Meet the Press: Tradition Perdition

Throughout my young adulthood, the news and journalistic analysis show Meet the Press was the model of its kind.  The closing self-tribute, “If it’s Sunday, it’s Meet the Press” was iterated without embarrassment.

I am going to assess what has happened to this once-venerated show, but first, I wish to give my credentials of expertise and fairness to justify my authorship.

I founded the Media Criticism course at Towson University and was the only professor who taught it for two decades.  I am known publicly for being pro-Trump and anti-Trump: WCBM and other media sources have cancelled me, as have several sources who say I support Donald Trump too much. An e-mail from WCBM’s Sean Casey stated: “The decision not to bring you on the show anymore was mine…I felt some of the articles that you wrote disparaging Trump and Trump supporters would alienate the base of our audience.”

So these are my credentials to criticize media coverage, as I, an Independent, am perhaps one of the diminishing few moderates left in society.

Back to Meet the Press (MTP):  This once exemplary show used to be the gold standard of great media political inquiry, going back to the overprepared tough media confrontation tradition of Lawrence Spivak and Tim Russert.

Viewers could not discern a political bias from these men. If a guest were not prepared, that guest would simply be humiliated.

Following Russert’s unexpected demise, the show shuffled among a few not ready for prime-time hosts, leading to two left-biased anchors, Chuck Todd and Kristen Welker, of whom the latter is the less journalistically competent.

Each and every week, Welker hosts with a left-wing-bias.  When she has a conservative or Republican guest, this guest is always first, usually followed by a far-left Democrat — say, Adam Schiff or Bernie Sanders — and a panel, typically composed of three left-wingers and a tepid conservative.

On June 29, MTP began with interviews with Oklahoma Republican Sen. Markwayne Mullin and Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy and New York Democratic Candidate State Rep. Zohran Mamdani on his far-left campaign for the New York mayoralty.

There were frequent skeptical follow-ups to Mullin and none for Murphy.

The interview with the controversially anti-Semitic Mamdani was a nothing-burger. Welker’s questions amounted to no less than a lovefest with her mentioning positions of those disagreeing with Mamdani, but never pushing him with probing follow-ups, while he smiled broadly throughout the interview.

Welker did press him somewhat about whether he supports the phrase “Globalize the Intifada.”  He dodged and dodged by saying he does not use the phrase, and his words and actions should suffice to reassure people.

She never asked Mamdani about his intent to arrest Benjamin Netanyahu should he take a step in New York and other anti-Semitic statements, or to defund the police, end the prison system, etc.

On MTP on August 10, three interviews began the show, primarily focusing on the gerrymandering wars: Democratic Governor of Illinois JB Pritzker, South Carolina Senior Senator Lindsey Graham, and Eric Holder Jr., who served as attorney general under President Barack Obama. 

Moderator Welker twice pressed Pritzker to reconcile his antipathy toward Texas gerrymandering with Illinois’ bizarre Congressional districting to minimize Republican representation in Illinois.

Negative: He couldn’t or wouldn’t.  She didn’t press him.

What in the world was Eric Holder doing on the show on the same topic and lacking any significance nationally on the topic?  No tough questions, no interesting moments.

The panel was awful, as usual…three pro-Democratic pundits (four if you count Welker) and conservative shy nice guy Lonnie Chen of the Hoover Institution.  Left-wingers Carol Lee, NBC News Washington managing editor, Tony Plohetski of the Austin American-Statesman and from the Center for American Progress, the Trump-despising and serially over-talking Neera Tanden.

Finally, but not exclusively, on August 31, 2025 on MTP, there were three virulently anti-Trump panelists, including formerly excellent Andrea Mitchell who, sadly, has become nothing but a predictable anti-Trump hater, plus progressive host Welker along with one shy conservative, Marc Short, who together could not even a decent discussion make.

NBC News Chief Washington Correspondent Andrea Mitchell [after a relentless attack on Trump]: “So it is an executive that is undeterred because Congress has been feckless.” Leigh Ann Caldwell, chief Washington correspondent for Puck, a little-known generally left-of-center source, particularly on this show: “It doesn’t sound like they’re willing to do it [block a nominee to the Federal Reserve] despite [that] this is a move by the administration to move around Congress and almost make Congress obsolete.” Ashley Etienne, former communications director for Vice President Harris: “I’m suggesting that the Democratic Party lean into a message framework of culture of corruption to highlight Donald Trump’s corruption,” and Marc Short, former director of legislative affairs for President Trump, providing no more than insipid, slightly right-of-center observations.

How about resurrecting MTP to a seriously fair give-and-take with some moderate principals, with the press not aligned with the left or right?

NBC has two options to rescue Meet the Press: Change the host and structure, or change the title to Meet the Left-Wing Press, unless that is too redundant.

Richard E. Vatz, Ph.D

Richard E. Vatz  https://wp.towson.edu/vatz/  is a Distinguished Professor Emeritus of political rhetoric at Towson University and author of The Only Authentic of Persuasion: the Agenda-Spin Model  (Bookwrights House, 2024) and over 200 other works, essays, lectures, and op-eds.  He is the benefactor of the Richard E. Vatz Best Debater Award at Towson.  The Van Bokkelen Auditorium at Towson University has been named after him.