sphere, Lieberman largely caucused with the Democrat Party during his four terms as a senator, representing the state of Connecticut.
But he identified as a centrist, and towards the end of his career, he embraced the No Labels movement, an organisation that shirks the traditional two-party system in favour of “common ground”.
Lieberman, however, was part of the Democratic presidential ticket in 2000, when Gore — then-vice president under Bill Clinton — raced for the White House himself.
When Gore chose Lieberman as his vice presidential candidate, the senator became the first Jewish running mate to represent a major party in the general elections.
The decision also catapulted Lieberman into one of the most divisive presidential races in recent history. The Gore-Lieberman ticket won the popular vote — but it lost the crucial Electoral College, the metric the US uses to decide who wins the presidency.
Instead, Republican George W Bush emerged victorious in that race, after the US Supreme Court ruled to end a recount effort in the pivotal swing state of Florida. An estimated 537 votes separated Bush and Gore in the state.
Lieberman’s career in national politics, however, came to an end in 2006, when he lost the Democratic primary for the US Senate in Connecticut. At the time, he faced strong criticism for his hawkish approach to the US’s war in Iraq.
He has, however, continued to exercise influence as a political lobbyist, lawyer and advocate for groups like No Labels.
This is a developing story. More details to follow.
The full provisional results are expected to be confirmed by the Constitutional Council in the coming days.
Opposition candidate Bassirou Diomaye Faye won more than 54 percent of votes in Senegal’s presidential election, the Dakar appeals court has said.
The court said on Wednesday the provisional results were based on vote tallies from 100 percent of polling stations. The results are expected to be confirmed by the Constitutional Council in the coming days.
Faye’s victory came just 10 days after he was freed from prison. The 44-year-old victor has said he wants a “break” with the current political system, and is set to become the youngest president in Senegal’s history.
The court said ruling coalition candidate Amadou Ba took more than 35 percent of the vote, and third-placed candidate Aliou Mamadou Dia won 2.8 percent.
Senegal’s outgoing President Macky Sall earlier congratulated Faye, saying his win is “a victory for Senegalese democracy”.
Analysts said his win reflected a protest against the outgoing leadership and divisions within a powerful, but weakened, governing coalition.
Faye’s message has been particularly popular among young voters in a country where more than 60 percent of people are under 25 and struggle to find jobs.
Washington, DC – Israel has killed more than 32,000 Palestinians in Gaza, displaced more than 80 percent of the population, destroyed large parts of the territory and imposed a suffocating blockade, bringing the enclave to the verge of famine.
But nearly six months into the war, the United States says it has not determined that Israel has violated international humanitarian law.
Washington’s assertion, made public this week as part of an oversight process on US weapons transfers to allies, has spurred bewilderment and condemnation from human rights groups.
“It’s absurd,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, director of Democracy for the Arab World Now. “It invites global mockery and disdain to hear such a statement issued in front of the world by the Biden administration.”
US laws prohibit arming countries engaged in human rights abuses. But advocates say the administration of President Joe Biden is bending the facts and denying well-documented Israeli violations to appear to be in compliance with the rules.
Whitson noted that Biden himself has described Israel’s bombing of Gaza as “indiscriminate”, which would make it a war crime, and that Washington has openly recognised that Israel is impeding aid to the territory.
The Biden administration has been facing increasing pressure to enforce US law when it comes to arming Israel. A recent public opinion poll suggested that the majority of Americans disapprove of Israel’s actions in Gaza.
NSM-20 memorandum
There are several US statutes that regulate the transfer of weapons to foreign countries.
Last month, the Biden administration issued a memorandum, dubbed NSM-20, requiring credible, written assurances from the recipients of American weapons that the arms are not being used in rights violations.
The allies must also certify that American defence articles are not being used to “arbitrarily deny, restrict, or otherwise impede, directly or indirectly, the transport or delivery” of US humanitarian aid.
On Monday, the US Department of State said it received the assurances from Israel and found them “credible”.
