matters

“All the President’s Men” was released 50 years ago this month, an anniversary that’s been greeted with equal parts rue and reverence by the journalists, political junkies and discerning cinephiles who have worshiped the film for five decades.

As a member of all three of those constituencies, I’ve done my share of genuflecting, most recently as chief film critic at the Washington Post, whose city room was as vivid and fully realized in the movie as Robert Redford’s Bob Woodward and Dustin Hoffman’s Carl Bernstein.

Like so many Posties of my generation, I’ll never forget the so-real-it’s-surreal experience of walking into the fifth-floor newsroom for the first time in 2002. By then, standard-issue electric typewriters and six-ply carbon paper had been replaced by far less visually interesting computers. But the office’s pervading atmosphere of hard work and quiet focus felt uncannily similar to its big-screen analog.

For the last two years, I have been researching a book about the making of “All the President’s Men,” whose production involved almost as many contingencies and unresolved questions as Watergate itself. Among the film’s many mysteries, one I’ve found particularly intriguing has to do with Katharine Graham, publisher of the Washington Post and CEO of its parent company during the Watergate investigations. As the movie amply demonstrates, it took guts for Woodward and Bernstein to persevere with their reporting in the face of terrified sources and their own growing paranoia. But, unbeknownst to many observers at the time, Graham was enduring even more withering pressures, with determination that was all the more impressive for being almost entirely invisible.

I’m still in the process of discovering why she remained invisible in “All the President’s Men.” For now, it’s clear that the backstory is more nuanced than mere oversight or, as many are quick to assume, simple sexism.

In fact, William Goldman’s first script of the film featured a sequence with Graham and Woodward, a scene that appeared in every subsequent draft. Based on an actual meeting between the two, it’s a cagey game of cat-and-mouse, with the publisher taking the measure of a nervous, still-inexperienced journalist, looking for reassurance that his reporting will prove out.

Earlier this year, at a January staged reading of “All the President’s Men” at Harmony Gold Theater in Hollywood — a fundraiser for the Stella Adler Academy — it was possible for fans to conjure what might have been. Mark Ruffalo played Woodward and Ethan Hawke played Bernstein in a version of the movie assembled from different Goldman drafts.

A high point of the evening was when Ruffalo and actor Susan Traylor brought the Graham-Woodward scene to tentative, tense and teasingly playful life. After grilling Woodward about his sources and coyly asking him about Deep Throat’s identity, Traylor’s Graham asked him if the truth about Watergate would ever be revealed. “It may never come out,” Ruffalo’s Woodward replied. “Don’t tell me ‘never,’” Graham laments, before bringing the meeting to a close with a gently peremptory “Do better.”

In poring over director Alan J. Pakula and Goldman’s papers, I’ve probably read that scene dozens of times. But when I heard it play out in real time, I was ambushed by the emotions it stirred — a mixture of pride in Graham’s legacy and deep sadness at how that legacy has been so inexplicably ignored in recent years.

I was also sad that Redford, who died in September, wasn’t there. He often expressed regret that Graham wasn’t a featured character in “All the President’s Men.” Keenly aware of how her spine and steadfastness made Woodward and Bernstein’s work possible, he wanted to honor that crucial support. When I interviewed him for the first time in 2005, he insisted that fearless owners were every bit as important in preserving democracy as the reporters he and Hoffman helped glamorize.

Over the next two decades, every time I saw Redford, he bemoaned the “downward slide of this thing,” by which he meant the constellation of institutions “All the President’s Men” celebrates: not just journalism and a robust First Amendment but a Washington where investigators, prosecutors, judges, the Senate and Congress did their jobs regardless of partisan loyalties, and a Hollywood where a studio as mainstream as Warner Bros. would agree to finance a tough-minded film about a contentious and still-raw period in recent history.

Granted, that film was based on a bestselling book and anchored by two huge stars. But today, with political and corporate leaders — including media companies — falling over each other to curry favor with President Trump, “All the President’s Men” feels like an artifact from a vanished age.

Nowhere is this more distressingly true than at the Post itself, where the newsroom immortalized by the movie has been slashed by more than a third, and where Jeff Bezos, who bought the paper in 2013, seems intent on erasing Katharine Graham’s legacy until it vanishes completely. During the first Trump administration, Bezos stood up to threats against the Post and the press at large that would make Nixon blush, or at least pea-green with envy.

