David Cay Johnston

YouTube video by DCReport Reality Check: Want to Defend Democracy? Start by Reading Real Journalism

If you want to live in a free society and not in Donald Trump's dictatorship, I have advice on what you can do:
m.youtube.com/shorts/qR7yO...

Trump and The New York Times From Trump selling pardons to billionaires reshaping Wyoming, today's NY Times front page shows why quality journalism remains essential.

Dismissing serious investigative reporting, like stories on Trump’s war powers or alleged pardons for the wealthy, help those in power avoid scrutiny. Journalism still matters for holding leaders accountable. Article by @davidcayjohnston.bsky.social

www.dcreport.org/2026/03/08/c...

Trump and The New York Times From Trump selling pardons to billionaires reshaping Wyoming, today's NY Times front page shows why quality journalism remains essential.

Youmay be unwittingly helping Donald Trump consolidate his dictatorship -- my new DCReport column.
www.dcreport.org/2026/03/08/c...

ChatGPT image of Donald Trump rather than the actor Slim Pickens riding a nuclear bomb based on the 1964 Stanley Kubrick film Dr.

Mr. Trump goes to war:

Of the current cross developing a drug is closer to $3 billion but you're ignoring the other side of the equation, which is the amount we pay for the drug once it's approved for use.
Without a doubt, Dean Baker's proposal would save a lot of money.

I think you misread Dean's idea. He would have the US government sell drugs at the cost of manufacture, not the monopoly profits pricing we currently experience.
He's written a whole book about this with every detail addressed.

Drugs Would Be Cheap but for Patents That Make Them Expensive Rep. Rashida Tlaib’s Medicines for the People Act proposes publicly funded drug research to reduce pharmaceutical monopolies and lower prescription costs.

America's antiquated system of financing pharmaceutical breakthroughs with patents isn't just the most expensive way to do it, it invites corruption, writes economist Dean Baker.
Read his insights, and the better financing alternative, at ad-free DCReport.
www.dcreport.org/2026/03/06/d...

Truth, as Donald would say:

Headline: why is Paramount hiring so many men with troubled pasts?

Why have at least five men who were credibly accused of sexual misconduct been hired by Paramount Studios by owner David Ellison, son of Larry - an excellent question raised by The Wrap.

There were 129 journalists killed around the world in 2025. Two-thirds (86) were slain by the Israeli military, a new report by the Committee to Protect Journalists found, per the WashPost:

There's a reason that for years, I've to Trump as "Delusional Donald." The headline below is so crazy and fact-free that everyone should understand:

@davidcayjohnston.bsky.social warns that Donald Trump’s “magical thinking” about a 4-week Iran war ignores reality. Killing Iran’s leader has inflamed long-standing Sunni-Shia tensions across the Middle East conflicts rooted in a 1,400-year divide. Wars don’t come with expiration dates.

My short new video for DCreport.org on Donald's magical thinking and his illegal war:
m.youtube.com/shorts/O3YBV...

By closing Moscow's Gulag Museum, Putin is erasing inconvenient Soviet history The erasure of the Gulag History Museum demonstrates that Soviet and Russian history is now whatever Vladimir Putin wants it to be.

The libertarian intellectuals at Reason Magazine provide the latest evidence that Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump are opposite sides of the same coin when it comes to erasing inconvenient history:
reason.com/2026/03/03/b...

Rochester, N.Y.: A New Lens on the City of Kodak

Gifted below is the link to Anna Starpoli's superb profile of Rochester in The New York Times:
www.nytimes.com/2026/03/03/r...

Iran Gave Trump What He Wanted; Trump Attacked Anyway Oman's foreign minister reveals Iran offered Trump deeper nuclear concessions than the 2015 Obama deal — hours before Trump launched strikes against Iran.

Iran gave Trump a huge face-saving opportunity on Friday. Instead, he started a war.
Please read my DCReport column, which provides crucial context for the widening Middle East conflict.
www.dcreport.org/2026/03/02/i...

