A self-proclaimed “non-profit journalism center” that is partnering with Google to control what information Americans see caught in a scheme to shut down right-leaning news sites is directly funded by George Soros.
The Washington Examiner, The Washington Free Beacon and numerous other mainstream conservative-leaning news sites were last week placed on a “blacklist” of “unreliable news sources” by the Poynter Institute, which has partnered with Google to determine what news sites Americans are allowed to read.
The report openly demanded advertisers “blacklist” the sites and force them out of business.
“Advertisers don’t want to support publishers that might tar their brand with hate speech, falsehoods or some kinds of political messaging,” the report warned in Mafia-style language.
After a massive outcry, Poynter backed down and slowly unpublished the report, which listed Breitbart, CNSNews.com, Daily Signal, Daily Wire, Drudge Report, Free Beacon, Judicial Watch, LifeNews, LifeSiteNews, LifeZette, LiveAction News, the Media Research Center, PJ Media, Project Veritas, Red State, The Blaze, Twitchy, and the Washington Examiner as unreliable news sites.
The report left off notoriously unreliable liberal sites such as ThinkProgress, whose editors and reporters routinely offer insane conspiracy theories or make completely incorrect statements.
“The walk-back was gradual. First, the authors reversed the inclusion of The Washington Examiner after further review. But the paper’s executive editor, Philip Klein, complained that the group was still urging an advertiser blacklist for those outlets still included — calling the process behind the list opaque and arbitrary,” Fox News reports. “Poynter’s managing editor, Barbara Allen, posted a mea culpa Thursday as the backlash built.”
Refusing to admit they lied and are engaged in political censorship, Poynter instead claimed, “We detected inconsistencies between the findings of the original databases that were the sources for the list and our own rendering of the final report,” making it appear the “blacklist” demands were the product of a math error and not a goonish attempt to silence opponents.
“We are removing this unreliable sites list until we are able to provide our audience a more consistent and rigorous set of criteria,” writes Poynter’s managing editor Barbara Allen.
But it appears it is the Poynter Institute that is engaged in biased news, unreliable content and pay-for-play politics.
One of the researchers that helped compile the list of “biased” and “discriminatory” sites is Barrett Golding, a producer for the Southern Poverty Law Center, which is the target of numerous lawsuits by former employees accusing it of fraudulent practices and open racism.
Poynter itself is funded by the Hungarian billionaire and radical activist George Soros.
“Poynter is funded by Open Society Foundations, liberal billionaire George Soros’ massive foundations, as well as the Omidyar Network. The two combined for “$1.3 million in grant funding.” Funds were sent to Poynter specifically to establish the International Fact-Checking Network. The ‘UnNews’ list was started to help fact-checking organizations determine what was ‘unreliable,’” NewsBusters reports.
In 2017 Google announced it was partnering with Poynter to “fact check” news stories and remove access to articles it deemed unreliable.