State Dept Paid NewsGuard to Tar Conservative Media

These leftwing ‘fact checking’ organizations are super-funded that exist to systematically destroy voices of opposition. To use one of their phrases, they are the ‘Great Misinformation Superspreader,’ the very definition of a viral false claim. They follow the same modus operandi of the widely discredited SPLC but the totalitarian-inspired Democrat government use these hate organizations to destroy the opposition. And they are funded by the Democrat regime.

Far-Left, Government Funded NewsGuard Seeks to Purge AI of Any Evenhandedness

Democrat U.S. Government Is Building A Vast Surveillance And Speech Suppression Web Around Every American

NY Post: State Dept Paid NewsGuard to Tar Conservative Media

By Eric Mack, NY Post, 09 December 2023:

The Biden administration could not get around the First Amendment in silencing dissent, but it has effectively found a way through the State Department paying NewsGuard to defund conservative media, according to a trio of researchers from the American Institute for Economic Research (AIER).

The First Amendment is “is so clear that only a politician could manage to miss the point,” AIER senior researchers Phillip Magness, James Harrigan, and Ryan Yonk wrote in the New York Post this week.

“And when politicians miss the point of a straightforward, necessary protection, they manage to find all kinds of people willing to help them place ideology above constitutionality, common sense, and simple decency.

“We give you the Biden State Department and NewsGuard.”

The Post and AIER have been targeted by NewsGuard — founded by Steven Brill, a Democrat activist and donor, in 2018. Newsmax has reported it has been, too.

NewsGuard’s rankings have since been used by advertising agencies to target and block conservative media from obtaining advertising revenue.

“NewsGuard bills itself ‘The Internet Trust Tool’ and purports to offer ‘transparent tools to counter misinformation for readers, brands, and democracies,’ which admittedly sounds impressive,” the AIER researchers wrote for the Post.

“But what is the likely outcome when the U.S. government funds this corporation through something called the Global Engagement Center?”

They point to the lawsuit filed by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton this week along with The Daily Wire and The Federalist, alleging the State Department has been funding technology to “render disfavored press outlets unprofitable.”

“Conservative voices, it says, are being suppressed,” they wrote. “And when they’re suppressed, their advertising revenues drop. And if their advertising revenues drop far enough, they will eventually be forced to exit the market.

Keep reading……

There is a ongoing lawsuit against Newsguard:

“In direct violation of the First Amendment, the United States of America and NewsGuard Technologies, Inc. are engaged in a pattern and practice of labeling, stigmatizing, and defaming American media organizations that oppose or dissent from American foreign and defense policy, particularly as to Russia and Ukraine.

This is accomplished by a contract between NewsGuard’s “Misinformation Fingerprints” program and the Department of Defense Cyber Command, an element of the Intelligence Community.  Under this agreement, media organizations that challenge or dispute U.S. foreign and defense policy as to Russia and Ukraine are reported to the government by NewsGuard and labeled as “anti-US,” purveyors of Russian “misinformation” and propaganda, publishing “false content” and failing to meet journalistic standards.  NewsGuard’s contract with the government requires it “to find trustworthy sources,” a provision in violation of the First Amendment that does not permit the government to vet or clear news sources for their reliability, “trustworthiness” or orthodoxy.

Consortium News and other news organizations have been stigmatized and defamed under the Cyber Command contract.  NewsGuard’s warning labels issued under the “Misinformation Fingerprints” program amount to a government-funded advisory as to official disfavored information, telling readers to “proceed with caution” when reading or viewing targeted news organization websites, including Consortium News.”

More here.