Thank you Kevin KAL Kallaugher, Stan!, Paranormal Cartoons, Christopher Thornock, Cat Wilson RN, and the 600+ others who tuned into my live video with Ann Telnaes and Chappatte Cartoons!
Join me for my next live video in the app on Tuesday 24th @ 12pm when I speak with fellow New Yorker cartoonist and author, Liza Donnelly.
But first, the recap…
“In an autocracy, the autocrat never picks up the phone. He doesn’t have to.”
That was the line that stuck with me after yesterday’s Draw Me Anything. It was spoken by Patrick Chappatte (Chappatte Cartoons), one of the most respected editorial cartoonists in the world, and it perfectly encapsulates the strange, suffocating atmosphere of 2026.
I was joined by Patrick (who joined us from Geneva) and the legendary US-based cartoonist Ann Telnaes for a 45-minute conversation that was less of an artist chat and more like a war room briefing. We had over 600 people tune in live (a record for this show!), which tells me that I am not the only one feeling the need to huddle together for warmth around the glow of a screen.
If you missed it, above is the full replay (for paid subscribers) and a breakdown of what we discussed. And we discussed a lot.
My Guests
If you are new here, let me briefly introduce the titans I was sharing a screen with:
Ann Telnaes is a two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist. She was a staff cartoonist at The Washington Post until early last year, when she resigned after a cartoon was spiked- a canary in the coal mine for the media landscape we now find ourselves in. She now publishes independently on Substack, where her work remains as sharp, elegant, and devastating as ever. (She also revealed a little secret during the stream: she is still using an old-school metal animation disc from the 1980s to create her work!)
Patrick Chappatte is a globetrotting cartoonist whose work has appeared in The New York Times, Le Canard Enchaîné, Der Spiegel, and countless others. He is also the Chair of the Freedom Cartoonists Foundation in Geneva. He has a unique talent for “comics journalism” -reportage drawn on the ground- including a recent interactive piece for Le Temps about the surreal spectacle of Donald Trump taking Davos “hostage”.
The Conversation: “Obeying in Advance”
We spent a lot of time talking about their upcoming book, Censorship (or Self-Censorship) in America. The book has already been published in French and is coming out in German, but (tellingly) they are still in negotiations for a U.S. publisher.
Why? Because, as Patrick noted, American publishers seem terrified of inviting the wrath of the administration.
This led us to the core theme of the chat: “Obeying in Advance.”
As Patrick explained:
“In an autocracy, the autocrat never picks up the phone. He doesn’t have to... It’s the people in charge, the editors, the publishers, the media owners, all those guys doing the job in advance. You don’t need censorship anymore. Because self-censorship will do the job for you.”
We discussed the recent incident involving Stephen Colbert and Texas Representative James Talarico, where a segment was reportedly suppressed—a classic example of corporate cowardice disguised as editorial discretion. Anne pointed out that this isn’t just about media control; it’s about the administration’s fear of losing its religious base. Talarico, a devout Christian who believes in the separation of church and state, represents a threat to the monolithic narrative Trump relies on.
The “Gábor Pápai” Warning
Patrick shared a chilling story about Gábor Pápai, a Hungarian cartoonist who won the Courage in Cartooning Award. Papay warned them years ago:
“If you guys in the United States or in Europe get to elect the populists... you’re going to follow the same path that we are following.”
Papay has been sued by his government and called a “cockroach” on national television. Patrick noted that while every country is different, the pattern—using the legal system to harass critics, demonising the press, and slowly eroding norms—is universal.
The U.S. has now fallen to #57 on the press freedom index, sandwiched between Sierra Leone and Gambia. As Patrick put it: “I’m not hopeful that the U.S. is going to go up in this context in the foreseeable future.”
The Immigrant Experience
One of the most moving parts of the conversation was when we touched on our shared status as immigrants. I am an Australian-American; Anne is Norwegian-American; Patrick is Swiss-Lebanese with an American son born in New York…
We talked about the dehumanising rhetoric being used against immigrants- the “animals,” the detention centres, the “denaturalisation” task force that is now reportedly targeting naturalised citizens.
Anne was visibly angry:
“I cannot tell you how angry this makes me... I’m a naturalized citizen just like you... He is definitely running on fear. That’s how he got into office in the first place.”
Patrick added a heartbreaking observation about how the world now views America:
