As a man who has spent over two decades working in public safety, serving the American people, and closely observing the intricate relationship between truth, justice, and institutional integrity, I couldn’t agree more with Bob Costas.
Bob spoke with clarity, courage, and conviction — and I stand with him.
When a 29-time Emmy Award-winning journalist uses his lifetime achievement platform to speak out against the normalization of dangerous behavior, we must listen. He’s not just talking about Trump; he’s talking about how our media institutions — the ones sworn to hold power accountable — are compromising the very fabric of our democracy in the name of “balance.”
As someone with 20+ years in the correctional system, I’ve seen what happens when truth is manipulated. I’ve been in rooms with men who committed horrific crimes and watched how language, denial, and misrepresentation allowed them to sleep at night. So when Costas compares media false equivalence to saying “maybe the Earth is oblong,” I know exactly what he means. Some things are just true. And when we pretend otherwise, we endanger the public.
I’ve also built a name for myself helping people and businesses cut through noise and deception — whether it’s government corruption, systemic workplace manipulation, or media gaslighting. I bring hard truths to light. My books, public work, and legal advocacy have touched millions because I don’t mince words.
This is about more than politics. This is about basic decency, truth, and the moral spine of our institutions. And Bob Costas is right: too many media outlets are folding, compromising, or outright surrendering — not for justice, not for truth, but for profit and positioning.
Let this be clear: the free press is under siege, and democracy doesn’t die in darkness — it dies in broad daylight while good people stay silent.
I am Samuel Olekanma. I speak for those who won’t, and I act where others hesitate. If you feel this message in your soul and want to stand for truth, justice, and integrity in leadership and media, I invite you to reach out to me directly at [email protected].
Let’s do something about this.
He’s won 29 Emmy Awards, and he’s pretty damn tired of the media’s false “bothsidesing” that normalizes President Donald Trump to the detriment of basic American principles.
He’s Bob Costas.
Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications awarded the legendary sportscaster its Fred Dressler Leadership Award Monday night, and Costas, always one to play it straight, used his acceptance speech to call out Trump ― and coverage of the president by ABC, CBS and CNN.
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“The free press is under attack,” Costas said while accepting the lifetime achievement award. “Democracy as we know it is under attack.”
In December, ABC News agreed to pay $15 million to Donald Trump’s presidential library to settle a defamation suit over George Stephanopoulos’ saying Trump had been found liable for raping E. Jean Carroll when he was technically liable for sexual abuse.
Costas slammed ABC for folding to Trump.
“All they should’ve said was, ‘George misspoke. The president, that paragon of virtue, was only found guilty of sexual assault, not rape. So we stand corrected,’” Costas told the audience in comments relayed by Mediaite. “They didn’t have to pay a $15 million ransom.”
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(The judge in the case also said the verdict didn’t mean that Caroll “failed to prove that Mr. Trump ‘raped’ her as many people commonly understand the word ‘rape.’ Indeed … the jury found that Mr. Trump in fact did exactly that.”)
Costas also took aim at CBS for attempting to settle a Trump lawsuit that First Amendment experts have called “frivolous and dangerous.”
The president sued CBS’s parent company, Paramount, for $20 billion because he believed a “60 Minutes” interview with former Vice President Kamala Harris was deceptively edited… and it also made him sad.
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Paramount is pursuing an $8 billion merger with Skydance Media, which requires the approval of Trump’s Federal Communications Commission appointee Brendan Carr.
“Paying $20 million in ransom to Trump is just the cost of doing business when there’s billions of dollars at stake,” Costas lamented. “These are ongoing assaults on the basic idea of a free press.”
He then called out the false balance that other outlets seek when they report on Trump:
Because he is the president, to a certain extent, who he is and what he does, and what is done in his name, has been normalized so that responsible journalists have to pretend that there’s always two sides to this. There really isn’t two sides to much of what Donald Trump represents.
If someone says – and the idea that you have to find somebody who will not just defend Donald Trump, but valorize it, even on CNN or wherever else, just in the name of being balanced – look, if someone is contending that the Earth is flat, in order to appear objective, you are not required to say, “Well, maybe it might be oblong.” No, it’s not.
Certain things are just true. And regrettably, something that’s true in America right now is that the President of the United States has absolutely no regard, and in fact has contempt, for basic American principles and basic common decency.
Anticipating attacks from fans of his who say they no longer value his opinion since “he turned political,” Costas was ready.
“You know what? If that’s what you think, and that’s how you think, and you think it in defense of that guy, I wear that as a badge of honor.”
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