U.S. Chamber Secretly Funds Local Media
A deep dive into the tangled web of Chamber-affiliated funds that make their way to local news media publications around the nation.
by Connor Seto, June 26, 2021
On the surface, the Madison-St. Clair Record looks like any other newspaper. The Record covers various legal news from the Illinois court system. However, some readers may be surprised to find out that this legal news publication is actually funded by the Institute for Legal Reform, an affiliate of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
The Record Inc. was founded in 2004 by conservative businessman Brian Timpone with an investment of $200,000 from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, according to news reports at the time. The company started by buying a local Illinois newspaper called the Madison County Record (now the Madison-St. Clair Record). The Chamber maintains that they have no editorial power over the publication, but when asked about their investment, Stanton D. Anderson, then-Chief Legal Officer for the Chamber, commented, "We wanted to educate [the people] that their county is the laughingstock of the country.”
Namely, Madison County, Illinois is ranked by the Chamber’s Institute for Legal Reform as one of the worst jurisdictions for business litigation in its annual “State Liability Systems Ranking Study.” In 2006, then-President and CEO of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Tom Donohue, even tipped the Chamber’s hand during a speech about legal reforms. He boasted, “Speaking of Illinois, you want to know what’s helped us be successful there? We launched a weekly publication in Madison County, Illinois—the mother of all jackpot jurisdictions—that is dedicated to exposing abuse of the county’s legal system. Since the launch of that newspaper about a year and a half ago, we’ve seen a change in the courts for the better.” He goes on to state that class action lawsuits and asbestos suits have decreased in the past year. These are the types of suits that, when successful, are generally unfavorable towards businesses.
Since 2004, the Record Inc. has expanded to include 10 state publications (print and online) and one online-only national publication, the Legal Newsline. The states in which these newspapers are located correlate to states which rank low in the Institute’s previously mentioned “State Liability Systems Ranking Study.” The states covered—Illinois (2 publications), Louisiana (1), California (2), Florida (1), West Virginia (1), Missouri (1), Pennsylvania (1), and Texas (1)—have all been ranked within the 15 most unfair state liability systems to businesses by the Chamber’s Institute in recent years.
These publications often run stories with a pro-business slant, but the sites only disclose that they are owned by the Chamber’s Institute when the Chamber is specifically mentioned in an article. This is hardly the most transparent way to communicate this information to readers. As a writer at Nieman Lab, a Journalism Foundation at Harvard, explains, “On the web, disclosure is perhaps even more important than in print. Readers aren’t necessarily making an active choice to consume information on Legal Newsline; as with any site on the web, visitors often arrive via search or a link from a mainstream source.” Furthermore, as of the writing of this article, only three of the 11 sites have a working “About Us” page which discloses this ownership.
When it comes to the climate, these publications often push headlines that are discouraging to pro-climate litigation. For example, in the Florida Record, articles with headlines like “Florida Chamber of Commerce says litigation isn't the answer to climate change” or “Business leader says innovation is way to solve climate change, not 'absurd' litigation” are commonplace. This is despite the fact that the Florida Record claims, “We shall make every effort to be fair and impartial. We shall also do our best to exclude any personal or political bias we have on our news pages.” Even worse, the Southeast Texas Record uses their newspaper’s editorial board to run headlines—such as “Alleged 'consensus' on climate change challenged”—which cast doubt on the scientific consensus of anthropogenic climate change.
As disclosed in 2018 tax filings, the Chamber’s Institute for Legal Reform is the “direct controlling entity” of this network of Record publications and it contributed about $2.7 million to them in 2018, the most recent year for which data is available. It’s also interesting to note that the address listed for the “Madison County Record Inc.” in these tax documents is the address of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s offices in DC.
In a world which is increasingly consumed by disinformation about topics such as politics, COVID-19, or climate change, access to transparent, authoritative avenues of information is crucial. Without transparency, citizens cannot make informed decisions about their futures. So, when one of the largest dark money groups in America starts financing media outlets, we should be concerned. As Donohue stated in his 2006 Chamber speech: “There’s an old political adage that says you shouldn’t pick a fight with someone who buys printer’s ink by the barrel… well, we’re buying the ink.” And the Chamber isn’t the only interest group attempting to sway public opinion by financing the news media. In fact, an ongoing investigation by the Tow Center for Digital Journalism found that the Record Inc. is hosted on the same server as hundreds of other conservative-leaning media sites. This is yet another reminder to check the facts and hold corporations (or trade associations) accountable—our future and the future of our planet depends on it.