“We have not found them [Israel] to be in violation of international humanitarian law, either when it comes to the conduct of the war or when it comes to the provision of humanitarian assistance,” State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller told reporters.
A day later, he said the US is conducting its own assessments of the war — not merely taking Israel at its word.
“We look at those assurances, and we look at them informed by the assessments that we have had ongoing,” Miller added. “And as I said, we have not reached the conclusion with respect to Israel that they have violated international humanitarian law.”
— Center for International Policy (@CIPolicy) March 25, 2024
What is international humanitarian law?
International humanitarian law is a set of rules meant to protect non-combatants in armed conflict. It consists of the Geneva Conventions of 1949 and subsequent international treaties aimed at limiting civilian suffering during war.
According to Whitson, apparent Israeli violations of international humanitarian law run the gamut: Israel has been accused of targeting civilians, indiscriminate bombing and disproportionate attacks.
“What we’ve seen throughout Gaza, particularly in the north, is widespread destruction of residential areas, farms, schools, universities, churches, mosques, hospitals — highlighting the indiscriminate nature of Israeli bombardment,” she told Al Jazeera.
“Even if they were targeting something arguably with a military value to them, the fact that they are doing this in such a wanton, reckless, widespread, catastrophic manner is evidence of the indiscriminate nature of the bombing.”
Moreover, witnesses and rights groups, including Amnesty International, have accused Israel of mistreating and torturing detainees during the war.
Last month, United Nations experts also raised concern about reports that Palestinian women in Israeli custody have been subjected to “multiple forms of sexual assault”.
There has been a growing number of reports about extrajudicial executions by Israeli forces in Gaza.
Earlier this month, Al Jazeera obtained footage from an Israeli drone showing the targeting of four unarmed Palestinians on an open road in southern Gaza.
While the US’s assessment of Israeli attacks is continuing, Miller said “none” have been found to be in violation of international humanitarian law.
US support for Israel
Brian Finucane, a senior US programme adviser at the International Crisis Group think tank, said there is “abundant reason for concern” that the Biden administration is not doing more to address violations of humanitarian law that are impeding its own efforts in Gaza.
He pointed out that, because of Israel’s blockade, the US has already resorted to “desperate workarounds” to get food into Gaza, including air drops and building a temporary pier.
The US has even acknowledged Israeli efforts to block aid. Earlier this year, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich publicly stated that he is blocking US-provided flour for Gaza, prompting a White House response.
“I wish I could tell you that that flour was moving in, but I can’t do that right now,” White House national security spokesperson John Kirby told reporters on February 15.
At Monday’s State Department news briefing, Miller also reasserted that Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank are “inconsistent with international humanitarian law”.
His comment was in response to Israel’s seizure of 800 hectares (1,977 acres) in the West Bank last week.
Speaking to Al Jazeera, Finacune expressed befuddlement that the US is accepting Israel’s assurances that it is abiding by international humanitarian law.
“The US has already concluded that Israel is violating international humanitarian law, so to turn around and accept the Israeli assurances is head-scratching to say the least,” he said.
“Any sort of favourable conclusion on the assurances — at a minimum — would disregard what’s going on in the West Bank. And it seems highly unlikely that US defence articles are not being used as a way to support or defend West Bank settlements.”
On May 8, the Biden administration is expected to submit a report to Congress about the implementation of NSM-20, which should ensure compliance with international law. But Finucane does not expect the report to be thorough or damning — due to political considerations.
“To the extent the White House has decided that US military support is going to be unconditional, it’s highly unlikely that the president’s subordinates are going to reach public conclusions that are at odds with that,” he said.
Top US officials, including Biden, have often stressed that Washington’s commitment to Israel remains “ironclad”.
The US is Israel’s main weapons provider. Washington provides at least $3.8bn in aid to Israel annually, and the White House is working with Congress to secure $14bn in additional assistance to the US ally this year.
“Unless there’s a fundamental change in the White House in terms of a course correction in Gaza policy, I think we’re unfortunately going to see more of the same,” Finucane said.
