The mega-merger between advertising giants Omnicom and Interpublic will come under more regulatory scrutiny than you think, and the key impasse is the awakening of capitalism, On the Money has learned. is.
Donald Trump isn't even in the White House yet, but the left of corporate America is already freaking out, and rightly so. For example, Paramount needs approval to merge with Hollywood studio Skydance, and as the Post reported earlier this week, its left-wing network CBS may be in violation of the Federal Communications Commission's impartiality rules. There is.
The FCC's incoming top cop, Brendan Carr, said he has heard that this will impose obligations on how local TV stations operate over the public airwaves (as opposed to cable). Kerr said the way CBS covered the 2024 presidential election is further evidence that it lacks “impartiality,” similar to providing both sides in any political debate. I believe there is, my sources said.
Similarly, advertising agencies such as Omnicom and Interpublic could face a similar battle as Trump regulators seek approval for their $25 billion merger when they take over next year. One key issue is that authorities rely on so-called news rating services, which rank news organizations on whether they promote misinformation or other content deemed inappropriate.
Critics argue that these assessments are based on left-wing groupthink rather than actual misinformation. Ad spending will then be heavily skewed toward left-leaning news sites and networks, leading to antitrust considerations (more on that later) that could impact the Omnicom-Interpublic deal, DC sources say. .
Many of the news outlets deemed safe by these services were the ones that labeled the Post's very true Hunter Biden laptop story as misinformation. Plus, it's no secret that Madison Avenue is notoriously woke.
As a result, ad agencies and corporate advertising departments are seeking political and regulatory cover to avoid news sites outside the progressive ecosystem, such as the New York Times, the Washington Post, and CBS. conservative activists argue. Critics claim they will pay for ratings services from organizations like NewsGuard to justify defunding conservative media.
Specifically, we have heard that President Trump's Antitrust Department, the Federal Trade Commission, and the FCC are likely to scrutinize Omnicom's partnership with Interpublic and seek answers regarding each agency's use of the ratings service. Antitrust lawyers say they can sue if they can prove there was some sort of deal to skew the scorers' scores to appease the advertising industry's leftists.
“There is legal precedent that if you participate in what is essentially a collective boycott, you can violate antitrust laws,” said a Washington, D.C.-based antitrust lawyer with ties to the incoming Trump administration. “All of these ad rating agencies appear to rate conservative news sites lower, and ad agencies are hiring retirees who want to take business away from conservative media. known.”
I've heard that Congress has held hearings on the rating business and is likely to hold hearings again. Some are already predicting that President Trump will block the Omnicom-Interpublic deal because of these woke advertising issues. Chris Rudy, the founder of the conservative site Newsmax, who has a table at President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort, told On the Money, “If these companies were to become ratings services… “If you're dependent on it, this deal can't go through.”
Ratings agency officials say what they are doing is providing a service that protects companies that don't want to interact with fake news or want to direct their advertising dollars away from bot farms on social media. I claim that there is only one. And to be fair, I haven't seen any direct evidence that there is an undisclosed deal punishing right-leaning news organizations.
NewsGuard said in a statement that its ratings are “based on nine non-political journalistic standards using a transparent process with multiple layers of review and fact-checking.” As a result of this nonpartisan, rigorous approach, NewsGuard's database has more conservative sites with overall “trustworthy” ratings than liberal sites. ”
NewsGuard further notes that “many conservative sites outperform similar left-wing brands. For example, FoxNews.com outperforms MSNBC.com, The Daily Caller outperforms The Daily Kos, and The Washington Examiner outperforms The New York The National Review outperforms the Times, the Heritage Foundation and the CATO Institute.”
NewsGuard CEO Gordon Crovitz said in an interview that students 60 and older are on the company's “target list” for advertisers and other companies that use the service. Ta. “Fox News and the New York Post benefit from our ratings,” he added.
But when On The Money reviewed the rankings, we found some strange results. For example, the New York Post receives a rating of 69.5 out of 100 from NewsGuard, which says the paper promotes “attention-grabbing headlines and gossip” and “inaccurate and misleading claims about politics.” criticized the paper.
Newsmax received a score of 20 out of 100, officials said, even though its website primarily features news copy from Reuters and the Associated Press. The Federalist, a respected figure in right-wing politics, scored a 12.5. Fox News received a 69.5 rating for “generally maintaining basic standards of trustworthiness and transparency, with significant exceptions.”
Conversely, the New York Times, which has been providing a steady stream of fake news about Trump and Russia collusion for years, received a perfect score of 100 out of 100. That is, until last February when the rating was lowered to a still-high 87.5. The Washington Post, whose left-handed bias and credibility issues literally bleed readers, also received a perfect score of 100.
Al Jazeera English, which is funded by the Qatari government and has been reliably accused of anti-Israel bias in its war with Hamas, has said it “mostly adheres to basic standards of credibility and transparency.” ”, he received 82.5 points.
stay tuned.
