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--:-- John Bickley: Welcome to Morning Wire, I'm John Bickley.
--:-- Georgia Howe: And I'm Georgia Howe.
--:-- John Bickley: This episode is brought to you by LifeLock. Between two-factor authentication, strong passwords, and a VPN, you try to be in control of how your info is protected. But many other places also have it, and they might not be as careful. That's why LifeLock monitors hundreds of millions of data points a second for threats. If your identity is stolen, they'll fix it. Guaranteed or your money back. Save up to 40% your first year. Visit LifeLock.com slash podcast for 40% off. Terms apply.
--:-- Georgia Howe: More than 50 families filed a class action lawsuit against Snapchat on Thursday, blaming the social media platform for the fentanyl overdose deaths of their children. There should be no reason any child should go on to Instagram, Snapchat, or any of them and be able to buy drugs. Why are families blaming Snapchat? And how is the app responding?
--:-- John Bickley: I'm Daily Wire Editor-in-Chief John Bickley with Georgia Howe. It's Friday, February 3rd, and this is Morning Wire. The College Board has revised curriculum for a new AP African-American studies course after certain aspects faced heavy criticism from conservatives. Who would say that an important part of Black history is queer theory? That is somebody pushing an agenda. We break down the content of the course and what caused the push for reform. And an expansive investigation into the media's reporting on the Russiagate narrative from the Columbia Journalism Review has put legacy media bias in the spotlight. What did the report find? And how are outlets like the New York Times responding to the scrutiny?
--:-- Georgia Howe: Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know.
--:-- John Bickley: Black Rifle Coffee has expanded their team of active duty service members, veterans, and veteran family members, all thanks to your support. This year alone, they were able to donate 120,000 bags of coffee to veterans and first responders. If you want to continue supporting this incredible company, go to blackriflecoffee.com and use promo code WIRE for 10% off your purchase and your first coffee club order. That's blackriflecoffee.com, promo code WIRE. Black Rifle Coffee, America's Coffee.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Over 50 families are suing Snapchat over drug overdose deaths that killed their teens. This comes as the FBI is investigating Snapchat over concerns that drug dealers are using the social media app to target kids. Daily Wire investigative reporter Maraid Elordi is here with the details for us.
--:-- Maraid Elordi: Hi, Georgia. So these families who filed their suit on Thursday say dealers used Snapchat to communicate with their kids to sell fake prescription drugs, many of which were laced with fentanyl, and that that ultimately led to the deaths of their children. Now, why are these parents focusing specifically on Snapchat? Is there a reason to believe that Snap is harboring the majority of this drug trade?
--:-- Georgia Howe: Well, according to a report by ABC News, Snapchat was implicated in 75% of overdose deaths among teens 13 to 18. The main reason for that is that Snapchat has features that are conducive to illegal activity. Specifically, messages disappear after being sent, so there's no evidence trail for these deals.
--:-- Maraid Elordi: Representing the families is attorney Matthew Bergman of the Social Media Victims Law Center. He says the problem is strictly unique to Snapchat. They all lost a child to fentanyl poisoning through counterfeit drugs obtained through Snap. Not through Instagram, not through TikTok, but through Snap. This isn't an internet problem. This isn't a social media problem. This is a Snapchat problem.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Another reason it can be hard to track this activity is because teens use an emoji and symbol code to disguise their drug deals. For example, an electrical outlet emoji is code for a hookup to a drug dealer. A pill parking sign banana or a blue circle emoji all mean Percocet or oxycodone.
--:-- Maraid Elordi: Now, you've also reported that the FBI and Justice Department are also looking into Snapchat for this reason, correct?
--:-- Georgia Howe: Yes. So both the FBI and the Justice Department announced at the end of January that they're investigating Snapchat over concerns about drug trade on the platform with a particular focus on dealers who target kids.
--:-- Maraid Elordi: Congress is also looking at the issue. Amy Neville, the mom of Alex, a 14-year-old boy who died from a fentanyl-laced pill, testified to Congress last month. Here's what she had to say.