Calls for more pressure
The experts and advocates who spoke to Al Jazeera described the NSM-20 report as a chance for the Biden administration to sign off on its military support for Israel, while certifying its legality.
The US Congress could potentially exercise oversight powers over the government, as established under the Constitution. But Capitol Hill is overwhelmingly pro-Israel — arguably more than the White House — and such a review is therefore unlikely.
Nevertheless, Hassan El-Tayyab, legislative director for Middle East policy at the Friends Committee on National Legislation, urged lawmakers to pressure the administration not to rubber-stamp Israel’s assurances that it is complying with humanitarian law.
“We have to keep pressing members of Congress to take action for accountability before any more innocent lives are lost: Palestinian civilians in Gaza and Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners,” El-Tayyab told Al Jazeera.
“This is an absolute nightmare. We do not want to see this boil over into a larger war, and it’s time to get a ceasefire.”
Hours before the State Department signalled that it would accept Israel’s assurances, the Biden administration decided not to veto a UN Security Council resolution demanding a ceasefire in Gaza, allowing it to pass.
But Washington was quick to play down the measure and call it “non-binding”.
“They’re trying to do is really build a dome to make military assistance to Israel untouchable, even if rhetorical criticism for Israel increases. So they want to have their cake and eat it, too,” Whitson said of the administration’s position.
In the past few months, the media sector in the United States has gone through one of its worst rounds of layoffs in decades, with some voices within the sector even asking if journalism is a viable career path despite surging subscriptions at publications like The New York Times.
Most recently, outlets like Vice and the sports blog Deadspin were decimated in a massive round of job cuts. Vice ended its online publication, and Deadspin laid off its entire editorial team.
These are the latest in a slew of headcount reductions at countless newsrooms around the US over the past decade at the hands of wealthy owners. The latter overwhelming have the backing of some of the biggest private equity and wealth management firms in the US like Apollo Global Management, Fortress Investment Group and Alden Capital, to name a few. These institutions are also called shadow banks.
A surge in private equity investments in media, experts said, has led to decisions that benefit investors but not always the companies and their employees, similar to the 2008 housing crisis and private equity’s ability to flourish during that time.
While the media business is in the spotlight now, it is a microcosm of a bigger challenge across the US economy. What makes it stand out is that it’s been a long and high-profile battle.
One such moment came with tech’s control (overwhelmingly led by Meta, then Facebook) in 2018 over audience traffic, which made newspapers, magazines and news portals beholden to the algorithmic choices of social media giants like Facebook and Twitter, which ultimately hurt the sector.
That was an optimal entry point for private equity to get a stronger foothold in the media business.
“Media companies were struggling at the time but not nearly enough as the journalism community was led to believe,” explained Margot Susca, the author of How Private Investment Funds Helped Destroy American Newspapers and Undermine Democracy.
“Funds use these market conditions to justify the gutting of these American institutions,” said Susca, who is also a professor of journalism at American University in Washington, DC.
‘Liquidating the entire industry for profit’
Like in the housing market, financial institutions capitalised on someone else’s misfortune to make money from it. In the 2008 recession, it was lenders and big investment banks ranging from Lehman Brothers to Washington Mutual, a move that ultimately led to their collapse.
The key is real estate. In the housing crisis, banks seized foreclosed homes for pennies on the dollar after homeowners defaulted on subprime mortgages.
In the case of the media sector, shadow banks are going after physical newsrooms and selling them. For instance, in 2018, Gannett sold the headquarters of the Asheville Citizen Times to Twenty Lakes Holdings, a real-estate affiliate of Alden Capital. Gannett sold the building for $3.2m. Alden then sold it to developers for $5.3m.
A comparable move happened at Vice last year. Only months after Fortress Investment Group acquired the publication, it left its office in Brooklyn, New York.
There’s a lot of real estate at shadow banks’ disposal. Private equity, hedge funds and other comparable firms control roughly half of all daily newspapers in the US.
“The problem with the news media sector is not its viability. The problem with the news media sector are these locust funds that are liquidating the entire industry for profit,” Susca said.
