In telling about Donald Trump and his Republican colleagues, the U.S. media is fake news with "left-wing monsters" in it who are guilty of "illegal" reporting on the president.

Realities are different.

Since Trump's election, many American news organizations seem to have succumbed to Trump's will, and more and more billionaire owners seem to have abandoned journalistic independence in support of Trump's good grace.

Despite this default, Trump continues to threaten journalists to brand pollsters “negative criminals” “should be investigated for election fraud.” In April, he attacked the “radical mad Democrats and their comrades” in fake news media, adding: “Those who lie to the American people on behalf of violent criminals must be held accountable by institutions and courts.”

The attacks overlooked the way some media filed Trump’s will – executives settled rash lawsuits, or wealthy owners interfered to avoid disturbing Trump.

The Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos ordered an overhaul of the editing page of this article in February, which actually made the newspaper criticize Trump. The Los Angeles Times gave up its approval of Kamala Harris under pressure from its billionaire boss Patrick Soon-Shiong.

In December, ABC News settled Trump's lawsuit, and First Amendment experts said it could promote more attacks on the media. The owner of CBS News is said to be considering resolving a $10 billion lawsuit filed against the network in an interview with editor Kamala Harris.

The New York Times reported that Paramount's lawyers plan to mediate with Trump despite legal experts deeming the lawsuit as frivolous. CBS said its show edited one of Harris's time for 60 minutes, which is a normal journalism habit. Paramount was sold to Skydance in negotiations, a sale that needed approval from the Trump administration. Paramount's controlling shareholder Shari Redstone, who will make a huge surprise if the deal is reached, told Paramount's board that she favors settlement with Trump.

“The people who bow to Trump are the owners of all these media or senior executives,” said Heather Hendershot, a professor of communications studies and journalism at Northwestern University.

"It's a huge problem and it's definitely driven by their bottom line. Jeff Bezos doesn't need to make money from the Washington Post. He can break even lose money in the Washington Post, and he'll be fine, but that could cause trouble for him and his other business businesses, so he'd rather wish him (Trump's) line."

Not always this way. Hendershot compares how CBS handles complaints in a 1970s sales Pentagon documentary. At the time, CBS was ordered to hand over all film and sound recordings from the film, but CBS president Frank Stanton rejected the Housing Commerce Commission’s subpoena, risking his jail sentence.

Today's CBS leaders don't seem too stout. In January, CBS decided to comply with the FCC’s “full, unedited transcripts and camera feeds” requirements for the interview with Harris.

Semafor reports that Redstone's potential for intervention in the 60-minute report is that the show's executive producer Bill Owens left the flagship news program earlier this year.

"Over the past few months, it's clear that I'm not allowed to do the show like I've been doing it, making independent decisions based on 60 minutes," Owens said at the time.

Last week, eight Democratic senators, including Bernie Sanders, wrote a letter to Redstone and Paramount Global's Board, describing the lawsuit as an "attack on the U.S. Constitution and First Amendment" and urged them not to settle with Trump.

"It definitely has no merit and cannot be tolerated," the senators said. They said Trump's lawsuit was a "blatant attempt to intimidate the media and those who opposed him."

CBS News does not seem to allow litigation to affect its coverage. Earlier this month, a 60-minute long report was reported on the presidential orders against law firms.

"In recent weeks, President Trump has signed orders against several law firms with the right to destroy them," 60 Minutes host Scott Pelley said at the start of the show. "This is important because the lawsuit has been a check on the president's power."

Matt Gertz, a senior researcher who oversees the organization Media Affairs (America), said CBS News “continues to carry out hard coverage of the Trump administration.”

"They can still do these six months, one year, on the road? We don't know," Gutz said.

“We need to have these conversations, and the fact that the president openly investigates specific media, and that we have these agencies that are clearly in response, trying to find a way to mitigate him – all of which are not something we should be satisfied with in liberal democracy.”

Gutz said some owners mistakenly calculated while bowing to Trump, overestimating his support among voters, so he has the ability to target any agency he chooses. But recent polls have shown that Trump is very unpopular with the support of Republicans, even with his support.

"These landscapes are moving quickly at the feet of these corporate media owners, and they should recognize this and try to protect the crown jewelry of the American free media so much that they are supervising them," Gutz said.

There is also a feeling that solving a specific problem with Trump can be a fool's errand. Trump insists on rhetoric, and the unquestionable coverage means that even he may be upset by the mainstream media coverage - even if an organization succumbed to him on the previous story.

While Trump’s easing campaign may continue in the backstage, journalists largely resisted the direction the media owners took. The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times continued to interrogate Trump’s excessive presidency, although the threat of intervention in the editorial process is higher than ever.

"We will never really know" whether the editor is forced to succumb to the pressure of the owner, Gutz said.

"A lot of what's happening in the media happens in small private discussions, where editors and journalists try to decide what to cover and how to cover it up. These unpublished stories often don't tell if they should run, if there's enough support," he said.

“I think to some extent, we don’t know if we lost the free media until it disappeared.”