In a very impressive alumni association, Scott MacFarlane is a rockstar among rockstars, although he'd probably be the last person to say so. A Hall of Famer and currently Congressional Correspondent for CBS News, he joins us today to reflect back on his time at WJPZ, and how it's prepared him for a career on the national stage.
Some of the biggest lessons Scott learned at WJPZ were personal ones, including "how to play well in the sandbox." The ability to get along with others is a skill that has helped him make many jumps in his career. We also talk about what he learned about the history of the station in producing "Greatest Media Classroom," the documentary for WJPZ's 40th anniversary a decade ago.
Scottie Mac tells the story of a challenge he had to come on his first day live on the air, nationally, on CBS News, and how his professional development at WJPZ prepared him for that moment. Related to that, we also dive into his outstanding reporting around the January 6th insurrection, and how his time covering Congress and federal courts perfectly positioned him to be a reliable source of information. Also, how has he dealt with online blowback to his reporting? And what advice does he have for young, up-and-coming journalists?
Finally, Scott talks about the family of WJPZ. And how it doesn't matter if you graduated in 1975 or 2022. You're just "his friend from school."
Join Us in Syracuse on March 4th: https://bit.ly/WJPZ50BanquetTickets
The WJPZ at 50 Podcast is produced by Jon Gay '02 and JAG in Detroit Podcasts
JAG: Welcome to WJPZ at 50. I'm Jon "JAG" Gay. I can't think of a better guest to have for the first recording of this podcast. Now, full disclosure, I'm not sure on our release order for the episodes yet, but this is actually our first recording. He is the man who was the executive producer of the video documentary for the 40th anniversary of JPZ.
We have him on as we celebrate 50 now, and just to prove what a nice guy he is: I started reaching out to people this morning and he hit me back and he said, Well, I'm in studio over at CBS on backup duty in case our signal fails from Florida after Hurricane Ian, but I'm happy to hop on with you in a couple hours.
And I was like, Great. Let's do it. Welcome Scott MacFarlane.
Scott: Hey, th that's what we do. That's what our family does. We drop everything when somebody calls for help, and I think that's the spirit of WJPZ more than anything.
JAG: Well, I certainly appreciate you being here. I know our audience will as well. There's so much to talk to here with you in just a short amount of time, but take us a little bit through your career and how you ended up as the congressional correspondent for CBS News, beginning with your time at Syracuse.
Scott: Yeah. Well, it all started with WJPZ as it should. I mean, that's the first outlet so many of us had for this bug or this passion for radio and broadcasting we all came to Syracuse with, or we all developed while we were there. I came to Syracuse hungry to try broadcasting any way I could, and WJPZ was the best way to do it.
The energy that pulsated out of the place you could feel at the moment you walked in. The spirit of the students, more importantly. It's the first place I've ever walked in. Perhaps the most recent place I've ever walked in, in my life, the only place I've walked in, in my life where everybody seemed like me.
JAG: Yeah.
Scott: For better or for worse, , I felt like I belonged. And you know, a kid at 18 years old, I never really felt like I belonged somewhere. And I've never quite felt like I belonged so much as I did at WJPZ in the years since. So it all started there and to this day, now that I'm a working as a professional in broadcasting, I can tell you I'm still leaning on all those lessons, all those reps I got at WJPZ.
There are days where I'm assigned a task of speaking to a few million people without a script, without a teleprompter, and I'm expected to do so exquisitely, really well. And the only way you can get to this point is by doing 1000 broadcasts before you graduate, right? 1000 broadcasts at WJPZ and all the muscle memory you form eventually pays off.
I have an odd trajectory from WJPZ to CBS News. It took about a quarter century. Worked in some local television news, some local radio news for a while. I was in Michigan for five years and liked it quite a bit. Ended up coming to Washington, DC shortly after, initially as a congressional aide, as a congressional staffer for a year to kind of get a taste of Washington DC from the inside out.
After that, I did eight years as a congressional reporter for the Cox Media Group and all the TV and radio stations they own. Then the next eight years I was with the local NBC TV station here in Washington. One of the Cox News directors liked me, and when he came to run the NBC station in Washington, he brought me with him ,which was awesome. I didn't have to move. I just moved into a different office down the street.
JAG: Sure.
Scott: But it was a great job. And then, New Year's Eve 2021, I began working at CBS News as their congressional correspondent, where I am today.
JAG: So you mentioned the muscle memory and the reps you got at JPZ. Are there any other examples you can think of, of stuff you learned at JPZ specifically that serves you so well now in your current role?
