House Republicans launch investigation into news rating group NewsGuard
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Rep. James Comer in Washington, D.C., earlier this month. Photo: Matt McClain/The Washington Post via Getty Images
House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) launched an investigation into misinformation tracking company NewsGuard on Thursday, citing concerns about "protected First Amendment speech" and "censorship campaigns."
The big picture: NewsGuard is a web extension that uses trained journalists to monitor and rate news and information sites' trustworthiness and it has highlighted issues with both conservative- and progressive-leaning websites.
- Sites are assessed for basic practices of credibility and transparency, rating publishers with a score of 0-100 for each of the nine criterion, per a statement on NewsGuard's website.
Driving the news: "Questions now surround the influence of NewsGuard's business relationships and other influences on its ratings process," Comer said in a statement announcing the probe on Thursday.
- Comer wrote to NewsGuard's co-CEOs and co-editors-in-chief, Steven Brill and Gordon Crovitz, on Thursday seeking documents as part of its investigation into whether the company's actions have "in any way" been "sponsored by a federal, state, local, or foreign government."
- These include "NewsGuard's business relationships with government entities, its adherence to its own policies intended to guard against appearances of bias" and "how it tries to avoid and manage potential conflicts of interest arising from its investors and other influences," per the letter to the veteran news executives.
- "A primary concern for the Committee is the Department of Defense contract NewsGuard was awarded in 2021, which raises questions about the involvement of federal agencies in potential censorship campaigns," Comer wrote."
What they're saying: Crovitz said in a statement to media the company looked forward "to clarifying the misunderstanding by the committee" about its work for the Defense Department.
- "Our work for the Pentagon has been solely related to hostile disinformation efforts by Russian, Chinese and Iranian government-linked operations targeting Americans and our allies," added the former Wall Street Journal publisher.
- "We also look forward to explaining that NewsGuard is the only apolitical service rating news sources — the others are either digital platforms with their secret ratings or left-wing partisan advocacy groups."
- Crovitz noted that under NewsGuard's "apolitical rating system, many conservative outlets outscore similar left-leaning brands: The Daily Caller outscores The Daily Beast, the Daily Wire outscores the Daily Kos, Fox News outscores MSNBC and The Wall Street Journal outscores the New York Times."
- Representatives for NewsGuard did not immediately respond to Axios' request for comment on Thursday evening.
Flashback: How NewsGuard launched