Now, Bezos has become a one-man meme of what author Timothy Snyder calls “obedience in advance,” quashing an endorsement of Kamala Harris, ostentatiously grinning his way through Trump’s second inauguration, vastly overpaying for a promotional film about First Lady Melania Trump and staying conspicuously mum (at least publicly) when a Post reporter’s home was raided by the FBI in January.

All of this has come at an enormous moral and material cost, with thousands of readers canceling their subscriptions and an alarming number of the Post’s finest reporters and writers leaving for other publications and platforms. As my former boss Marty Baron told my former colleague Ruth Marcus in the New Yorker in February, Bezos’ turnaround has been “sickening” to witness: “a case study in near-instant, self-inflicted brand destruction.”

Of course, that brand was built, in no small part, by “All the President’s Men,” which taught a generation how to walk, talk, dress and act like real reporters. (Hint: A good corduroy jacket and a pen in your mouth can’t hurt.)

In 1976, Pakula was interviewed about his dealings with Graham, whom he admired tremendously and with whom he would become close friends. “I could do a film about the Katharine Graham story,” he enthused. “It’s a superb story.”

Thirty years later, Steven Spielberg would bring Pakula’s idea to fruition with “The Post,” about Graham’s decision to publish the Pentagon Papers, a dress rehearsal for the even higher stakes of Watergate a year later.

“The Post,” which starred Meryl Streep in a shrewdly judged performance of aristocratic assurance and creeping insecurity, premiered in Washington less than a year into Trump’s first administration. Bezos attended that screening, which many of us saw as tacit acknowledgment that he was taking her lessons in character, comportment and competence to heart.

That was clearly wishful thinking. Graham may have finally assumed her rightful place in the newspaper-movie canon, but we’re still left to ponder her absence from the most iconic journalism movie of the 20th century.

It’s no longer the shoe-leather reporters who need a big-screen tutorial in how to do their jobs. It’s their bosses. A simple place to start would be to memorize the best two-word speech to never appear in a major motion picture: Do better.

Ann Hornaday was a film critic at the Washington Post from 2002 to 2025, when she retired. “All the President’s Men” plays at TCM Classic Film Festival Saturday at 2:45 p.m.

A Lahore court has ruled in favour of Pakistani singer Ali Zafar in his defamation case against fellow singer Meesha Shafi. On Tuesday, the court ordered Shafi to pay Zafar 5 million rupees ($17,900) in damages.

Zafar sued Shafi for defamation in 2018 after she accused him of sexual harassment in Pakistan’s highest-profile #MeToo case.

What has the court ruled?

The court’s ruling, which has not been released to the public but has been seen by several Pakistani media outlets, states that a 2018 social media post by Shafi and an interview she gave to a lifestyle magazine contained “false, defamatory and injurious imputations” against the plaintiff, Zafar.

The court found that her allegations of sexual harassment of a physical nature had not been proved to be true or shown to be made for the public good, and therefore constituted actionable defamation, according to Pakistan’s leading daily newspaper, Dawn.

The court added that Shafi was to be “permanently restrained from repeating, publishing, or causing to be published, directly or indirectly, the aforesaid defamatory allegations of sexual harassment of a physical nature against the plaintiff, in any form of media”.

This order will be appealed to the High Court, Nighat Dad, the lawyer who represented Shafi in court, told Al Jazeera.

As well as a member of Shafi’s legal team, Dad is the executive director of a nongovernmental, research-based advocacy organisation, the Digital Rights Foundation.

She said: “The appeal is likely to challenge the judgement on several grounds: that the trial court misread and selectively interpreted the evidence, failed to properly consider material evidence presented by Meesha, and overlooked the legal context, particularly that her sexual harassment complaint against Ali Zafar is still pending before the Supreme Court.”

What was the #MeToo case involving Shafi and Zafar?

In April 2018, Shafi, now 44, posted a statement through a series of posts on X, then called Twitter, accusing Zafar of sexually harassing her on multiple occasions.

Shafi wrote: “I have been subjected, on more than one occasion, to sexual harassment of a physical nature at the hands of a colleague from my industry: Ali Zafar.”