Scott: Yeah. WJPZ gives you your first taste of how to be a good player in the sandbox with other people. If you're in the broadcasting industry or pretty much any communications field, you have three distinctive things that are uniquely stressful that other industries may not have.
First of all, you have unyielding, relentless deadlines. That can be stressful. You have competition among colleagues, which not every profession offers, where you're all kind of competing for the same lead story, the same play by play assignment, the same airtime, and competing with your own teammates can be stressful.
And also, not sure if you're aware, but the broadcasting industry tends to attract some dynamic people.
JAG: That's very well put.
Scott: In every sense of the word, and that can be stressful. So you have these three unique, distinctive inflammatory stresses in your life, and you have to navigate them, you have to carry them, and you have to play well with your teammates despite all that stress.
That's how you're gonna be judged, and that's how you're gonna succeed in your career is how well you handle that. Not so much by your broadcasts, not so much by your writing or your appearance or your ability to navigate a challenge on the job. It's how you navigate that issue. Are you somebody who's low stress, low maintenance, who doesn't give your supervisor heartburn or problems, and navigates the stress?
WJPZ is your first taste of that. Here you are. Many of us at WJPZ were there during an era where the equipment was unreliable.
JAG: Yes.
Scott: Many of us were there when we needed to be in the building. Somebody had to be in the building 24 hours a day, which means we were there at four in the morning on a Wednesday.
Those were stresses that we learned how to digest and carry at WJPZ. That's why that real world experience, that professional model WJPZ has built, suits us so well because we learned when we're professionals how to carry all that stress and play well in the sandbox.
JAG: When I brought my now wife to Syracuse the first time for the banquet and she met you, she was like, Wow, Scottie Mac. He's really impressive. He's just such a nice guy.
You mentioned being easy to work with and not a pain to your bosses. How important is it to be a nice guy in this business or good person?
Scott: Every break I've gotten was for that. Every time I've been able to escalate my career, it was because somebody viewed me as somebody who was easy to work with.
I mentioned there was one transition that was really pivotal for me. I mentioned it briefly. I was for quite a while, the correspondent covering Congress for the Cox Media Group, and I kind of didn't know where to go next. I wasn't sure what the next stepping stone was, if there was one, but the news director at the Cox Television station in Pittsburgh had worked with me on a few projects and thought that I was really easy to work with.
He thought I was nice. And so when he caught a big break, he gave me a big break and he's the one who brought me with him to NBC. Being nice, being somebody who's just easy to work with, who says hello, who asks about things besides work when you talk to him, that goes a long way.
So every time I've had a chance to escalate my career, it's because of that dynamic, not anything else.
JAG: It's a very valuable life lesson there. Are there any significant events in the history of the station that you recall being a part of, or big moments in the station's history while you were there?
Scott: While I was there? It's foggier than it used to be in the memory. . Um, Before I answer that question, let me just add a footnote to the prior question. I think it's important for folks listening to hear this. I appreciate that you brought somebody to banquet and that person is still with you. Let's start with that.
But that she thought I was really nice. Let's also say you're capturing me at my favorite moment of the year. I'm at my nicest when I'm in Syracuse, cuz I'm so enamored to be there and I love our group so much, it brings out the sunshine in me. I may not be as sweet and lovey dovey when I'm on the job and somebody's giving me hell.
But in Syracuse, it's my dream.
JAG: Right? Right.
Scott: I'm always at my nicest. Nevertheless, memories at the station. I have deep visceral memories at the station even after I was gone. That's how devoted so many of us are to WJPZ, that we feel the victories, that we feel the defeats that happen after we're gone.
So let me lay that foundation. I was incredibly proud when the new studio opened in about 2012. When the new facility opened, I felt like it was my accomplishment as a WJPZ alum, even though.
JAG: Part of the family.
Scott: We're part of the family. I didn't pay for it and I wasn't able to use it as a student, but it felt like my victory felt the same way when all the other evolutions that have occurred since 1998 occurred.
When I was a student, it felt like a big deal to do things that seem so small now. Reimaging the station, getting CD players instead of having to use cart machines. That sounds incremental. Let me tell you. At the time, that was a big freaking deal and a life changer. It felt important when we started new news programming, when we expanded the facility, all those things felt big at the time, and in retrospect, they were big because we were exclusively student run and we pulled things off with no money, no pay, and only the free time we could muster for WJPZ. All accomplishments felt herculean.
JAG: Related to that, when you produced the documentary that I just rewatched an hour ago on the 40th anniversary of WJPZ, what did you learn about the station that you didn't know? In doing essentially the reporting for that documentary, what surprised you?