But where do shadow banks go once physical assets like real estate have been liquidated?
They squeeze out revenue where they can for as long as they can. That often means cutting staff.
G/O Media, formerly known as Gizmodo Media Group, sold off Deadspin, its sports blog. The new owner, Lineup Publishing, said it would not bring over any existing editorial staffers even though it aimed to “be reverential to Deadspin’s unique voice”, G/O CEO Jim Spanfeller said in an email to employees.
Great Hill Partners acquired the media brand in 2019 and drastically shifted Deadspin’s editorial vision. The publication was a sports-centric one that also housed vibrant cultural commentary on a variety of topics. At the direction of the new owner, the publication was directed to “stick to sports”. The announcement led to mass resignations.
This week, G/O Media sold two more publications from its portfolio — The AV Club and The Takeout.
G/O is not in a financially dire position, according to Spanfeller, who told Axios this year, “We’re not strapped for cash.”
Unionised staff at US publishing company Conde Nast walk the picket line during a 24-hour walkout amid layoff announcements in New York City in January [File: Angela Weiss/AFP]
According to the Writers Guild of America East, which includes various unions representing editorial staff from multiple media firms, Great Hill Partners made an estimated $44m in revenue in 2023. The guild suggests that Great Hill Partners has enough money to make decisions that do not undermine the financial security of its staffers.
When Spanfeller was appointed in 2019, the private equity firm said he was a significant investor in the company but did not disclose the specifics of the financial agreement. Spanfeller’s appointment came directly from the firm suggesting that it intended to oversee day-to-day editorial operations across G/O’s portfolio.
Great Hill Partners did not respond to Al Jazeera’s request for comment.
G/O is the latest in a string of companies laying off workers in the last few months alone.
Last month, Engadget, a brand owned by Yahoo, had a series of layoffs including of high-profile editors. It came amid a reported refocus on traffic growth. But how can you drive more traffic with high-quality reporting with fewer people to make the product?
Meanwhile, Apollo Global Management, which now owns Yahoo, is doing very well. The asset management firm’s stock is up nearly 250 percent over a roughly five-year period – 80 percent this past year alone. The firm acquired Yahoo in 2021 and also has a significant stake in several other large media companies, including Gannett, which owns hundreds of newspapers around the US, including USA Today, the fifth largest. In 2019, Apollo provided $1.8bn to finance the acquisition of the newspaper giant and merge it with GateHouse Media.
‘Layoffs were the core strategy’
Once Gannett’s acquisition of GateHouse was complete, it scrapped hundreds of jobs immediately. In 2022, the newspaper group slashed roughly 600 more jobs in two rounds of cuts in August and November.
Apollo also acquired both Northwest Broadcasting and Cox Media Group, which included 54 radio stations, and 33 TV stations.
“After funds became owners, layoffs were the core strategy to try to maximise revenue. [These are] firms that just had profit as the sole motivation,” Susca said. “Layoffs are the stark reality of hedge fund ownership and private equity investment.”
Historically, private equity firm involvement has led to layoffs – an average of 4.4 percent of job losses in two years as well as a 1.7 percent decrease in pay, according to a study from the University of Chicago.
That is what happened at Cox Media Group. Almost immediately after its acquisition, talent from local TV and radio stations across the country was laid off.
Apollo Management did not respond to Al Jazeera’s request for comment.
New York-based Alden Capital operates a similar job-cutting strategy and is one of the most infamous hedge funds in the sector for decimating a number of newspapers around the country.
In 2020, Vanity Fair referred to the firm as the “grim reaper of American newspapers”.
Vanity Fair’s stern critique is because of the massive slate of layoffs at the papers Alden Capital owns, including the Denver Post, even as one of the company’s executives said “advertising revenue has been significantly better”, according to reporting from Bloomberg in 2018.
Alden bought Tribune Publishing and gutted many of its newsrooms. At the time, Tribune was profitable, but Alden still moved forward to strip down its papers to make more profits.
