SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
Let's take a step back to 2019. President Trump's well into his first term. Sixteen-year-old Greta Thunberg is urging world leaders to act on climate change at the U.N. "Game Of Thrones" is in its final season, and TikTok - eh, just a harmless little app used by Gen Z for lip-synching and dance videos. But still, a 28-year-old Washington Post video producer saw an opportunity.
AI-GENERATED VOICE: TikTok knows that The Washington Post is a newspaper.
SIMON: Dave Jorgenson launched The Washington Post TikTok. He's known for short videos that break down news headlines with a dash of humor.
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DAVE JORGENSON: (As character) My package.
(As delivery person) Sign right here with your finger?
(As character) I'm always so bad at signing these with my finger.
(As delivery person) Yeah, me too. It's going to ask you a question on the screen.
(As character) What is this? A tip?
(As delivery person) Oh, no, it's a tariff.
(As character) What?
(As delivery person) No, you're not paying the tariff. The importer is paying it.
(As character) The company I bought it from?
(As delivery person) Yes, and as a result, the company is charging you a duty.
(As character) This is in addition to the $200 I already paid?
SIMON: Now I understand. He's amassed a following of almost 2 million. Dave Jorgenson is leaving the Post now to start his own media company. He joins us now from Kansas City. Thanks so much for being with us.
JORGENSON: Thanks for having me. I'm so glad you understand tariffs now. I've spent the better part of my year trying to explain them.
SIMON: Well, of course, our financial people have done a good job on our air, but suddenly, you know, you made it actually slip into form for me. What happened when you first went to the Post? Can you tell me they said, what the heck is TikTok?
JORGENSON: Oh, well, I kept bringing it up, and that was the answer to me - to bringing it up multiple times. But I came to the Post initially in 2017. And for a couple of years, was just running around, making the weirdest videos possible. There's one I just stumbled across that I totally forgot about, where I read Sean Spicer's book in a bathtub covered in rose petals.
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JORGENSON: (As character) Chapter one, it's over. The president wanted to see me. The call came at 4 o'clock on a Thursday afternoon in late July in the White House.
That's the kind of stuff I was doing before TikTok.
SIMON: I have to tell you, I'm glad I missed that one, but go ahead, yeah.
JORGENSON: (Laughter) Yeah, yeah. So yeah, I was doing that for a couple of years. And the reason I bring up stuff like that is I could kind of figure out what I could and couldn't get away with at The Washington Post. And so when I pitched TikTok, I had built enough trust across the newsroom where they said, we don't know what you're talking about but maybe go ahead and try it under the radar. And so I did try it. I was not under the radar. I posted it everywhere. I tweeted about it. It was a whole strategy.
SIMON: One in 6 Americans now get their news from TikTok. I have to tell you I'm not entirely reassured by that. Why do you think it's taken off?
JORGENSON: I think a couple things happened. One is that TikTok was just one of the first apps that understood we are holding these vertical screens in our hand, and so the video should be vertical when you open the app. And it's very immersive in that way. Still, when you open it, it's just video hitting you in the face, like, for better or worse. The other part, in terms of it just being so impactful, I think it is often a break from what's happening around us. It started well into Trump's first term. I think that's part of its success to some degree. My job often is to go, hey, these things are happening but let me try to inform you in a funny way.
SIMON: Is it still journalism?
JORGENSON: For me, it's always been journalism, but I think it's even more so than it used to be. The difficulty is anyone on TikTok can post on TikTok, right? So there are people, whether they're doing it intentionally or not, that are spreading misinformation. I specifically go at that, where I try to do things like, we have a series called Misinformation Monday, where I go, here's what you're getting wrong this week. Let me try to unpack it for you. And often, that almost entirely comes at it with humor and satire. But I think journalism is informing people, and that's what I want to do, if I can stand on my pedestal for just a second. But I'll get off it in a second. Don't worry.
SIMON: Back onto the pedestal, please. Tell us about the...
JORGENSON: (Laughter).
SIMON: ...Company you're starting called Local News International, LNI.
JORGENSON: LNI stands for Local News International, what started as my YouTube channel, and now we're expanding it to be an actual company. What's really great is I'm bringing Lauren Saks, who was my editor for the last six years. So she's approved over 4,000 TikToks. And Micah Gelman, who is head of video, is also coming along with me. So we have this sort of built-in infrastructure that we're lifting out of the Post and trying to build on with the things that were kind of - we weren't able to do while at The Washington Post.
That means more long-form videos where we can get deeper into subjects, and it's not just kind of the surface-area explainer. There's a little bit more there. The idea is that already we're kind of this source in the same way that "The Daily Show" was the only way people were getting news in the mid-2000s. And there was that sort of outrage of, why are millennials learning from Comedy Central?
SIMON: I must point out the only way some people - and I remember interviewing Jon Stewart, who said he got his news from NPR.
JORGENSON: Actually, that's a really valid point because everything I'm doing is - I would say almost everything - 95% is sourced from other journalism. So I'm using all of this really great journalism from around the world, including NPR, and I'm turning it into a video that just gets it all out there for you to understand and, again, hopefully laugh, but on a platform like YouTube and TikTok, where all these young people are, and otherwise, maybe you wouldn't be seeking out news.
SIMON: Dave, what's going on at the Post?
JORGENSON: (Laughter) You tell me.
SIMON: Well, I mean, we should explain if somebody hasn't followed it, a great number - and I do mean a great number - of distinguished journalists have departed your newspaper. I will include you in that company.
JORGENSON: Oh, wow. Thank you, Scott.
SIMON: Well, I'm interviewing you. I'm trying to curry favor, but go ahead, please, yeah.
JORGENSON: (Laughter) It's working. There's a great number of journalists who have left. There's a lot of great journalists that are still there. But certainly, there doesn't seem to be a totally clear plan. And that was a big part of, amongst many reasons, including just personal career ambitions, for me to leave. With that level of uncertainty, it just becomes a little bit harder to stick around.
SIMON: You've done interviews with The New York Times and NPR. Now, in the old days, people would say, oh, that's great. Oh, look at all the attention.
JORGENSON: (Laughter).
SIMON: Is that still the case anymore?
JORGENSON: My dad definitely said that. So he was excited. And I know my mom was really excited about me talking to you. So there's that. But as far as...
SIMON: Sorry. Ooh, ooh. Go ahead, yeah.
JORGENSON: (Laughter) Yeah. No, they're compliments. They're compliments. But the larger point I'm making is I think the legacy media organizations still exist and are actually becoming integrated in ways that are really exciting. I mean, NPR's own Planet Money has a TikTok channel that I've loved for years, and that's a really great way that they've reintroduced NPR to some people who didn't know what it was. You know, at The Washington Post, back in 2019, when I was a young man in his 20s, people thought my name was Washington and I was posting. They had no idea.
SIMON: (Laughter).
JORGENSON: Yeah. And so we just slowly had to work our way into, here's what The Washington Post is. And similarly, that's what I'm doing with LNI. But, you know, through these legacy organizations that I think a lot more people care about than you might think.
SIMON: Dave Jorgenson, host of Local News International, thanks so much for being with us.
JORGENSON: Thank you, Scott. I appreciate it.
SIMON: NPR contacted The Washington Post for comment and did not receive a response. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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