Scott: The continuity and consistency of the type of person WJPZ produces. The voices from 1973 sound an awful lot like the voices at the time. I was producing the documentary in the early 2010s. I was interviewing current students and I was interviewing the founders and they were both saying the same things and they didn't know each other.
But through WJPZ, like the symmetry of every generation that's gone through WJPZ, the passion that they have for radio, the undying, relentless energy they bring to the mission. You can't tire us out. You can't get us to fall out of love with broadcasting and radio and the pride, the unyielding pride every generation has in the fact that students do this.
It sounds professional, it operates professionally and is a model for broadcasting and student organizations nationwide, The pride everybody has, no matter when they were here, the fact that the people who founded WJPZ could be the grandparents of the current students , yet they speak the same language and they seem like friends and brothers and sisters to each other.
That's something that's unique to this organization, and I'll tell you, I've seen other professional networks, other alumni networks, other student groups that have alumni bases. It, it is all a joke compared to what we have. The unified family of WJPZ is one of a kind. It's a unicorn, and I take such pride in it, and I think we all did.
JAG: I'm so glad to hear you say that. Back to my wife for a moment, The first time she came, she said, "You know, I talk to like three people from college. I never understood why you talked to so many Syracuse people, and now I get it, after being welcomed in as part of the family." So absolutely the case. When I was watching the documentary and rewatching it, there were just so many nuggets throughout that I'm like, Oh, geez, I didn't know that.
I didn't know that. So obviously the greater point is how similar we have been for five decades now, but any historical parts that you said, Oh geez, I didn't know that. Let me dig a little deeper into that as you got into it?
Scott: I think I grew a deeper appreciation for the two or three decades, which our radio station was broke. I mean, they didn't have any money, but managed to make great things happen. I mean, there was no dedicated university funding to put us on the FM dial. There was no dedicated university funding to help build great studios and the pioneering, equipment that got WJPZ on the air in the first place.
I mean, WJPZ got on the air in the first place through borrowed, if not stolen parts right from elsewhere in the university campus. I think that's a success. There's the moments where you recognize it was unpaid students doing things professionals do without the ability to put their full time toward it, cuz they are students.
JAG: Right.
Scott: And without having any money. It's remarkable. And I knew we did it that way for four years, but I had a less than necessary appreciation for how much went into getting these things going. No money and no full time staff.
JAG: Do you have any funny anecdotes or stories from your four years at Z89 that stick out to you that, that are I guess, appropriate for the podcast?
Scott: Well, that's quite a caveat at the end now, isn't it? Yeah. Appropriate for the podcast.
JAG: Well, you share whatever you wanna share. Scott!
Scott: We did our senior staff meetings, I'm quite certain, at a Denny's on Erie Boulevard that had a rodent investigation, um, because it just became a tradition and we didn't seem to care that there was a rodent infestation.
We decided to just do them there. That's who we were. That's what we were. I recall being locked into the station on several occasions, being locked outta the stations on several occasions. There was one night we were locked in, couldn't get out of the Watson Theater Complex, so I slept beneath the console in the production room. That happened, but I can't be alone in that.
JAG: What are the mechanics of that? How do you get locked IN?
Scott: Well, all things are possible in Watson Theater Complex.
JAG: This is true.
Scott: All good things and all bad things. It's no secret to those of us who are quite familiar with WJPZ and my story. But I married the girl I met the first day on campus who, you know, was a regular devotee of WJPZ, a regular listener, and hung out at the station.
I want everyone to know that we kept all amorousness outside the building.
JAG: Important to know.
Scott: Didn't think it'd be appropriate to do that. I hope that's true for everyone who stepped foot in the console and the studio room that I used.
JAG: I'm sure it is. I'm sure it is.
Scott: Yeah. Are you sure? Are you sure about that?
JAG: There's the investigative reporter coming out!
Scott: I found every out of the experience to be joyful. I don't remember ever being angry, stressed, mad, unhappy, sad, or displeased when I was inside WJPZ. And that's true to the current day and that's why it's so special to so many of us. It just brings joy, it brought joy and still brings joy.
JAG: So for those who don't know, Scott, he met his lovely wife Lisa at Syracuse. I did not know. So she did not work at the station? She was a listener. And you met as freshmen?
Scott: We met first day at school.
JAG: Oh, wow.
Scott: We met up in the dorm, so that was locked and loaded from the start. She did not participate in WJPZ, though she was a broadcasting student. I think she didn't wanna encroach in something that she saw I was so deeply devoted to. It wouldn't have been an encroachment, but I appreciate that she was being judicious about that. She and I were both broadcasters. She stayed in it for 10 years after graduation and she,ended up changing careers to become a school teacher when we wanted to become parents.