--:-- Maraid Elordi: Now, how is Snapchat responding to all this? Well, Snapchat first publicly addressed this issue in 2021, at which time the company said it had become more aggressive in trying to shut down drug dealers' accounts and had added measures to make it harder for users to find the Snapchat accounts of minors.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Snapchat also said it blocks searches for drugs on the app and redirects them to resources about the dangers of fentanyl. But parents of children who overdosed say Snapchat and other big tech companies have too much immunity thanks to a federal law called Section 230. Critics say Section 230 allows Snapchat to escape responsibility by claiming they can't be held responsible for the speech of users on the platform.
--:-- Maraid Elordi: Conversely, though, Section 230 functions to protect the free speech of Americans who use social media platforms, so it is a complex issue. Either way, Snapchat has a major issue on its hands with drug dealers targeting minors, and even if the law doesn't target the platform, parents may start pulling their kids off.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Well, it's definitely a scary thing for parents. Maraid, thanks for reporting.
--:-- Maraid Elordi: Thanks, Georgia.
--:-- Georgia Howe: That was Daily Wire investigative reporter Maraid Elordi. Coming up, how a governor got the college board to change an AP history class.
--:-- John Bickley: The College Board this week released its revamped curriculum for a new advanced placement course in African American studies, and it removed much of the contentious subject matter criticized by conservatives, including Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. Here to discuss the new curriculum is Daily Wire senior editor Ash Short.
--:-- Ash Short: So chunks have been removed that were predominantly associated with writers and scholars of critical race theory. The theory has spawned a variety of scholarly offshoots that all basically examine privilege and oppression between whites and non-whites, with a strong emphasis on the Black experience, or at least the experience of the activists who came up with the theory.
--:-- Georgia Howe: The theory has been criticized as divisive and counterfactual, but nonetheless remains influential in academia. The new advanced placement curriculum removes content from those associated with such teachings, as well as content that promotes claims from queer theory and feminist theory.
--:-- Ash Short: The rationale is that these theories have a strong activist component that is inappropriate for the K-12 classroom. Just as a concrete example, Black Lives Matter will no longer be part of the formal curriculum but it still listed in a list of options for research projects. Likewise, Black conservatism has similarly been added as an option as well.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So this was a major revision. What sparked all these changes?
--:-- Ash Short: While Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and several other conservatives publicly criticized the original curriculum, the Florida Department of Education recently informed the College Board that the course ran contrary to Florida law and said it significantly lacks educational value.
--:-- Georgia Howe: For example, DeSantis pointed out that the courts advocated for abolishing prisons, which he called a radical political position. But it wasn't just conservatives speaking out against the curriculum. Leon County Commissioner Bill Proctor, an African-American Democrat, called the original curriculum trash and said it was ideology, not history.
--:-- Ash Short: Now, Florida has become a real battleground state when it comes to education. For example, last month, we reported that Governor DeSantis staged something of a takeover of the board of one of the state's struggling colleges.
--:-- Georgia Howe: But there was other news this week on that front as well, correct?
--:-- Ash Short: Right. He also announced this week that the state of Florida would stop funding diversity, equity, and inclusion bureaucracies at public universities. In the same press conference, he also stated there would be increased scrutiny on what he called deadweight professors.
--:-- Georgia Howe: DeSantis made the announcement after he asked public university administrators to provide his office with a detailed account of DEI expenditures. This week, he announced those initiatives would be defunded, saying that bureaucracies are, quote, hostile to academic freedom and constitute a drain on resources.
--:-- Ash Short: Now, speaking of academic freedom, how is he defining deadweight professors?
--:-- Georgia Howe: That mainly has to do with performance reviews. DeSantis had previously signed legislation mandating performance reviews for tenured professors every five years. This week, he announced additional accountability procedures, including the ability for university presidents and trustees to call a post-tenure review at any time.
--:-- Ash Short: But critics say all of this amounts to a threat to academic freedom.
--:-- Georgia Howe: All right. Well, Ash, thanks so much for reporting.
--:-- Ash Short: You're welcome.
--:-- Georgia Howe: That was Daily Wire senior editor Ash Short.
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--:-- John Bickley: An extensive report released this week by the Columbia Journalism Review offers harsh criticism of the media's handling of the Trump-Russia collusion story. The outlet says that after 18 months of investigation, it found serious flaws in the reporting that earned The Washington Post and The New York Times Pulitzer Prizes. Here to give us the details about the report and what impact it's having is Daily Wire culture reporter Megan Basham.
