CSPAN - Washington Journal Amy Goodman
Aired: 2026-04-18
Duration: 06:30


=== Independent Media as Oxygen (02:33) ===

[00:00:22]  Clarice if she can come and introduce elected officials.
[00:00:29]  If we could all sit!
[00:00:30]  Good afternoon.
[00:00:32]  I'm Clarice.
[00:00:33]  I'm very glad to be here.
[00:00:34]  You're watching live coverage of the Michigan Democratic Women's Luncheon here on C-SPAN.
[00:00:39]  New Jersey Democratic Senator Corey Booker, speaking to attendees here in Detroit.
[00:00:44]  And coming up, we expect to hear from former Vice President Kamala Harris with live coverage here on C-SPAN.
[00:00:50]  The city councils, the school boards.
[00:00:54]  I'm Amy Didman from Democracy Now.
[00:00:56]  Can you tell us what you think about President Trump saying climate change is a Chinese hoax?
[00:01:01]  I'm sorry, I'm running late for a meeting.
[00:01:03]  Right, but you weren't running late when you're just standing there.
[00:01:05]  So my first impressions of Amy were...
[00:01:09]  What did you say to those who say that you're a war criminal?
[00:01:12]  Man, she doesn't show what anybody thinks about.
[00:01:13]  So don't push me.
[00:01:14]  I'm a journalist.
[00:01:15]  Independent media is the oxygen of a democracy.
[00:01:18]  What do you mean by independent?
[00:01:20]  Not being sponsored by corporations.
[00:01:22]  Amy's chaotically brilliant at the spy game.
[00:01:25]  We began on nine radio stations.
[00:01:28]  If she believes something, she's going to fight for it and get it out to the world.
[00:01:33]  Straight up, Journal.
[00:01:34]  That was a clip of a trailer for a newly released documentary called Steal This Story, Please.
[00:01:40]  It focuses on the career of journalist Amy Goodman, who joins us now.
[00:01:45]  She is the co-founder and host for Democracy Now.
[00:01:47]  And that documentary highlights her 40-year career in journalism.
[00:01:51]  She's here to talk with us about that as well as News of the Week.
[00:01:54]  Good morning, Amy.
[00:01:55]  Thanks for being with us.
[00:01:56]  It's great to be with you, Taylor.
[00:01:58]  I know you're on tour right now promoting this documentary.
[00:02:01]  Let's do a little backstory about how did this documentary come about for people who are familiar with your work?
[00:02:08]  Well, to start, it's such an honor to be back on C-SPAN.
[00:02:11]  I used to come on with Brian Lamb and other folks on Washington Journal because Democracy Now started 30 years ago on nine radio stations and we started on the Pacifica radio station in Washington, D.C.
[00:02:27]  So I would just come over to C-SPAN.
[00:02:31]  It was just, it was the only daily election show in public broadcasting at the time.
[00:02:37]  That was the year that President Clinton was re-elected.
[00:02:41]  And it was just a project.
[00:02:43]  It was going to wrap up right after that election.
[00:02:46]  But there was such a demand for the show.
[00:02:49]  We used the primary system in the country to look at state by state what people were doing.

=== The Demand for Democracy Now (03:34) ===

[00:02:56]  At the time, most people didn't vote in the United States.
[00:02:59]  When I got the call from Pacific Radio to host this show, I was at an underground house in Haiti covering elections.
[00:03:07]  When people would go to the polls, they'd be gunned down.
[00:03:10]  When people would announce for office, they could be killed.
[00:03:13]  And yet most people voted.
[00:03:16]  So why in the United States, in the most powerful country on earth, did most people not vote?
[00:03:22]  I didn't think it was apathy.
[00:03:24]  I really wanted to know how people were involved, what they were doing in their communities.
[00:03:31]  And so it was those authentic voices at the grassroots that is what Democracy Now became known for.
[00:03:40]  You know, movements make history.
[00:03:42]  Yes, the President of the United States occupies the most powerful position on earth, but there is a force more powerful, and it is everyone, everywhere.
[00:03:54]  And I wanted to know what people thought, what people were doing.
[00:03:59]  And so the show just started to increase just on radio, on public radio, Pacifica Radio.
[00:04:07]  And let me say a little about Pacifica Radio, where we got started.
[00:04:10]  Well, I mean, then it went the week of the 9-11 attacks.
[00:04:13]  We're broadcasting from New York from an old hundred-year-old firehouse in downtown Manhattan that had become our new home.
[00:04:23]  It was three weeks before the 9-11 attacks.
[00:04:26]  Our show at the time, it's every morning at 8.
[00:04:30]  People can check it out at democracynow.org or on local TV and radio.
[00:04:36]  But at the time, it was 9 every morning.
[00:04:38]  So the first plane hit the first tower of the World Trade Center at 8.47.
[00:04:44]  We heard a kind of sonic boom-like crash outside the firehouse.
[00:04:50]  But the show must go on at 9 o'clock.
[00:04:53]  We went on at 9.03.
[00:04:55]  The next plane hit the next tower of the World Trade Center.
[00:05:00]  And then, well, as we all know, events started to unfold.
[00:05:04]  People were running by the firehouse covered in ash.
[00:05:08]  And we just kept broadcasting hour after hour.
[00:05:12]  We were inside the evacuation zone, the closest national broadcast to ground zero.
[00:05:18]  That's when a local public access TV station in New York, Manhattan Neighborhood Network, said, can we just flip the switch?
[00:05:27]  They were connected to this community television training center and put you on.
[00:05:33]  And so once we went on one TV show, it took off.
[00:05:37]  And stations around the country started to say, can we run you as emergency broadcasting?
[00:05:43]  Then in PR stations and PBS stations, community and college stations.
[00:05:49]  And now we're on 1,500 public television and radio stations around the United States and around the world.
[00:05:58]  And that's how Democracy Now has grown.
[00:06:01]  But we started on Pacifica Radio, which is the oldest independent network in the United States.
[00:06:08]  It began in 1949 in the Bay Area.
[00:06:11]  I am headed there today for this new film out about Democracy Now, and it'll be in theaters in Berkeley and Sebastopol and at the Roxy and San Francisco and San Rafael and then Seattle and then Portland, Oregon.
[00:06:28]  It began in 1949.