And she though, like every student I felt of the time. Was a devoted listener of WJPZ. We had familiarity with the whole campus. I know that's likely still true. , I'm sure it was true when you were there. I'm sure it was true 10 years ago, 30 years ago. That's so cool! And that's not true at every university in America.
And that's not true of every broadcasting outlet in America. It's just true of WJPZ, which speaks to the fact that the station's been quite good at reflecting the campus it serves and the community it serves.
JAG: I know you're a modest guy, Scott, but it would be remiss of me not to mention in your most current two roles at NBC's affiliate in Washington and at CBS News, the investigative reporting that you've done, particularly in regards to the January 6th riot.
The reporting that you have done is the old school, nose to the grindstone, digging through papers and court filings and all that sort of stuff that is really impressive and has resulted in some amazing results and stories that you've broken. You're a great follow on Twitter. What would you say about the idea of what you learned at Syracuse in terms of the old school reporting as opposed to just Googling something or taking the easy way to doing things as opposed to just really, really diving into it for hours and doing the hard work?
Scott: After a while, you don't have a choice. I mean, you get to a certain strata in the broadcast journalism field. And if you are not finding your own news, if you're not enterprising, or scooping, you're gonna find you're not very busy. For example, here at CBS News, there are many dozens of correspondents and there are 22 minutes of airtime tonight, right?
There are dozens of correspondents and there are two or three who will make the morning show's top block tomorrow morning. What are you doing that's different? What are you doing that adds value? And usually when you're a reporter, that means you're enterprising, you're fnding something everybody else doesn't know.
You're finding something that you can't Google. That was true to a degree at NBC. Show up for work today, what are you gonna do for us? You had some smart people in that room. They know a lot. What do you gotta tell 'em that they don't know already? It's almost like a survival instinct. You better find something that people don't know.
January 6th was a unique confluence of two things I was a specialist in. I was particularly good after a couple decades of covering Congress. And I was uniquely good at covering the Washington DC Federal Court. That was part of my beat at NBC and those two worlds collided.
JAG: Sure.
Scott: On January 6th cuz there's an attack on Congress and about 880 people are now being prosecuted in the Washington DC Federal Court. That's right in my wheelhouse, . That's two sports I excel in. Now they're one. So, I had a leg up on folks and I've tried to put some distance between me and the others because I'm pretty good at that one very unique thing, a federal crime that involves Congress.
JAG: And that speaks to sourcing and relationships that you developed over your time, quite some time in DC, right?
Scott: It helps, I think the WJPZ lessons helped me in a different way. I've shared this story a few times. But there are moments, where if you don't have that foundation, you will collapse. My first day at CBS News on the air,I don't think it was a hazing , but it seemed like a hazing
My first assignment was actually on January 6th, 2022, the anniversary of the insurrection, and my assignment was to be on the morning show, and do a two minute long, what we call talk back. Just a verbal report. No tape, no preproduced piece about what was happening that day, the scope and size of it, and what's next to the investigation.
I could have done that with my eyes closed. I've been doing that for the past year, every single day. So I'm like, No problem. What a great way to get started. They're easing me into CBS News. God love 'em. Then they broke the news to me that this will have to be fully scripted because we wanna run it past the lawyers and the editorial standard supervisors.
Cause it's about an open investigation. It's about criminal cases. We wanna be meticulous and they're right about that. And Scott, we think we're gonna try to play this casually and conversationally. We're not gonna put any video up or lots of graphics. It'll just be you talking to the camera and we're not gonna give you a teleprompter.
So we'd like you to do this two minutes and verbatim. From start to finish, exactly as approved by the lawyers and the standards people, and there'll be nowhere to hide. There'll be no scripts to refer to, and there'll be no teleprompter.
JAG: Memorize the whole two minutes.
Scott: Yeah. Kind of. Or...yeah. And I mean, those of us in broadcasting and those of us who've been in broadcasting in a while, all know the secret. The hardest broadcast you'll ever do, the most stressed you'll ever be as a broadcaster is the first time you go on the air at a new place.
Because do you know who's watching? Everybody is watching . You know how judgemental they're gonna be? Very. They're going to be at their most judgemental. They're gonna look at the way your tie is tied. They're gonna look at the way your makeup is. Is your hair straight? How's his diction? How's his vocal tenor? How's his conversationalism?
And while you're in that fish bowl, we want you to do two minutes unscripted, verbatim.
JAG: And how did it go?
Scott: I think I stuck the landing, but I wouldn't have come close to doing that if I hadn't done a thousand broadcasts before graduation. Not even close. I don't care how many years you've been in the profession.