So Marco Rubio says we attacked Iran because Israel was going to do so and we needed to act preemptively.

What was that Donald said -- "America first?"

Netanyahu is leading Trump like a farmer with a nose ring in his
biggest pig.

Iran Gave Trump What He Wanted; Trump Attacked Anyway Oman's foreign minister reveals Iran offered Trump deeper nuclear concessions than the 2015 Obama deal — hours before Trump launched strikes against Iran.

The ayatollahs made huge concessions to Trump last week, giving him a better deal than Obama got in 2015 including letting American oil companies into Iran, but Trump chose war anyway.
My latest DCREPORT column explains this little known news:
www.dcreport.org/2026/03/02/i...

From Mehdi Hasan's Zeteo news service, news that should shake your soul:

One Oakland police officer made $490,000 in overtime. The city can’t find records detailing much of what he did One OPD officer logged 5,242 total working hours, racking up $490,000 in overtime pay. If he worked more than half of the time in a calendar year, why can't the city tell us what he did?

In this century we entered the world of cops paid a quarter million dollars a year. Now a police lieutenant in Oakland, Calif., is on the verge of becoming a three-quarter million dollar cop:
oaklandside.org/2026/01/29/o...

It's Official: the Cybertruck is More Explosive than the Ford Pinto - FuelArc News We now have a full year of data for the Cybertruck, and a strange preponderance of headlines about Cybertrucks exploding into flames, including several fatalities. That’s more than enough data to comp...

Analysis of crash data shows that you're 17 times more likely to die in a vehicle fire if you buy Elon Musk's Tesla Cyber truck than if you had bought a Ford Pinto, the 1970s era car infamous for gas tank explosions in rear end collisions.

fuelarc.com/evs/its-offi...

The Joy Reid Show Politics Podcast · Updated Weekly · A three times weekly dose of Joy-Ann Reid's takes and analysis of the news, politics and culture. If it's hot and happening, and matters to you, it's here.

Joy Reid has invited me onto her podcast tonight during the 7 PM East Coast time hour. Yay!
podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/t...

Image from the film 1984 with Big Brother's image on a poster hung from a government building matched to Donald Trump's poster of himself hanging on the Department of Justice building.

But of course...

Much as I've been critical of Gorsuch's sometimes coldly cruel
jurisprudence in my books and columns, I think here he was trying to find an analogy that simpletons could grasp.

YouTube video by DCReport Reality Check: Why Prince Andrew’s Arrest Should Worry Donald Trump #PrinceAndrew #DavidCayJohnston

The arrest of Andrew Mountbatten–Windsor is a major legal and political blow for Donald Trump, as I explain in this two minute Reality Check video for DCREPORT.
m.youtube.com/watch?v=Jc4j...

Bravo

YouTube video by DCReport Reality Check: Is “National Security” Being Used to Expand Presidential Power? #nationalsecurity

An important story that our big news organizations are flubbing, a story that should alarm you about the how the Trump dictatorship is consolidating power: www.youtube.com/shorts/APlMo...

David Cay Johnston Explains Why His Name Appears in Epstein Files — and Why Trump’s Redactions Matter David Cay Johnston explains why his name appears in the Epstein files, why context matters, and why Trump’s redactions raise urgent transparency concerns.

Guess who's in the Epstein files and proud to be there:
www.dcreport.org/2026/02/17/d...

Chidinma Anyanwu (@amay.a100) on Threads President Obama and Michelle at the NBA All Star game. Notice no boos

Trump gets booed at sporting events, JD Vance, too. SO what happened when the Obamas attended the NBA All Star game.
www.threads.com/@amay.a100/p...

Rigging Elections, Trump Style Kristi Noem’s Arizona comments about “the right people voting” spark concerns over Trump administration efforts to influence the 2026 and 2028 elections.

My new DCReport column explores the latest Trump regime push to rig our 2026 elections, a story every major news organization missed.
www.dcreport.org/2026/02/15/r...