Stephen Harrison
Appearances
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
So the prosecutor is supposed to do everything in the district from handling prosecutions for minor drug cases to murder to all the civil litigation and lawsuits that go on. And lately, Ed Martin's been sending a lot of these threatening letters to various nonprofit organizations that he has political disagreements with.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
He has sent a similarly threatening letter to the New England Journal of Medicine, to Chest, which is a medical journal that doctors who specialize in the lungs and chest read. And he says, you need to start including a variety and a diversity of opinion in your medical coverage. And so instead of just reporting or including studies that...
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
The New England Journal of Medicine thinks are scientifically credible. He wants them to report more outlier or alternative medicine and include that in the coverage for doctors.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
I'd say right from the very beginning, it's been pushing the boundaries. For one, Ed Martin defended a lot of the January 6th accused criminals, right? So when he arrives as the prosecutor in D.C., he finds himself in the unusual position of being named on both sides of the case. He's both the prosecutor and the defense. So, I mean, that's never happened before, right?
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
And then he gets there and he immediately fires all of the prosecutors who are working on cases against January 6th defendants. And then he says – he's reportedly said that we're President Trump's lawyers now.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
He's also sent – just another letter that he sent I think is really interesting was one to Elon Musk and Doge and said, hey, if you need anything from the Justice Department, we will protect you. We are here to serve you. Another thing about this is the procedure, right?
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
Really, if there's an issue with a nonprofit that is not following the rules that it needs for having tax-exempt status, then that issue is supposed to be brought and decided by the IRS. If the IRS revokes tax-exempt status, then the prosecution gets referred to the DOJ. Ed Martin here is doing entirely the reverse. He's sending this vaguely threatening letter to Wikipedia from the DOJ.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
And when really all of these issues are supposed to be decided by another part of the federal government, and that's the IRS.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
On the one hand, you have Democratic opposition. You have Dick Durbin, who read all of the things that Ed Martin failed to disclose to the Senate, such as the fact that he has been on Russian state TV over hundreds of times, and he did not disclose that in his statements to the Senate.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
But more importantly, we're getting some cracks among Republicans in the sense that Tom Tillis has said he's a no vote for him, the January 6th language was too much. Other Republicans have expressed concerns.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
Well, I'd say I'm a low-key Wikipedia editor. I'm the type who fixes typos, uploads photos. I spent some time working on an article about the Stonely P, which is my favorite bar and restaurant here in Dallas. It's really famous. But I'm not like an extensive Wikipedia editor. And I think it really has to do with personality. Like I'm really driven to do investigative journalism and reporting.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
Ed Martin has this relationship with this guy named Tim Hale Cusinelli.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
And he's someone who's a convicted January 6th rioter and has also espoused anti-Semitic views. And Martin has appeared on multiple events with Hale. He's called him a great friend. They were on the podcast together.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
So in his response to the Senate, Ed Martin said that he is not very close with Tim Hale Cusinelli.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
If Ed Martin isn't confirmed, then that position is temporarily appointed by the D.C. court, right? You would think that that person might not be as openly partisan as Trump's pick. We will see. But then Trump does get a second chance because he's in the executive branch and he gets to appoint his pick for the position. So, I mean, it could go away with Ed Martin if Ed Martin doesn't get the role.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
The Heritage Foundation and Project 2025 are very against Wikipedia. They're against what they see as establishment institutions and sort of mainstream media perspectives. So I don't think that the right, and I should say the far right's political attacks on Wikipedia will stop, even if Ed Martin doesn't get this position.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
And so I research a story and it gets published in a newspaper somewhere. And then that article ends up as a source, a reliable source, that's linked on Wikipedia. So I feel like I'm contributing to Wikipedia in that way more so than the actual editing.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
The acting U.S. attorney in Washington, D.C., Ed Martin, sent a letter to the Wikimedia Foundation. And the Wikimedia Foundation is the nonprofit organization that helps operate Wikipedia.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
There are a lot of consequences if Wikipedia and the Wikimedia Foundation lose its tax-exempt status. One, they'd have to pay taxes, right? You know, state and federal taxes. And, of course, Wikipedia doesn't really have a way other than donations of bringing in money. Wikipedia famously doesn't have ads. It's not selling your personal information like every social media site does.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
And so there would be a lot less funds for the technical infrastructure of Wikipedia, the servers. There would be a lot less staffing and educational initiatives. And I also just think that people would be a lot less likely to donate to the Wikimedia Foundation if it became a for-profit enterprise.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
People want to donate to the nonprofit idealistic goal of a free internet encyclopedia, and they don't want to donate to just another big tech company. Where is this letter coming from? Yeah, I think that conservatives in recent years, not always, but in recent years, have really decided that they have a bone to pick with Wikipedia. Do leftists really now control the editing?
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
So Wikipedia doesn't reflect a MAGA or America First perspective. If you go to the article on January 6th, it's going to describe it as a riot. It's going to speak to the violence, all the things that were reported at the time. Whereas Ed Martin, this DOJ prosecutor that Trump appointed, would say, well, it was like a big party. It was a celebration, right?