Alden often pushed to beef up subscriptions even after shedding physical assets like office space and social assets like its people, which, Tim Franklin, senior associate dean at Northwestern University Medill School of Journalism, suggests is a losing strategy.
“It’s like charging for 16 ounces of Coca-Cola and putting it in a 12-ounce bottle. You’re giving people less and then expecting people to pay. The problem is that you end up in this doom loop. You’re getting less digital subscription revenue because you are providing less content, so then you make cuts and then you see even less revenue and you make more cuts. It’s this never-ending cycle of rinse and repeat,” Franklin said.
Alden Capital did not respond to Al Jazeera’s request for comment.
Doomed to failure
Shadow banks and big banks have made risky investments and hoped they would work out financially.
They sold the idea that someone could very well make payments on a subprime mortgage. Now, the idea is that a media company can create quality reporting on a shoestring budget and a fraction of its headcount. But those are unrealistic expectations and doomed for failure.
During the 2008 housing crisis, big banks essentially created an insurance plan for themselves: sell the debt and make money off the interest. Now private equity is employing a comparable strategy for media.
In the housing crisis, the banks bundled the mortgage loans in a package and sold them to the bond market to random investors. The banks had protections. If a lender defaults, they sell the debt on the secondary market for a profit. The strategy was to bet on the homeowners who were most likely not going to be able to afford the mortgage payments. But ultimately, that backfired, and the resultant housing crisis has been well documented.
“The only people there [who] were able to buy homes at the point could do so with cash or with Wall Street financing because that cash was still flowing,” said Aaron Glantz, author of Homewreckers: How a Gang of Wall Street Kingpins, Hedge Fund Magnates, Crooked Banks, and Vulture Capitalists Suckered Millions Out of Their Homes and Demolished the American Dream.
“Private equity is not depending on that credit system,” Glatz added.
NBC and MSNBC laid off employees [File: Justin Lane/EPA]
In either situation, the protections afforded investors were not passed down to homeowners in 2008 or writers, editors, on-air talent and others in the media industry now.
While some savings and lending banks failed and were the recipients of massive bailouts, shadow banks flourished. Generally speaking, these companies make money during times of economic vulnerability, leading to an even more challenging situation for average people.
In the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, funds were largely criticised for buying up distressed housing across New York City and forcing out longtime residents – a move that brought rent-stabilised properties to market rate, which ultimately allowed them to drive up prices on their buildings and raise the value of the buildings around them.
“They’re reliant on cash that is just sitting around ready to be spent or credit lines that they can get from banks like JPMorgan Chase or they can leverage other assets. They own so many other assets,” Glatz said.
One of those assets over the past decade is a growing number of media companies.
But even then, it poses the question: If all these media companies are struggling, why are their executives so wealthy?
Behind a number of these mass layoffs are uber-wealthy executives. That’s the case for Business Insider, The Washington Post and Vice, just to name a few.
In January, Business Insider, owned by the German media giant Axel Springer, laid off 8 percent of its workforce. Axel Springer, however, is doing well financially. Its CEO, Mathias Doepfner, has a net worth of $1.2bn.
Executives on both the editorial and business side at the short-lived outlet The Messenger raked in close to million-dollar salaries. Meanwhile, editorial staffers launched a crowdfunding campaign to make ends meet because the outlet did not give them any severance packages.
NBC and MSNBC laid off 75 people this year. Brian Roberts, the CEO of NBC’s parent company, Comcast, raked in more than $32m in 2022.
Despite the recent layoffs, the network hired former Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel as a contributor. Hiring McDaniel was met with swift backlash from high-profile talent across the news organisation and the NBC News Guild, the union representing journalists across the network.
The union in particular pointed out that McDaniel – who was known for helping to enable former President Donald Trump’s baseless claims that the 2020 presidential election was rigged – was hired after the company laid off more than a dozen unionised journalists. Amid the backlash, NBC cut its ties with McDaniel.
NBC is just the latest major network to make job cuts. At CBS, despite its high viewership during American football’s Super Bowl, parent company Paramount laid off staffers the following day at CBS News. Meanwhile, CEO Bob Bakish made $32m in 2022.
