It’s bad enough that the GOP propaganda machine has so successfully implanted in the minds of millions of Americans that traditional news outlets are somehow disseminating fake news. The label of “fake” usually accompanies real news that tends to put certain Republicans in an unfavorable light when they do things like subvert democracy or claim an election was stolen when it wasn’t.
The last thing the news industry needs is to have its biggest print publisher, Gannett, participate in the actual production of fake news. In Illinois, Gannett is accepting money to publish fake newspapers that manufacture coverage helping GOP candidates. The fake newspapers carry names like the “West Cook News” and “Chicago City Wire.” They appear to be the handiwork of a Florida-based right-wing activist, Dan Proft, who has taken particular aim at incumbent Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot. Proft was an Illinois Republican gubernatorial candidate in 2010 and has a current talk show on a conservative radio network.
The fake newspapers previously were printed by a Chicago suburban newspaper, the Daily Herald, but the owner canceled the contract on Sept. 22 after Pritzker publicly chastised the company and refused to participate in a candidates’ debate sponsored by the Daily Herald. Proft’s company, Local Government Information Services, then took its business to cash-strapped Gannett, lamenting that it had paid “millions of dollars” to the Daily Herald’s publishing company, Paddock Publications, over a period of several years.
A Daily Herald editorial defended its relationship with Local Government Information Services as strictly commercial and insisted that “the Daily Herald’s editorial mission to be unbiased and fair.” Gannett isn’t commenting.
The fake newspapers and their corresponding websites have the look of legitimate publications, with captioned photos and bylined stories. But a closer look at the articles suggests something is way off. There are lots of crime mug shots featuring Black men and articles focused on LGBTQ mockery. Among other oddities is someone’s fixation with youth tennis and the profiling of Chicago-area youths who achieve absurdly low (non-newsworthy) rankings — as if designed to embarrass someone.
The publications have been repeatedly cited by fact-checking outlets for distributing misinformation. The Chicago City Wire’s coverage of Darren Bailey, Pritzker’s Republican challenger in the Nov. 8 gubernatorial race, reads like it’s been copied directly from campaign promotional material.
“It has all the appearance and trappings of an official news organization, and it’s trying to hitch a ride off the credibility of newspapers built over time,” Peter Adams, senior vice president of education at the News Literacy Project, told the Columbia Journalism Review. “This crosses the boundary into propaganda.”
Gannett, which also publishes the non-trustworthy Epoch Times, remains silent about such printing contracts. Profiting off operations that help undermine real journalism is abhorrent, no matter how much Gannett needs the money.
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