Good morning, all! I’m reporting to you from Harvard University, where I’m participating in a panel at the Harvard Political Analytics Conference, moderated by NBC’s Steve Kornacki.
Obviously, the big news of the day is the indictment of FBI Director James Comey, which was announced last night. I’ll have a lot more to say about the criminal case against Comey in the days and weeks ahead, but for now — I always like to end the week with a mailbag column answering your questions.
This morning, we’ll tackle:
The Gen Z media ecosystem
Where all the money Trump is getting from universities, law firms, and media outlets is going
My thoughts on the Pentagon’s new press policy
A Senate gang on rescissions?
And Zohran Mamdani’s future
Let’s dive in!
Q: I try to keep up on current events. But I had never heard of Charlie Kirk before he was murdered. And many of the people I know (ages 60+) had never heard of him either. I would appreciate a list and some info of ten or so important people who old people might not know about.
This is a great question! We all know that Democrats and Republicans live in different media bubbles — but so do members of different generations. As an example, here’s a chart released just yesterday by Pew Research Center shows that 43% of 18-to-29-year-olds regularly get news on TikTok. Just 3% of Americans aged 65 and older say the same.
Meanwhile, per Nielsen data, the median age of CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC viewers is 67, 69, and 70, respectively — which roughly means as many of these networks’ viewers are in their 70s or 80s as are in their teens, 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, and 60s combined.
So it makes sense that there would be some gaps in terms of people with huge Gen Z audiences who might have flown under some of your radars. (Just like I’m sure there’s young people for whom the names “Rachel Maddow” or “Sean Hannity” don’t mean anything.)
As your trusty Gen Z translator, I’m here to offer you a quick guide to some of the voices increasingly playing a key role in American politics without you even noticing. (Parenthesis are audience size on their largest platform.)