In November, Conde Nast laid off 5 percent of its workforce. The Newhouse family, which leads Advance Publications, the parent company of the magazine giant, has a net worth of $24.1bn, according to Forbes.
Vice Media, which was once valued at close to $6bn, has since filed for bankruptcy and ended publishing on its website [File: Eric Thayer/Getty Images/AFP]
In recent weeks, Vice laid off hundreds of employees and ended publishing on its website. It has been plagued with a nearly endless series of layoffs in the past few years. Prior to filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy last year, the media company paid its executives roughly $11m – even though its executives were notoriously known for mismanagement.
Yet they were bailed out. Amid the Chapter 11 filing, Fortress Investment Group acquired Vice – a company that was once valued at $5.7bn – for $225m. Executives left with hefty paycheques while staffers were left jobless with little notice.
Fortress did not respond to Al Jazeera’s request for comment.
The Washington Post eliminated 240 jobs, yet it is owned by Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, who is worth more than $200bn, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, making him the second-richest person in the world.
In 2021, Brown, alongside Senators Tammy Baldwin and Elizabeth Warren, introduced the Stop Wall Street Looting Act, which would have reformed the private equity industry.
The bill never made it past committee, so it never had a vote in the full Senate.
Experts believe that Washington has not done nearly enough to curb the power of private equity.
“You have a government system, a regulatory, legislative system that has basically failed at every turn to stop the growth of these hedge funds,” Susca said. “And private equity firms in the journalism market, to me, is an institutional failure.”
The US decision to abstain from a UN security council resolution calling for a temporary ceasefire in Gaza, which allowed the resolution to pass, may be part of its plan to force Netanyahu’s government to collapse, says Middle East Analyst Trita Parsi.
Russia attacks areas in eastern and southern Ukraine in retaliation for fatal bombardments of Russia’s border regions.
At least three people have been killed in Russian attacks on northeastern and southern Ukraine, officials said, as Kyiv called for more Patriot air defence systems to battle a surge in missile strikes.
Russia used guided bombs in air strikes on the city of Kharkiv on Wednesday for the first time since 2022, killing at least one person and wounding 16, local officials said.
Announcing the toll, Kharkiv’s Mayor Ihor Terekhov described the attack as “another act of bloody terror against Ukrainians” and said four children were among the wounded.
Three residential buildings were damaged, the interior ministry said on the Telegram messenger. Terekhov said a medical facility was also damaged and local police said a school had been hit.
People gather at the site where buildings were damaged by a Russian military strike, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, in Kharkiv [Vitalii Hnidyi/Reuters]
Kharkiv and the surrounding region have frequently been attacked with missiles and drones since Russia’s full-scale invasion began in February 2022, but the use of large-calibre guided bombs was unusual.
“Kharkiv was hit by aerial bombs – for the first time since 2022,” Serhiy Bolvinov, the head of the investigative department of the regional police, said on Facebook.
The region’s Governor Oleh Syniehubov also reported the use of guided munitions on Wednesday.
Attacks on southern Ukraine
Moscow has escalated aerial attacks on Ukraine in the past few weeks, targeting key infrastructure – including power stations – in retaliation for fatal bombardments of Russia’s border regions.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy urged Ukraine’s allies to speed up deliveries of warplanes and Patriot air defence systems following the strike.
“Bolstering Ukraine’s air defence and expediting the delivery of F-16s to Ukraine are vital tasks,” he said in a statement on social media.
“There are no rational explanations for why Patriots, which are plentiful around the world, are still not covering the skies of Kharkiv and other cities,” he added.
In southern Ukraine, the governor of Kherson region, which is partially occupied by Russia, said one woman had been killed in a drone attack on the village of Mykhailivka.
“A 61-year-old local resident was fatally wounded in her own home,” the official, Oleksandr Prokudin, wrote on social media.
And in the southeastern city of Nikopol, officials said artillery fire killed a 55-year-old man, while a ballistic missile strike on the coastal territory of Mykolaiv left eight wounded.