It's that fundamental muscle memory that kicks in when you're stressed on the air. When they put you on a high wire on the air, all that muscle memory kicks in. We all, who have the WJPZ experience, will stick that land because we have all the reps. If I hadn't had that, I'd have collapsed in that moment, and I don't think they were deliberately trying to test me , but increasingly I'm thinking they might've.
JAG: As you get to know your coworkers there a little bit better.
Scott: Right.
JAG: In your reporting about such a divisive topic as January 6th, you have been subject to some real ugliness online.
Scott: Yeah.
JAG: Twitter trolls, some serious threats. How have you been able to handle that? And if you'd rather not go there, that's fine.
Scott: No, it's fine. It's reality. It's far less than it used to be. I got a lot of kickback from people who are either defendants in the criminal cases or from people who are sympathetic to the defendants in the criminal cases. A lot of that has gone away. My social media platform of choice for news is Twitter. It's just the one I'm most effective at utilizing, especially for this story.
People who have real concern about what I'm reporting. Or who want to, you know, villainize me. They're largely not on that platform anymore. Or they've tuned me out. So I would say the ratio of trolls is so remarkably small now. Doesn't bother me. At first it was a thing, and we took some, you know, precautions to make sure that people who were saying bad things, that we were keeping an eye on them.
But as a journalist, you always expect some kickback to what you do. Most times when you report news, somebody doesn't like that you did it. And this world, this January 6th world, has been so politicized. There's now a whole subset of Americans who don't like anything you report, whether they know the people involved or not.
And that's my reality. But less so than my colleagues who spent four years reporting on Donald Trump as President. I didn't have to do that. Those people catch hell too, and it's a reality They've dealt with more than I have.
JAG: Fair enough. I know. We certainly appreciate the hard work you do.
I want to end on a brighter note. Of course. You alluded this several times already, Scott. The relationships and the big just family that the WJPZ Alumni Association is, from the founders in the seventies to the current students. We've got six decades covered with our alumni at this point. Are there, and I don't wanna exclude anybody, because you're well known and friends with just about everybody in the alumni association, but are there any lifelong friendships and relationships that you developed at your time at WJPZ or as an alum? A few people that you can think of that you've just really have become a big part of your life.
Scott: No, that's just...all of them! When I show up and I see my fellow alums, I feel like I've gone to a family reunion and I wanna hug every one of'em. I don't know that there's any other organization out there that could do that.
That has the capacity to do that. I'm in another alumni associations. it's something you do, it's something you keep an eye on. WJPZ's alumni association is something you feel it's in your soul. My favorite moments occur when I'm with a member of the association. One of my fellow family members from WJPZ. You know, he and I, or she and I, are having a lunch, having coffee, meeting up somewhere.
We see a third party and I like to introduce that fellow WJPZ alum as my friend from school. And I find myself always saying that even though that person I'm with didn't actually go to school with me. You know, JAG, if you and I were out at Starbucks and somebody came over we knew, I'd say, "Hey, is my friend from school, Jag." Even though I graduated before you showed up.
JAG: Only by a couple of months. I got there in the fall of 98.
Scott: But you're my friend from school, right? I see Greg Hernandez, who was a founder of WJPZ. 1973. He's my friend from school. I see the current students and they're my friend from school and this is the only place on earth where I think that dynamic exists. I loved it and I think it's one of the coolest parts of WJPZ.
No offense to the radio programming we produced. No offense to all the things we learned for our professions, including the lesson I just told you about. That's the magic. You can't replicate it, but fortunately you also can't kill it. We're stuck with that for life.
JAG: Right. No matter what. The alumni association is so strong, and I like that, "my friend from school," even though they may be 20 years older or 20 years younger, and to somebody who's on the outside and doesn't know the power of this organization, it's an easier way than trying to explain whether it's alumni association with this banquet. Every February march we go back for, and it doesn't matter how old you were.
It's a much more succinct way to explain this, and that is the mark of a true broadcaster. Scott McFarlane, thank you so much for being on this podcast and for all the work you do professionally, for the alumni association, for the radio station. You wanna give a quick plug for your Twitter before we go?
Scott: Oh yeah. I'm on Twitter so long as my wife doesn't throw the phone away cuz she's about done with me being on Twitter. She's about done with me posting updates. It's MacFarlaneNews and it's a lot of orange stuff you'll see there. A lot of orange ties, a lot of Syracuse gear that somehow makes cameo appearances in every post.
JAG: I love when you tweet that you're wearing something orange from the set of CBS News, and then all the alumni get excited. We always enjoy when you do that.
Scott: People need to know that. People need to know that.
JAG: Scott, thank you so much for your time today. It's been a real honor and pleasure.
Scott: Oh, best part of my day.