A shameful week for America’s institutions – and for democracy itself, writes Simon Marks
4 July 2025, 17:03 | Updated: 4 July 2025, 17:40
This week, the ticking clock didn’t just mark another countdown on 60 Minutes. It rang out like a warning bell for American democracy.
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What began as a media spat over an edited interview with Vice President Kamala Harris has spiralled into something far more serious. CBS’s decision to heavily edit the segment—cutting Harris’s hesitant, vague comments on Gaza in favour of a polished, decisive soundbite—was questionable. But their subsequent surrender to Donald Trump’s frivolous $16 million lawsuit is indefensible.
Let’s be clear: this wasn’t journalism on trial. It was the First Amendment. And Paramount, CBS’s parent company, didn’t just settle—they cowered, reportedly to keep Trump sweet ahead of a mega-merger. The message to future presidents is now dangerously clear: threaten the press, and they might just pay you to go away.
But it doesn’t stop with the media. Trump’s intimidation strategy extends across the country. Universities are being forced to toe the line—this week, the University of Pennsylvania caved under federal pressure to ban trans athletes. Law firms have paid off the administration to keep contracts. Cultural institutions have gone silent. Capitulation is becoming a norm, not a cautionary tale.
Meanwhile, Congress handed Trump his “Big Beautiful Bill”—a colossal tax-and-spend package that gifts trillions to the wealthy while stripping millions of health care and food assistance. ICE, the agency already notorious for terrorising migrant communities, will soon command a larger budget than the FBI.
Trump calls it “the biggest bill ever.” Economists are calling it reckless. History may call it ruinous.
And through it all, Democrats have largely offered commentary—not resistance. The authoritarian creep continues unchecked, enabled by corporate cowardice and political paralysis.
As Trump prepares to sign his sweeping legislation on America’s 249th birthday, one can’t help but wonder what kind of country will emerge by the 250th.
If the last week has shown us anything, it’s that the greatest threat to democracy isn’t a ticking clock—it’s the silence that follows when institutions stop standing up.
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