--:-- Megan Basham: So, yeah, I think that's an important place to start because the context here is that CJR is a magazine for professional journalists. It's put out by the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, and it's really highly respected in the industry. It also tends to be politically progressive.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So all that to say that this criticism is not coming from conservative media or figures. And then you look at the reporter who wrote the story, Jeff Gerth. He spent decades at the New York Times, and he's won a Pulitzer Prize himself, and he taught investigative journalism at Princeton.
--:-- Megan Basham: So his credentials within elite media circles are pristine. And what did Gerth's investigation find?
--:-- Georgia Howe: Well, it's actually a four-part series that together is nearly the length of a short book. So I'm just going to hit the highlights here. He found that the Washington Post and New York Times didn't follow their own rules when using anonymous sources.
--:-- Megan Basham: So over a thousand times in its coverage, the Times attributed information to, quote, a person familiar with, nothing more specific than that. And they ignored evidence that should have cast doubt on their stories.
--:-- Georgia Howe: To give you just one example in early 2018 the Times ignored a publicly available report from the FBI lead investigator who said he did not find any serious evidence that Trump had Russia ties.
--:-- Megan Basham: They relied on selective leaks coming from Congress that Girth says they should have known were politically motivated. The FBI itself wrote a report detailing numerous inaccuracies in a Times story that was titled, Trump campaign aides had repeated contacts with Russian intelligence.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Girth said the FBI categorically refuted both the lead and the headline to that story.
--:-- Megan Basham: So Girth also says that when special counsel Robert Mueller announced that he was not going to recommend action against Trump after that 10-month investigation, there was panic inside the Times newsroom because basically they knew that that was going to cast a negative light on their reporting.
--:-- Georgia Howe: So I spoke to independent journalist and former Rolling Stone editor Matt Tybee, who recently broke stories about the FBI's involvement with Twitter, and he's quoted in Girth's story.
--:-- Megan Basham: So Tybee told me that the pains Girth took to get his sources on the record is itself a rebuke to the media. The whole thrust of Jeff's piece is that it has a lot to do with legacy media sources being willing to accept things on face from unnamed sources, particularly in the intelligence world.
--:-- Georgia Howe: I think Jeff did the right thing in putting almost the entirety of that story on the record. He's got almost everybody giving him the information under their own names, which is kind of a message he was sending to the business that this is how you do it.
--:-- Megan Basham: So yes, he's identified all the errors, but there's probably another layer of scandal beneath this in terms of the unnatural relationship between these organizations and certain sources.
--:-- Georgia Howe: And the fact that this report comes so many years after the fact, how are the media responding to this pretty devastating report?
--:-- Megan Basham: Well, the Times says it's standing by its reporting and that those Pulitzers are proof of its quality. But other than that, I really don't know how else to describe it other than a wall of silence, which is fairly shocking given the outlet and reporter in question and just how lengthy and detailed this report is.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Taipi told me he believes that's because the press is in a very difficult situation here. There's really no way to retract five years of getting something wrong. The size of the CJR piece reflects the enormous scale of the errors. So it's something that logistically would be very difficult for any of these organizations to admit to.
--:-- Megan Basham: Well, hopefully we hear more of a response than that.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Thanks, Megan.
--:-- Megan Basham: Anytime.
--:-- Georgia Howe: That was Daily Wire culture reporter Megan Basham.
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--:-- John Bickley: Another story we're tracking this week. The U.S. is tracking a suspected Chinese surveillance balloon that has been spotted over U.S. airspace for a few days now. The Pentagon has thus far decided not to shoot it down due to risks of harm to people on the ground.
--:-- Georgia Howe: A senior defense official told reporters that, quote, once the balloon was detected, the U.S. government acted immediately to protect against the collection of sensitive information.
--:-- John Bickley: Well, that's all the time we've got this morning. Thanks for waking up with us. We'll be back this afternoon with more of the news you need to know.
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--:-- Georgia Howe: The U.S. blew through the $31.4 trillion debt ceiling last month, and still the White House refuses to reduce spending. If you're worried about the future of this nation's economy, you need to consider diversifying into gold with Birch Gold. Birch Gold makes it easy to convert an IRA or 401k into an IRA in precious metals. Text WIRE to 989898 to claim your free info kit on gold and talk to one of their precious metal experts. Text WIRE to 989898 today.
--:-- John Bickley: Thank you.
