How progressive mega-donors are taking over local media in the US

For several years now, the U.S. media has had a major existential problem, acknowledged by Jeff Bezos, owner of The Washington Post, just this week: low trust ratings among citizens.

According to Gallup's most recent annual barometers, for the past three consecutive years, more U.S. adults say they do not trust the media at all than trust it a great deal or somewhat. In fact, just 31% of Americans express solid trust toward the press, regardless of whether it is traditional or alternative media.

However, according to various studies, the greatest skepticism falls on national news networks or newspapers, whose editorial lines have been quite marked for several decades. On the other hand, local media, which for long were considered politically more undefined, have maintained high trust numbers with respect to the national press. But this reality could soon change, according to a report by RealClearInvestigations.

According to the report, several organizations and donors linked to the Democratic Party and progressive causes are investing monetary efforts to take over dozens of local media across the country, a situation that could jeopardize the editorial independence of local media.

According to RealClearInvestigations, during the fall of 2023, the progressive-leaning MacArthur Foundation promised to spend $500 million over the next five years to support local journalism.

Before that, some initiatives emerged, such as the National Trust for Local News, which in 2021 had pledged to raise $300 million to invest in a company "dedicated to protecting and sustaining community news." Two years later, in 2023, National Trust for Local News bought Maine's largest newspaper, The Portland Press-Herald, along with 22 other newspapers in the state without attracting national attention in a stealth operation.

Likewise, other projects have been created in recent years, such as States Newsroom, founded in 2018 with the goal of pursuing "nonpartisan coverage of state politics." This project has already formed partnerships with local media in all 50 states, RealClearInvestigations reported.

In addition, The American Journalism Project has committed $55 million to "rebuilding local news."

All of these organizations and initiatives have something in common: the Tides Foundation, the Open Society Foundation and the MacArthur Foundation.

Not so independent anymore?

While the vast majority of these foundations do not publicly hint at partisan preferences when presenting their values to the public, they all have a marked history of funding progressive projects and causes.

For example, the MacArthur Foundation funded, through a grant of $800,000, journalist and activist Nikole Hannah-Jones, author of the controversial "1619 Project," a Pulitzer Prize-winning report for The New York Times. This self-described investigative work posited that the founding of the United States was not in 1776, when 56 congressmen met to pass the Declaration of Independence, but in 1619, the year slaves were first brought to Virginia. This work was heavily criticized by historians and fact-checkers for multiple factual errors in the text and was heavily challenged by NYT editors even internally before it came out.

The MacArthur Foundation, in addition to backing Hannah-Jones with hundreds of thousands of dollars, has also received money from the well-known Open Society and Tides Foundations, well known for their financial support of the Democratic Party and progressive causes.

In particular, Democratic mega-donor George Soros has long been in the role of acquiring local media.

In 2022, in Florida, through the startup Latino Media Network, financed by Lakestar Finance LLC (linked to Soros), the businessman took over Cuban broadcaster Mambí, a historic anti-communist and conservative radio station that had a strong influence in southern Florida. That year, Latino Media Network, whose payroll is riddled with personalities, activists and companies linked to the Democratic Party and progressive organizations, also acquired 17 other local Hispanic radio stations for $60 million in cities such as Los Angeles, New York, Miami, Houston, Chicago, Dallas, Las Vegas and San Antonio, as well as McAllen, Texas, and Fresno, Calif.

Just a year later, Soros' Open Society Foundation and billionaire Swiss-born philanthropist Hansjörg Wyss, another powerful progressive investor, teamed up to fund the aforementioned National Trust for Local News. This organization bought nearly two dozen respected local Maine newspapers, including the Portland Press Herald, the Lewiston Sun Journal and the Kennebec Journal.

At that point, Maine's local media was basically left at the mercy of owners funded by billionaires and Democratic donors. Only one alternative media outlet, The Maine Wire, proposed a conservative communications counterweight in the state.

Now, already in the current election cycle, Soros' stealth moves to acquire local media ceased to pass unnoticed from national attention with the purchase of Audacy, the country's second-largest radio network.

In particular, congressional Republicans moved chips, denouncing the speed with which the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) approved Soros' purchase of Audacy.

The House Oversight and Accountability Committee, chaired by Republican James Comer, announced in late September that it will investigate the process of how the FCC approved a transaction of such magnitude in record time, shortly before the general election.

Specifically, Comer claimed that "the FCC is taking unprecedented action in this case to expedite a required review of broadcast licenses by bypassing its standard procedures and processes."

In all, thanks to the FCC's approval, Soros was left with some 200 radio stations and an audience of 165 million Americans in the decisive stage of the 2024 campaign.