Shafi added that she was speaking up as an “empowered, accomplished woman who is known for speaking her mind!”

In her posts, Shafi referred to the global “#MeToo” movement by women and girls against sexual harassment and assault.

The hashtag gained worldwide prominence in 2017 when women in Hollywood and beyond began speaking out in the wake of allegations against the former American film producer and now convicted sex offender, Harvey Weinstein.

Within hours of Shafi’s post, Zafar, now 45, responded on X: “I categorically deny any and all claims of harassment lodged against me by Ms Shafi.”

He added that he intended to take the allegation to “the courts of law” and to address them legally rather than “contesting personal vendettas on social media and in turn disrespecting the movement”.

Shafi and Zafar were once known to be friends and are both prominent figures in Pakistan’s entertainment industry. Both have also made appearances in films outside Pakistan. Shafi even performed a small cameo role in 2003 in a music video for Zafar’s first album.

In April 2018, Shafi spoke about her allegations against Zafar during an interview with fashion and lifestyle magazine Instep Pakistan.

She told the magazine that she had not publicly spoken about the harassment at the time it happened because “I’m a public figure and so is he (Ali Zafar). My thought process was who I am and who he is and what that’s going to lead to. Being ready to talk was far off because it had just happened. I buried it.”

Have other women accused Zafar of inappropriate behaviour?

Yes. Several Pakistani celebrities and public figures posted in support of Shafi online after her 2018 X posts.

Additionally, other women came forward to accuse Zafar of sexual harassment.

They included makeup artist and painter Leena Ghani, who wrote in a statement on X in April 2018 that Zafar had on “several occasions” crossed the boundaries of what is considered appropriate behaviour between friends.

“Inappropriate contact, groping, sexual comments should not fall in the grey area between humour and indecency,” Ghani said.

Maham Javaid, a journalist who now works for The Washington Post, alleged in April 2018 that Zafar had tried to kiss her cousin and pull her inside a restroom in a now-deleted X post.

How has the dispute between Shafi and Zafar unfolded?

The pair have filed a slew of complaints against each other.

In June 2018, Zafar filed his one‑billion‑rupee defamation suit against Shafi. At the time, that was equivalent to more than $8m. It is now equivalent to $3.5m, due to the devaluation of the Pakistani rupee.

Shafi then filed a complaint about the alleged harassment before the Ombudsperson Punjab for Protection Against Harassment of Women at the Workplace, later in 2018.

Her complaint was rejected on the technical grounds that she and Zafar did not have an employer-employee relationship. An appeal is pending in the Supreme Court.

Zafar also filed a separate cybercrime complaint with the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) in November 2018, alleging that Shafi and others were running a coordinated smear campaign against him on social media.

Based on this report, the FIA filed a First Information Report (FIR) against Shafi and eight others in September 2020 under Pakistan’s Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act (PECA).

Those named in the complaint included Ghani, Javaid, comedian Ali Gul Pir and actor Iffat Omar, who had publicly supported Shafi and posted critical comments about Zafar online. The PECA offences they were charged under – criminal defamation provisions covering “offences against dignity” – carried a maximum penalty of three years in prison.

It is not known publicly whether the FIA cybercrime case has reached a verdict.

In September 2019, Shafi filed her own two-billion-rupee civil defamation suit against Zafar in a Lahore court, accusing him of making false allegations about her in the media. Two billion rupees was worth roughly $13m when Shafi filed the suit in 2019; due to the rupee’s steep depreciation, the same amount is now worth about $7m. That case is ongoing.

What has been the response to this week’s defamation ruling?

Actor and television host Iffat Omar, who was also named in the FIA cybercrime case and was also a witness for Shafi in Zafar’s defamation case against her, criticised the court ruling in an X post on Tuesday.

Omar wrote: “People were silenced, pressured, bought, and scared. The entire support system was broken. On top of that, we were accused of running a foreign agenda, of being paid huge amounts in dollars. I said it then, and I say it again – prove it in court. I am ready to open all my bank accounts, everything.”

Last week, Saqib Jilani, another of Shafi’s lawyers, asked the Lahore court to dismiss the defamation lawsuit, arguing that Zafar had not produced any concrete evidence to support his defamation claims.

