CMD & Free Press File 'Fake News' Complaint with FCC on Behalf of 40,000 Petition Signers

Printer-friendly versionSend by emailThe Center for Media and Democracy and Press have a complaint with the Federal Communications Commission urging an investigation of the extensive airing of "fake news" by TV broadcasters who take government and corporate Video News Release (VNR) stories and run them unlabeled as real journalism. In just one week nearly citizens have signed our petition calling on the FCC, Congress and local broadcasters to stop fake news.

The petition seeks to strengthen and enforce laws against government propaganda and demands "that the Bush administration stop using our tax dollars to create fake news reports." The Center and Free Press hope to gather a quarter million signatures and begin organizing citizens locally to meet with stations in their community to sign agreements to stop airing all VNRs unless they are clearly labeled and not pawned off as news.

Sheldon Rampton and I first reported on fake news over a decade ago. Revelations over the past year have finally moved this issue into public consciousness and we've already gathered 40,000 signatures on our petition. We have no illusions that the filing of this complaint will solve the problem. This is a corruption now deeply embedded in TV media and corporate and government propaganda practices. Fake news has been produced and aired covertly for decades, and is now a business involving billions of dollars for broadcasters, PR firms and their clients.

Recent revelations in the print and on-line media, and the findings by Congress's Government Accountability Office (GAO) that VNRs from the Bush administration are illegal "covert propaganda," have created a unique opportunity for activism. Our organization has moved rapidly with Free Press to build momentum both at the regulatory level and most importantly among the grassroots public to expose and stop fake news. This will continue to be a major focus of our work and we are excited by the new momentum and awareness surrounding the scandal of fake TV news. We hope to mobilize this growing public outrage into real media reform.