Ukraine’s ground forces commander warned last week Russia was gathering more than 100,000 soldiers in advance of what may be a major offensive this summer, as Moscow seeks to press its advantage on the battlefield.
Russia meanwhile announced that its air defence systems had shot down 18 rockets near the border city of Belgorod, which has been regularly targeted by fatal Ukrainian attacks.
The governor of the Belgorod region, Vyacheslav Gladkov, said two people were wounded during the barrage and a later drone attack.
A majority of Americans disapprove of Israel’s actions in Gaza, a new poll has shown, as the Israeli military continues to pound the besieged Palestinian enclave and imposes a siege that has created a hunger crisis.
The Gallup poll released on Wednesday found that 55 percent of respondents disapproved of the Israeli military’s actions in the Gaza Strip, up from 45 percent who said they disapproved in November, a month after Israel began its operation.
Among Democratic Party voters, the percentage was even higher, with 75 percent of respondents expressing a negative view of Israel’s actions, while 60 percent of independents also said they disapproved.
“The Gallup poll reflects a clear disconnect between the Biden administration’s policies and the views of a majority of Americans, particularly Democrats, on Israel’s actions in Gaza,” said Raed Jarrar, advocacy director at Democracy for the Arab World Now, a think-tank in Washington, DC.
“This divergence suggests a pressing need for the administration to realign its foreign policy with the values and expectations of its constituents,” Jarrar told Al Jazeera in an email.
“Such a substantial gap in approval should be another reason for the administration to end its ongoing support to Israel’s genocide.”
A majority of Americans (55%) now oppose the military action Israel has taken in Gaza, a shift from November 2023.
The findings of the poll, which was conducted earlier this month, come as Israel has intensified its bombardment of parts of the Gaza Strip despite growing international demands for a lasting ceasefire to end the war.
US President Joe Biden, a Democrat, has also faced protests and public anger over his staunch support for Israel and refusal to withhold foreign aid to the Israeli government until it complies with international human rights norms.
Earlier this week, the Biden administration abstained from a United Nations Security Council ceasefire resolution instead of using its veto, a move that experts said highlighted Biden’s frustrations with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
But Washington continues to provide weapons and public support to Israel, and senior US officials have downplayed the importance of the UN Security Council measure.
Meanwhile, the Palestinian Health Ministry in Gaza said on Wednesday that Israeli attacks on the territory over the past 24 hours had killed at least 76 Palestinians, raising the total to at least 32,490 Palestinians killed since Israel began its assault following Hamas’s October 7 attack that left 1,139 Israelis dead.
Israel also continues to block humanitarian aid deliveries to the enclave, which is facing shortages of food, clean water and other supplies.
A UN expert warned this week that there are “reasonable grounds” to believe Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. The Israeli government rejected those allegations.
Against that backdrop, Biden’s approval rating for his handling of the situation in the Middle East sits at 27 percent, according to another Gallup poll released last week.
Among Democrats, the approval rating was 47 percent, compared with 16 percent and 21 percent among Republicans and independents, respectively.
“Democrats’ widespread opposition to Israel’s actions underscores the difficulty of the issue for President Joe Biden among his most loyal supporters,” Gallup said on Wednesday.
“Some Democratic critics believe Biden has been too closely aligned with Israel by not taking stronger actions to promote a ceasefire and to assist Palestinian civilians caught in the war zone.”
Biden has faced a growing protest movement over his Gaza policy as he campaigns for re-election in November against his predecessor and the Republicans’ presumptive presidential nominee, Donald Trump.
Groups have urged Democratic voters to cast “uncommitted” ballots during several state primaries so far this year, including in the key US swing state of Michigan.
Earlier this month, organisers of the so-called Listen to Michigan campaign announced plans to take their movement national.
“Today, we launched our national movement to let you all know uncommitted voters aren’t going anywhere, and we aren’t backing down until we achieve a permanent ceasefire,” Layla Elabed, a key organiser, told reporters.
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