Also last week, Shafi’s mother, the Pakistani actor Saba Hameed, who has been attending court proceedings in Pakistan while her daughter lives in Canada, told reporters: “We have been fighting this for eight years, and we are not accepting defeat in this matter.”

What happens next?

Shafi’s legal team intends to appeal the defamation ruling in favour of Zafar to the High Court. “This is far from the end of the road,” Dad told Al Jazeera.

She added that other legal actions relating to this are ongoing.

“Meesha Shafi’s original complaint of sexual harassment against Ali Zafar has been pending before the Supreme Court for several years now,” Dad explained, referring to the 2018 complaint dismissed on technical grounds by the Office of the Ombudsperson Punjab for Protection Against Harassment of Women, but which Shafi has appealed.

“Separately, Ali Zafar initiated a criminal case alleging cyber-defamation against Meesha and her witnesses, which also reached the Supreme Court and is currently stayed.”

Dad said that Shafi’s civil defamation suit against Zafar is also still pending.

Why is this significant?

“This ruling risks setting a deeply troubling precedent,” Dad said.

Currently, she said, survivors of sexual harassment face major legal, social and reputational barriers. Decisions like the Lahore court’s recent order are likely to discourage victims of sexual harassment “from speaking out at all”.

“If defamation law is interpreted in a way that punishes speech before underlying harassment claims are even adjudicated, it shifts the burden unfairly onto survivors and reinforces silence over accountability,” Dad added.

“And that is the real danger here.”

WASHINGTON — At a Senate hearing Wednesday to consider the confirmation of Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.) as Homeland Security secretary, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) opened by asking whether “a man with anger issues” can set the right example for federal immigration agents.

Mullin, President Trump’s pick to replace Secretary Kristi Noem, faced tough questions before the Senate Homeland Security Committee about how he would carry out the administration’s mass deportation effort and how he would steer the agency in the wake of controversies that led to Noem’s firing earlier this month.

For his part, Mullin said he will work to ensure a secure homeland as well as to “bring peace of mind and confidence to the agency.”

“My goal in six months is that we’re not in the lead story every single day,” he said.

Throughout the hearing, Democrats made digs at Noem while examining Mullin’s character and ability to lead the nation’s largest law enforcement agency. Most Republicans painted Mullin as a good man and a hard worker while chastising Democrats for punishing federal workers with the continued Homeland Security funding shutdown.

The leadership shake-up comes amid intense scrutiny over increasingly violent immigration enforcement tactics since last year that intensified after the shooting deaths of two protesters in Minneapolis by immigration agents, which Noem — without evidence — called domestic terrorism.

She was fired days after testifying before congressional oversight committees, during which she faced criticism from Republicans and Democrats alike.

“It’s not the role of the secretary to be a cable news commentator in the wake of a crisis” said Sen. Gary Peters (D-Mich.). “This is a role where temperament matters, where judgment matters and where experience matters.

“We have seen under Secretary Noem’s leadership how shortcomings in these traits can compound the challenges that already come with leading a large and complex department, and now more than ever, we need a DHS secretary who is a steady hand, who will provide thoughtful leadership, follow the facts, tell the truth, and hold agency officials accountable when they need to be.”

Paul brought up incidents to illustrate why Mullin is not fit for the job, including a time in 2023 when he nearly got into a fight in a Senate hearing room and more recently when Mullin called Paul “a freaking snake.”

Paul also confronted Mullin for saying he “completely understood” why Paul was assaulted by a neighbor in 2017, which left him with six broken ribs and a damaged lung.

Mullin did not apologize for his remarks and instead accused Paul of smearing his character.

“I’ve worked with many people in this room,” Mullin told Paul. “It seems like you fight Republicans more than you work with us.”

But Mullin added that their personal differences wouldn’t keep him from doing his job — “it’s bigger than partisan bickering” — and asked Paul to let him earn his respect.

Paul appeared unmoved. Referencing the 2023 near fight with Sean O’Brien, the head of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Paul asked Mullin to “explain to the American public how a man who has no regrets about brawling in a Senate committee can set a proper example.”

Mullin was prepared for the moment: O’Brien was sitting behind him. The union president, he said, has become a close friend.

“Both of us agreed we could have done things different,” Mullin said.