President Donald Trump's Federal Trade Commission has reportedly taken aim at leftist advertising cartels that allegedly coordinated a boycott to starve conservative media outlets and squash free speech online.
According to several reports, the FTC launched investigations into approximately a dozen media and advertising groups for potentially violating antitrust laws.
'These so-called "ratings outfits" are the left's latest attempt to silence conservatives.'
The agency's new chairman, Andrew Ferguson, previously expressed concerns about advertisers coordinating to ban certain ideas.
During an April antitrust conference, he said, "I am deeply concerned ... if advertisers either get in a room together and say, 'We're not going to do advertising next to this idea,' or they say, 'We're going to agree that this third party decides which ideas get advertisement and which don't.'"
"Drying up the advertising will dry up the idea. So the risk of an advertiser boycott is a pretty serious risk to the free exchange of ideas," he declared.
RELATED: 'Go f*** yourself!' Elon Musk rips into Disney and other advertisers dropping from X platform
Ferguson's concerns stem from an ongoing dispute between Media Matters and Elon Musk's X.
In 2023, X sued Media Matters for defamation, claiming the site released a report that misrepresented the user experience to push advertisers to boycott the social media platform. The report warned advertisers that their content would appear next to white supremacist hashtags, causing many to pull their ads from X.
The FTC's investigation, as reported by the New York Times, seeks to determine whether the media and advertising groups, including Media Matters and Ad Fontes Media, coordinated to prompt an advertiser boycott.
Alliance Defending Freedom legal counsel Logan Spena told Blaze News, "Antitrust laws are important tools for countering coordinated censorship. Individual businesses can decide what to say or what not to say — the First Amendment protects them too. But it does not protect coordinated conduct in restraint of trade, including trade that involves speech."
"As the Supreme Court said back in 1945, 'Freedom to publish is guaranteed by the Constitution, but freedom to combine to keep others from publishing is not,'" Spena continued. "We hope the FTC will ensure that antitrust laws are vigorously enforced to the fullest extent consistent with the Constitution."
Dan Schneider, the vice president of the Media Research Center's Free Speech America, told Blaze News that he is hopeful Ferguson's appointment will lead to positive change.
"These so-called 'ratings outfits' are the left's latest attempt to silence conservatives," Schneider stated. "They collude with and conspire against advertisers, media outlets, and advertising firms to eliminate conservative media. It's not just wrong and un-American; it is illegal. Fortunately, we finally have an FTC chairman who believes in the rule of law and is prepared to stop colluders."
The FTC declined a request for comment from the NYT.
Adweek confirmed the Times' reporting, stating that the FTC sent the groups Civil Investigative Demand letters requiring them to turn over documents and respond to inquiries.
Ad Fontes Media CEO Vanessa Otero told the outlet, "They're requesting pretty much anything pertinent to our business since we started."
She claimed the FTC's demands were "excessive" and "overzealous."
"Businesses have rights to not advertise next to stuff they find crappy," Otero continued. "And no one is colluding with anybody about this."
Otero stated that Ad Fontes Media will comply with the agency's requests.
Media Matters confirmed to Adweek that it is currently under investigation.
Media Matters President Angelo Carusone stated, "The Trump administration has been defined by naming right-wing media figures to key posts and abusing the power of the federal government to bully political opponents and silence critics."
"It's clear that's exactly what's happening here, given Media Matters' history of holding those same figures to account. These threats won't work; we remain steadfast to our mission," Carusone added.
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Who can forget their first summer camp?
The buzz of anticipation among friends as the bus arrives at the campgrounds, the spooky stories around a campfire with s’mores, the corny songs and accompanying hand motions. It’s the quintessential childhood experience etched into our personal stories forever.
When the law ignores truth, kids pay the price.
For some children, summer camp can be a nerve-racking experience — leaving mom and dad for the first time, sharing a communal space with strangers, roughing it without the usual comforts of home. Part of growing up involves being pushed outside your comfort zone, but young boys and girls should never be subjected to situations that compromise their safety and dignity.
Yet, a new Colorado policy does just that, putting a controversial political agenda ahead of kids.
The Colorado Department of Early Childhood recently updated its regulations for licensed resident summer camps to force camps to allow children to access bathing, dressing, and sleeping facilities of the opposite sex, meaning if a young boy says he’s a girl, camps are forced to place him with girls (and vice versa).
Camp IdRaHaJe in Bailey has served children since 1948.
A Christian summer camp, it derives its name from the classic hymn “I’d Rather Have Jesus” and exists to present the truth of the gospel to the thousands of kids who attend every summer. Camp IdRaHaJe serves children of all beliefs and all backgrounds, but each family knows that the camp houses children only according to their biological sex.
When the camp learned about Colorado’s new policy, it applied for an exemption multiple times — but it was denied each time.
With summer upon us, the camp is in an impossible situation between adhering to its religious beliefs and compromising the safety and privacy of the approximately 2,600 kids who will attend over the summer.
Colorado’s position on this matter is untenable.
Each passing day reveals more and more truths about gender identity ideology, and the evidence continues to point out what we knew all along: Biological sex matters.
Medical experts around the world are taking a strong stance against rushing kids through processes that negatively alter their bodies and turn them into lifelong medical patients. Individuals who have gone through this process voice their regret and their anger that adults who should have known better are recklessly pumping them with cross-sex hormones and removing otherwise healthy body parts.
But Colorado insists on pushing this disproven, dangerous trend.
The state has laws that prevent licensed counselors from speaking with children about underlying issues that could cause gender dysphoria, a condition that is often resolved as children are allowed to develop naturally through puberty (rather, the state forces counselors to promote its extreme ideology). The state also forces kids to share intimate spaces with members of the opposite sex on overnight school trips, often without parents’ knowledge.
On top of all of this, the state refuses to respect dissenting beliefs. Camp IdRaHaJe holds the commonsense and religious belief that we are created male and female, and nothing can change who we are. Colorado’s policy allows individualized exceptions, but it turned down the camp’s requests for a religious exemption to the policy.
Before this policy was enacted, Camp IdRaHaJe met all the department’s requirements to hold a resident camp license — a license the camp has held since 1995.
The department issuing the licenses annually inspects camps, and any reported violation of a regulation could shut the camp down. Since the camp cannot allow children to access spaces of the opposite sex in good conscience, it retained the services of Alliance Defending Freedom (where I serve as legal counsel) to sue the state so that it can retain its license and safe policies that respect human dignity.
Colorado cannot force a Christian summer camp to adopt its extreme policies on gender and sexuality. When the law ignores truth, kids pay the price.
Camp IdRaHaJe has every right to believe that boys are boys and girls are girls. The sooner we get back to that reality, the better our kids are for it.
Beyond the open grooming, the state guidance effectively barred adoptive parents from serious religious adherence by disallowing religious activity that is 'openly hostile or unsupportive' of children who claim to be LGBT.
According to ADF's viewpoint diversity index, 54 percent of tech and finance companies prohibit religious nonprofits from receiving benefits.
Elston said they were taken by van to a police station, stripped down to their underwear, and searched before being put in jail cells.
Despite the recent corporate retreats from leftist propaganda, companies such as Airbnb still succumb to ideologist narratives and pressure.
'I remain committed to fighting for free speech, not only for my own sake but for all my fellow citizens.'
The $500 billion corporation that was 'instrumental in the formation' of the GARM censorship machine has apparently reversed course.
'Taxpayer dollars should never be used to fund facilities that profit off abortion and distribute dangerous gender-transition drugs to minors,' Bursch said.
Chiles v. Salazar could prove a landmark Supreme Court ruling that prevents the government from forcing counselors to endorse gender ideology.
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