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
So it's Wikipedia's first and foremost, not really reflecting the MAGA or America First point of view. Then secondly, there's a specific issue with how Wikipedia has been describing the conflict in Gaza, the Israel-Gaza war.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
The Wikipedia articles on that will say things like various... Human rights experts and organizations have described Israel's actions as war crimes, right? And they're drawing from the sources that say that.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
And so organizations like the Heritage Foundation have pledged to go after individual Wikipedia editors to target them and intimidate them and try to get that information and that content removed from Wikipedia. And then lastly, I would say that we see this in a lot of authoritarian regimes around the world.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
We have in Russia, they have tried to find and they have fined Wikipedia several times.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
arrested Wikipedia editors for putting views on the encyclopedia that go against the state. So I think that a lot of authoritarian governments don't like Wikipedia. They don't like this independent source of knowledge that they can't control.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
I think there's something deeper going on because Elon Musk is... famously one of the biggest critics of Wikipedia. But now, back in 2017, he said, I love Wikipedia. It just keeps getting better and better. And now, more recently, he's been tweeting that Wikipedia should rename itself quote-unquote Wokipedia.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
He's been getting his followers on X and saying, hey, you shouldn't donate to the foundation.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
So I think that there's just been a really significant effort, particularly from the right wing, whether that's Musk or the Heritage Foundation and now Ed Martin, to discredit Wikipedia and tarnish its reputation.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
Well, it's fair to say that Wikipedia has had a pretty big reputational change over the years. I remember that in college myself. In the early days, people were saying, this is anarchy, right? Anyone can edit this. How could he possibly trust it? We all remember Stephen Colbert's phrase, truthiness, but he actually had another one, wikiality.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
But here are a couple main transitions in the story of Wikipedia's credibility. One was in 2005, Nature ran this article comparing Encyclopedia Britannica's scientific articles and Wikipedia's encyclopedia articles. And what they found is they were roughly about the same amount of errors between them, that they were basically the same in accuracy. And so that was a big concern.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
credibility boost for Wikipedia as opposed to the traditional print encyclopedia model. And I also think that in terms of Wikipedia just getting better, I mean, it just got better because there were more eyes on it. There was the mobile revolution. People could look at Wikipedia pages really quickly and say, hey, this is wrong. I want to fix it. And so That just made Wikipedia better and better.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
And so we get to the point by 2018, Facebook and YouTube are starting to link to Wikipedia pages when there's a piece of content that might have misinformation. So even today, if you look up flat earth theory on YouTube, you'll see the Wikipedia page for flat earth theory that says that it's been debunked and that it's pseudoscientific and that we know that the earth is not in fact flat.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
Well, the Wikimedia Foundation first put out a statement saying that it's committed to its principles, which include neutral point of view, no original research, the kinds of things that make the articles the way they are. It made the point that the foundation... The entity that the Trump DOJ sent the letter to isn't actually the one who's editing the articles.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
That's the community of volunteers around the world. And it said that Wikipedia in many ways is one of the last sites that fulfills the promise of the early internet and that it's nonprofit. and that it's designed to educate and not persuade people. I will say that some Wikipedia editors are saying, hey, the nonprofit Wikimedia Foundation is headquartered in San Francisco in the United States.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
But this has always been a global project, a free encyclopedia that anyone can use. And so the Wikipedia editors themselves are saying, hey, is this maybe time to move to Germany or some other country in the EU that isn't experiencing what Wikipedia editors are perceiving as the democratic backsliding under the Trump administration. Wow. How do you say Wikipedia in German? Oh, you got me there.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
Tell us who Ed Martin is. So Ed Martin is the acting U.S. attorney in D.C. appointed by Trump. So he was appointed by Trump day one, and he hasn't yet been confirmed by the Senate. And he comes out of Missouri, which in the organization that he was working with there is called the Eagle Forum. The Eagle Forum was founded by Phyllis Schlafly.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
She's very famously an opponent of the Equal Rights Amendment.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
In that organization, the Eagle Forum is very much anti-LGBT, anti-feminist, just an ultra-conservative organization that really focuses on social conservative issues.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
I think it's really two things that made him become part of the Trump orbit. One, he came out really early for Trump and then he repeatedly boosted Trump in the media. So he co-authored a book with Phyllis Schlafly called The Conservative Case for Trump. And this was really early. This is 2016. He has this podcast called The Pro-America Report.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
I'm Stephen Harrison. I'm a journalist who has covered Wikipedia for the past eight years for sites like Wired and Slate. I'm also the author of The Editors, which is a suspense novel inspired by Wikipedia. And outside of that, I'm a lawyer, and my practice area is IT transactions.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
He's been on Russian state media over 100 times trying to promote Trump's image.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
And Martin just jumped on TV a lot and really praised Trump early and often, right from the very beginning. And so he's kind of without a position, and he hasn't landed as a politician himself. So I think he was probably really happy when he got the call from Trump to take up this position as U.S. attorney in D.C.
Today, Explained
What did Wikipedia do?
What's the day-to-day of U.S. attorney position? So the U.S. attorney anywhere is the top prosecutor in the district. But in D.C., that's especially important because of all the federal agencies that are there. It's obviously the headquarters of the federal government.